I am rewriting this because it disappeared into the ether when I sent it the 
first time, so I apologize if somehow I end up saying the same thing twice.

In the US we don't get to see women breastfeeding very much. It is done in 
private so our images of loving and nurturing an infant are centered around 
bottlefeeding. We can try to describe the joy of breastfeeding for these 
women, but it is a lot like trying to describe sex, very difficult to capture in 
words.

It is somehow much easier to put the negative into words so their attitude 
toward breastfeeding is often patterned by the statements of friends who 
failed to make it through the struggles of the first week or two, so women will 
often say to me "I would like to try breastfeeding" as if it were a duty to be 
borne, for the health of their child, but not something they long to do, like the 
nurturing they see with the bottle. I honestly think we can talk til we are blue 
in the face, about the joy of breastfeeding, but that seeing their peers 
engaging in breastfeeding would do more to change their behavior than 
anything we can say. It would say to them - hey this is lovely too, perhaps 
even lovelier than the bottle...

I keep thinking of when these hideous platform shoes became popular when I 
was a teenager and I couldn't imagine wearing them, but sure enough within 1 
month they looked totally cool to me, and I started longing for them and then 
eventually got a pair myself. And breastfeeding is hardwired to a certain 
extent, it should be much easier to shift attitudes, if we can just show these 
women what it is all about. We need to make it the image they associate with 
mothering and nurturing.

Kathy Lilleskov RN IBCLC

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