Dear Lactnetters:
     *Part I.  There appears to be a *misconception* that, in the 1950s
and '60s, the most common teat (artificial nipple) designs in use were
long, straight ones.  This is actually contrary to what I observed
during this period, at least in Australia and - based on the advertising
in my mother's UK women's magazines - in Britain also.
    The teats commonly in use had a slightly narrower shaft with a more
bulbous end.  Some of the earlier ones of this period were more
cherry-shaped.  I can remember as a teenage girl in the late-1950s,
thinking that there was something wrong with my nipples because they
weren't cherry-shaped like the Maw's rubber teats of the day, which were
advertised as "natural".  [Though so-called "orthodontic" teats were
devised in the 1940s - long before the studies of Ardran (1958) and
Weber, Woolridge & Baum (1986) on what *really* happens in the baby's
mouth during breastfeeding - marketing of these teats in Australia came
much later.]

    *Part II:  I shall use personal ecperiences to illustrate and expand
on this topic.  When my first baby ws born, in Feb. 1965, the hospital
soon put artificial teats in her mouth (over my objections), as did the
after-care hospital where we were sent to "correct" the feeding problems
- caused, guess where!  Mercifully, my baby had experienced the breast
for two days and had the chance to imprint on it, before the needless
and ill-conceived routine interventions. The teats used, and supplied by
the hospitals, were narrower at the shaft than at the end.
    The very first straight teat I saw was when I asked the
maternal/child health nurses to recommend the *slowest* teat available,
as I hadn't given up on breastfeeding even though by then my daughter
was being given her total calculated daily requirements by bottle.  (I
realized even then that, when I traveled home to a remote area 5 1/2
weeks postpartum, the breast would seem more desirable if I made
bottle-feeding very slow and frustrating.)
    The slowest teat available, I was advised, was the Ansell #3, used
for prematures. When I saw it, I was surprised, as it was the very first
straight teat I had seem - it looked strange, in the context of the
times.  This teat hasn't been available for many years, and the company
is now a well-known condom manufacturer.
    It was the fact that it was *slow*, plus putting my baby to the
breast 2-hourly, which contributed to the speed with which I was able to
get her to feed better at the breast (instead of sleep) and successfully
relactated.  The shape of the teat was *irrelevant* during those 4 1/2
days.  Previously, in the maternity and after-care hospitals, my baby
had been kept in a nursery (or the matron's office if she dared cry
before the set 4 hours were up, which she did), and she screamed for
around 45 minutes before being brought to me for each feed.  She was
then exhausted, which is understandable, and promptly went to sleep when
put to breast (helped by the fact that the let-down was inhibited by the
big drama made of pre-feed weighing).  She was then taken away to the
nursery and fed EBM from other mothers, and later artificial milk, with
a fast teat.  By the time we were discharged to stay in the city with my
mother-in-law for a week or two, my daughter was conditioned to *sleep*
at the breast.  At least she would accept it, and stay there, though
doing nothing.  This is why the shape of the new teat was *irrelevant* -
she was used to having the *real thing* in her mouth.
    When I arrived home at the cattle station (ranch) where we were
living, my copy of The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding had come in the
mail, and I immediately started on relactation, using the WABF
guidelines.  I'd already known relactation was possible, thanks to early
contact by letter with LLL's Marian Tompson (bless her).  My baby got
breast first, 2-hourly, and a bottle only after every second feed, i.e.
4-hourly.  The flow from the Ansell #3 teat was so slow that this form
of feeding was obviously less rewarding to my tiny daughter - she really
had to work hard to get anything. No risk of taking too much!
    To finish the story, I was expressing after feeds to increase the
stimulation while my daughter was still not a vigorous sucker, and after
4 1/2 days the bottle feed consisted *totally* of my own expressed
breastmilk (EBM).  I saw that it was pointless to give bottle feeds when
I obviously had a full supply, and this was the last bottle.  From then
on it was breast only.  Okay, we had some ups and downs when I stopped
watching the clock and my baby forgot to demand often enough (she'd been
trained out of it by alleged "experts") and made only a tiny gain in
several weeks, but returning to the pre-demand, 2-hourly feeding
recommended by Marian Tompson for just such an eventuality quickly fixed
this.

    *Part III:  That, by the way, is how I got into relactation, and is
not the only time I have relactated (but that is another story - See: J
Trop Pediatr, Feb. 1993).  In 1966 I was asked to research relactation
for the fledgling Nursing Mothers' Association of Australia, and have
continued since then, first for NMAA and latterly independently.  I'm
still learning, because each mother-baby situation is individual, even
the same mother with different babies.

 Cheers,
   Virginia (back on Lactnet, temporarily, after the weekend NO MAIL)
   Virginia Thorley, OAM, IBCLC
      In summery Brisbane, Australia

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