Playing the baby's advocate here, I have struggled with the tension 
which appears to exist between meeting the mother where she is, to 
show her the respect which she deserves, which Kathy has expressed so 
well, and the need to speak for the baby.   I agree with all that she 
has said.  But at the same time, the purpose of breastfeeding, or of 
bottle-feeding, is to feed the end-user, the baby.  And what the baby 
is fed has life-long health consequences.  We have to work with the 
mother because she is the one with the power in the relationship to 
make the choice about what the baby will be fed, and to carry it 
out.  What bothers me is how much respect or advocacy we owe to the 
baby?    In the post below, the baby is not mentioned, even once. Is 
our responsibility only to the mother? I'm wondering how we would 
re-write this with the baby as the prime focus, rather than the mother?

Pamela Morrison IBCLC

"It is respect to have mom vocalize what she wants and then aim your
counseling or help at meeting her goal. It is not respect to take a mom
like this and try to "make" her nurse more, or whatever, so that she
meets our criteria. Plus if your counseling is not aimed at her goals,
it won't work!

I guess this bugs me so much because I get the referrals to some of
these moms who are mostly formula feeding but staff feels mom needs BF
help, and guess what? The moms do not return my phone calls for help, or
if they do answer the phone they do not want an appointment with me, but
say they have been helped enough and feel good about what they are doing
feeding wise. This is not to say we should not encourage mothers or talk
about the benefits but we have to take each situation individually and
tailor our help to what the mother wants or needs."

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