dear Khalid and others,

having aided and abbetted this discussion of introducing bottles, i would
like to protest in my own behalf that i agree wholeheartedly with khalid's
position - there is no good reason for bottles ever. however, since i started
in this biz of offering people "advice" about bf, i have already done about
all the things i probably would have vowed to never do, if i were not such an
old cynic.

among those things, advising women to give up on bf, urging and begging a
woman to use formula (the adopted baby was getting a little breastmilk and
barley water. that's right, strained barley water, not even barley water
based formula, is this a rave i have missed in past lactnet episodes?),
giving out info on how to wean babies that i would personally consider too
young to wean - you name it. i like to think i have a little talent for
convincing women to do things I want them to do (nurse, etc.). but since the
population i deal with consists mostly of women who have a "problem"  (in
their opinion), i feel it is unreasonable to believe i can convert all of
them to true believers.

my ideal scenario about bottles would be: after the tragic death of the
nursing mother, i would ask, is there not another woman to nurse this child?
if the answer was negative, i might sadly shake my head and say, well,
perhaps, just this
 once. . . .

carol brussel
"build a better world through breast feeding"
(and i do differentiate between breastfeeding and breast milk in a bottle)