When I get discouraged and frustrated about those in "the system" who make
breastfeeding difficult, I remind myself of how far we've come. My oldest
child is 21 years old. When he was born, he was the only breastfed baby in
the hospital nursery (a fairly small town, but still...). The nurse tried to
give me a shot right after his birth to dry up my milk - it was part of the
routine - and when I stopped her and said I was breastfeeding she said "Oh,
you don't want to do THAT."
I was told to nurse for one minute on each side every four hours and to wash
my nipples with some horrible stuff before and after each feeding. On the
second day I could increase it to two minutes every four hours.

Fortunately, I was a "farm girl" who had noticed that the horses and cows
never watched the clock or washed their nipples so I ignored everything I
was told and nursed my son for the next 2 and 1/2 years.

But look how far we've come. Yes, we're still a long way from a culture that
is truly supportive of breastfeeding, but we've made progress, and it's been
thanks to those dedicated people who helped one mother at a time, who shared
the research, who kept working away at it. And we'll get there.

Teresa Pitman