Hi All,
Well, I watched the show last night before I went to bed (remember, I taped
it?).  I was rather upset by a lot of the BF story, although some of the
other stories were pretty good...

Let's start with the opening scene and some quotes in the order of their
occurence:

-----------------------

"...Baby Friendly nonsense."  Male Dr.

"Forcing women to nurse - it's a little Qrwellian."  Female Dr.

""But we're not allowed to send them home with formula - that seems like
pretty heavy encouragement."  Same male Dr as first quote.

"Where's the contract for the dad to sign stating that he won't beat the
crap out of the kid?"  Other male Dr.

-----------------

Ok, this could be looked at as positive - they are talking about Baby
Friendly - or negative - ridiculing Baby Friendly as something too difficult
and not worthwhile.

I think it was both.  The one male (black) Dr who was in favor of Baby
Friendly, had lines to counter each negative statement (except the last),
but he was one against 3...not great odds, but let's face it, probably very
realistic in this day and age of corporate marketing and misinformation.


Let's go on.  The final scene in the prologue was of female Dr. Diane
sitting on a toilet pumping with a Lactina, she sure had lots of milk.

Why did she have to be sitting on the toilet, why in the bathroom at all?
This is a hospital with lots of other rooms where she could have gone.  THis
was distressing to me as it may lead women to believe that the only place
they can do their pumping is while sitting on a toilet.  Not good.

Next quotes:

<<Mother of dead baby:  "The Nursing director told me not to supplement."

A later quote that ties in with this:

<<Male Dr., "THe Lactation COnsultant explicitly told her not to
supplement....did not know about lack of weight gain...told the mother to
take the baby to the Dr. ...she made the appointment but never went in..."

So we have here, the mother's version then the LCs records showing that she
gave the appropriate information, but that the mother did not follow it.
Sadly, this was only touched on briefly, and so makes LCs and Nursing
directors look like fanatics, especially when the hosp they work at has a
Baby Friendly intent.  This is not good.

More quotes:

"...Baby Friendly Contract mom signed..."

"...hosptial put pressure on my client to BF..." (clients lawyer)

First of all, I hate misinformation, and this is some serious
misinformation.  This makes it sound as if women have to sign some Baby
Friendly contract stating that they will not use any ABM and will only BF.
This simply is not accurate, as we all know.  Also, I dislike the 2nd quote
of putting pressure on the mother to BF.  IF she wants to BF she will, if
she doesn't all the pressure in the world will not make her BF, there will
be some reason why she will fail and end up using ABM.


Some scenes:

Dr. Diane in the grocery store, baby is fussy, so she pulls out a bottle.
???  Why not pull out a sling pop the baby into it and BF the baby?  That
certainly would have been a more positive answer.  I know that Diane was
having serious doubts about herself as a mother, but they could have had
some stranger come along and suggest it, maybe even show her how...Maybe we
could look at this particular scene as being a positive by saying "See, the
bottle was not effective.  Had she put the baby to breast, she would have
solved a problem and felt better about herself in the process."

The scene where Diane came home to find the neighbor babysitting.  The
neighbor is happily bot feeding her infant...notice she is black?  I think
that says volumes and if I was black, I'd be pissed.  I am not black and I
am still offended.
Then Diane realizes that baby has a high temp, rushes her to the hosp and
they tell her immed it is roseola, as they are getting ready to do an IV.
Like roseola is a big deal.  All my kids have had it, and I never knew what
it was until the fever was gone and the rash showed up.  Now parents will be
thinking "Oh my God(sh), Roseol is some dangerous disease!"  Correct me if I
am wrong here, but isn't Roseola a MINOR thing?  My Peds never seemed
concerned with it.

The scene with the nursing mother refusing ankle surgery becasue it would
mean 3 days away from her baby.  OK, there was some good in this.  The male
Dr didn't seem to think it was any big deal to just wean immed., but Diane
suggested pump/dump instead.  However: why not " Well, she can pump and
dump, but let's take a look at what meds she will be on, see if they will be
OK with BF, and if not, find some that are, so that she can have the baby
brought to her (or better yet room in) for BF.  That way BF will be
uninterupted."

A good thing:  The Dr in favor of Baby Friendly was very consistent in his
beliefs.  His parenting advice to Diane towards the end (the ROseola scene)
was very practical and touching.  Also nice to see that at least one Male
Dr. was in favor of the Baby Friendly contract for the hospital.


The last scene:  (direct quote from the mother:)

Breastfeed, don't breastfeed, cloth diapers, black and white toys, organic
food.  God, what difference does it make?  The only thing you really have to
do is keep them alive - That's all.  And I couldn't do it.  I couldn't do it."


Speaks volumes doesn't it?  Obviously it means something to the mother, but
what is it saying to the rest of us?  She is feeling horribly guilty because
she couldn't keep her baby alive, and I can understand and appreciate that.
However, that line just made BF and anything else we do to better our
children's lives worthless.  If the only thing we have to do is keep them
alive, well, hell, we can do that using karo syrup and evaporated milk.
Been done before.  Let's not talk about the quality of life or the quality
of parenting.  Let's not talk about what she should have done (take baby to
Dr., follow LCs advice).  Let's just throw it all out the window, shall we?
Let's put the blame on the hosp and Baby Friendly and Lactation consultants.
Dr. Diane had a point about the mother being negligent - she was.  She did
not follow the medical advice given to her to take the baby to the Dr for
check-ups, (what about the one wk and 4 wk check ups???) and she listened to
what she was told ( don't supplement yet, but take baby to Dr) but followed
only what she heard (do not supplement).  The mother is to blame here, for
the most part.  This is not like the other stories we have heard when the
mothers have been actively searching out help and being turned away.  When a
mother takes her baby to the Dr and is told, "he is just a slow gainer" and
she keeps bugging them, about it and they still do nothing and the baby
dies, then the medical establishment is at fault (although I have to wonder
why the mom wouldn't give ABM on her own judgement if she knows her baby is
not gaining...) for letting down and not listening to the mother.

So, IMNSHO, this episode had some "OK" parts, but for the msot part it had
misinformation, blamed the wrong people (and BF) and wasn't as
pro-breastfeeding as they (the producers) would like to think it was.  I
guess showing a Dr sitting on the toilet pumping is supposed to be Pro-BF...
yeah, right.
The negative in this episode outweighed the positive, and the positive
needed some work.

The end...let's see what comes of this, shall we?  I fully expect to be
inundated with phone calls the next few days...I know a lot of us will.

Jay Simpson, CLE
Sacramento (State Capital), California, West Coast, USA
"No Miracles performed here, just a lot of love and hard work."