Hi,
I think a lot about the guilt thing.  I think there are multiple factors in
this issue. Under-lying emotional issues often drive life choices. Informed
people are not immune from being driven by these emotions. I feel strongly,
for instance, that the decision to use drugs and alcohol often results from
wounded and depressed people attempting to self-medicate.

 New mothers are vulnerable, and the choices they are confronted with are
influenced by all the other things going on in their lives.  The essential
decision of parenting is:  How much do I commit to the child?  It can be
very hard to commit at the deepest level while trying to assimilate the huge
role/responsibility of parenthood -- esp. if other difficulties are pulling
at you. How we behave when pregnant, how we give birth, and how we feed our
babies are the first in a long series of choices which have to be made --
ALL of which will be looked back on with either pride or regret.  OF COURSE
talking about the details are going to provoke emotional responses, some of
which will be resentful.

Maureen Minchion recently made a reference to IBCLC as a "free-standing"
credential. I fervently concur, and feel we are a hybrid which combines
elements of other professions in a new, woman-empowering way. We have to be
independent of the kind of institutional thinking which often subverts other
empowerment movements (witness the natural childbirth movement.)  IBCLC
background training  needs to emphasize a strong counseling componant which
compliments and enhances strong clinical breastfeeding skills.

 If RNs are being expected to do the initial hospital contacts for
breastfeeding, then their training needs to include counseling so that they
are able to help women explore these huge decisions sensitively.  Community
based LCs also need this training.   While there may be inescapable guilt
which results from choices made in parenting, it may also be true that some
of the resentment breastfeeding proponants pick up on results from lack of
skill in the way we talk to new mothers. I continually speak with new
mothers who are angry at the way their babies are still being shoved into
their breasts in the hospital by nurses who ignore their distress signals.
I am also often confronted with women angry over the way a lay-counselor has
made them feel while discussing returning to work. Learning how to talk with
people is an art and a skill.  We have to make sure we are emphasizing this
skill.

Barbara

I strongly promote the idea that IBCLC certification include specific
counseling training.