Dear Friends:
    We have learned from our sisters in Norway and  South Africa and other 
countries that there are breastfeeding problems  everywhere. We  know that the 
fear of insufficient milk is a universal  phenomenon; every culture has its 
rituals, prayers, and special foods to help a  mother through the early 
postpartum.
    However, when birth became industrialized and  medicalized, when mothers 
and babies were routinely separated in hospitals,  breastfeeding problems have 
increased enormously. 
    Birth and breastfeeding are always a challenge,  albeit a necessary one, 
for humans. Some stress promotes health by making all  the systems within work.
    As an aside, Dr. Michel Odent has given an  interesting definition of 
health  "being a system which allows us to  struggle on a minute-by-minute basis 
and to adapt constantly to the  environment", and says, " Health cannot  be 
really understood outside the  context of the struggle for life." (From his book 
"Primal Health".)
    There is no reason or evidence to suppport  making birth or breastfeeding 
more difficult, as seen the abuse  of technology so rampant in the USA today. 
To illustrate, we know from our  experience, and from research, that cesarean 
section is a barrier to the  establishment of lactation and of breastfeeding; 
yet the national cesarean  section rate in the US is nearly 1 woman out of 3. 
For some reason, this  statistic is not taken seriously, just as 
breastfeeding on a national level is  not taken seriously. 
    While there will be women who will persevere  despite all obstacles (as 
posted about the lady laboring in the parking lot to  achieve her goal of a 
vaginal birth of a footling breech #6 baby), there are far  more women who will 
succumb to cultural pressure. And who can blame them? I am  as vulnerable as 
they, despite my grey hairs and clinical experience and being  able to quote 
from research. 
    When a neonatologist can say that human milk is  insufficient in front of 
NICU staff nurses, and I have to bite my tongue out of  fear of having the 
lactation program shunned, the pressure of the 'norm'  outweighs research, 
respect for normal process and common sense.
    warmly,
    
 
Nikki Lee RN, MS, Mother of 2, IBCLC, CCE
Maternal-Child Adjunct  Faculty Union Institute and University
Film Reviews Editor, Journal of Human  Lactation
www.breastfeedingalwaysbest.com

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