Barbara wrote: << I think we need to be careful that we present ourselves as a profession that is honest enough to speak straightforwardly to mothers about changing their behavior rather than sneaking up on them and clobbering them with judgements and condemnations. Feeding choice honestly may never have been closely examined before, and there may be hidden issues influencing their choices that we cannot know. >> I think there are ALWAYS hidden issues, some may not have much of an impact on choices and some will have major impact. A friend and colleague of mine who does holistic birth counseling said something many years ago that I always keep in mind - we must truly believe that each mother makes the best choices she can with the information she has. She has her baby's best interest at heart. For women who will buy those bottle-propping items, they buy them because they truly believe that using them causes no harm. There is nothing to be gained by putting a mother down, or her choices. We are charged with a nearly impossible task, to give mothers information about behaviors and patterns they rarely or never hear discussed as normal, which sometimes goes against every parenting model they have ever had, including their own parents and most of society, and which may even feel right to them, but they will be challenged by both their friends and their physicians. We to do this day in day out, swimming upstream in a river clogged with formula and its paraphernalia with only each other for support. I think most of us are exceedingly gentle with the moms we work with, meeting each one where they are even as we help the guide them somewhere they say they wish to go, and even though they sometimes find the journey is for whatever reason, too much for them. Lactnet is, yes a place where we can express our frustrations both with limiting terms and the world where we have to use them. By feeling free to work through things here, we are unburdened of their heavy weight when we go out to help the vulnerable new families who need us. It is a great gift to be able to come unshoulder ourselves in this manner. Lactnet is like an electronic form of both challenging and refreshing meditation, and I thank all of you who help make it what it is. It is somehow easier to deal with all the issues, both overt and hidden, when we have a place to come where we do not have to hide anything ourselves. Judy LeVan Fram, Brooklyn, NY *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html