I know this is a touchy subject to jump in on, but I think that often mothers decide to mix breastfeeding and formula feeding because they still think the two things are pretty much equivalent. My understanding, though, is that once you move away from exclusive breastfeeding, the risks from adding formula mount up pretty quickly. It only takes a tiny amount of formula to increase the risk of allergies and diabetes, for example, and to decrease the iron absorption from breastmilk. I don't think mothers are aware of this. They see formula as the "norm" and that giving some breastmilk, even a little, gives the baby a few bonus benefits. And sure, some breastfeeding is better than none. But the risks of adding that formula are real. What would we say to a mother who said "I'm going to use a car seat for my baby sometimes, but I just can't commit to using it every time we go out in the car. It's such a pain to put the baby in and get the straps done up. So I thought I'd use the car seat sometimes, and just let the baby lie on a blanket the rest of the time." Or if she said "I just don't feel I can feed my baby formula all the time. It's a lot of trouble to mix it up. So I'm going to give one bottle of plain cow's milk a day, and feed formula the rest of the time, just to give myself a break." We all know there are mothers who do both those things. Hey, I've seen mothers give two-month-old babies root beer in a bottle. But we try really hard to discourage them! Teresa Pitman Guelph, Ontario *********************************************** 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