I've been following the debate about the ILCA Avent and Playtex booths, which has sort of broken off into a general discussion about equipment and breastfeeding aids. I usually just lurk on these boards but feel compelled to throw in an opinion (or two). Our profession is built around debunking the notion that breastfeeding is strictly natural and reinforcing the notion that it is a learned behavior for both mother and baby. We offer assessment skills to help tease out which areas need strengthening and fine-tuning (better latch, low supply, etc.) We (I hope) do not merely suggest that climbing into bed with the baby and nursing around the clock will solve all problems. It seems paradoxical to me to suggest, then, that "equipment" and breastfeeding aids have subtly undermined breastfeeding. Are we forgetting that for years and years, before these products were available, babies were fed by spoon, by soaked rag, by other breasts, and sometimes, alas, not fed enough at all? In a world where I could be in big trouble for suggesting that someone finish a feed by calling their lactating sister into the room, you better believe I'm grateful for the supplemental nursing system, or the double electric pump. I see equipment as an advancement, an area in which technology has NOT gone awry, and I find it unrealistic and a little too romanticized to think that, for example, hand expression is always best simply because it involves a warm, fleshy, nurturing hand and does not need to be plugged in. Or that the mere existence of equipment chips away at a woman's confidence. Women do focus on pumping, but to me that is a separate issue, which involves leftover notions from the bottle-feeding era ("I want someone else to be able to feed the baby") and a realistic attempt to adjust to the world we (all) live in, which emphasizes independence and makes baby-toting just plain awkward most of the time. Just some thoughts... Heather Kelly, MA, I hope IBCLC *********************************************** 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