The Tale of the Bad Bottle-Feeding Mama

~by Emi

(Pre post note, I'm about to pour my heart out. This is difficult for me at the best of times with people I know well. For me to do it for strangers is pretty much unheard of. So be kind. Be gentle. Bear with me. Emi, x)

To celebrate Global Breastfeeding Week, I felt like I should share my somewhat different breastfeeding story...

Here goes...

There was a time, pre having my own children, when I thought I knew how to be a good mother. It was in my bones. I truly felt like my calling in life was Be A Mother. So strong, was this calling, that I actually ended up working as a nanny for a few families before I had my own children.

Up until this point, I had been adamant that I would breast-feed. I mean, it was best for the baby, full of goodness and a special way to bond with your child, right?

I am all for breast-feeding, truly I am. But it is touted to us not only as this natural, beautiful way of nurturing your child (true) but also as this natural, beautiful way of nurturing your child that is easy and you *should* be able to do and if you can't, you're a failure. (False).

Whilst the breastfeeding journey with my daughter Pixie has been fraught with five bouts of mastitis, it is still going strong at 11 months. I am very proud of this fact, and myself, but it's not this journey I want to share with you.

The one I want to share is my journey with my son, Ru.

This is Ru.

He is smart, so smart. He is funny, and joyful, and emotional, and a pain-in-the-ass, and frustrating, and amazing, and sweet, and kind, and I Love Him.

Guess what?

Bottle fed.

I am not about to defend a mother's right to choose to bottle over breast. Yes, you have that right and no one should judge you for it. What I am going to broach is the massive amount of guilt you as a mother feel if, for whatever reason, you can't breastfeed.

I breastfed Ru for nearly three months. It was awful. No one told me that it can take up 6 arduous weeks to establish a breast-feeding routine. No one told me I would be reduced to being a dairy cow. No one told me that I would be feeding 10-12 times in 24 hours. All I was told was 'This is best. You should know how to do it.'

I would spend hours every day, EVERY day, crying, feeling like a failure. Ru would take forever to latch on and then when he did, he would feed for hours at a time, only to cry when he came off, awful cries that hurt my new-Mama heart as I somehow *knew* he was telling me he was hungry. He would be in tears, I would be in tears, Steve would be in tears watching this struggle, feeling useless that he couldn't fix it.

And then, to top it all off... I got mastitis. The Mother of All Mastitis. Having had mastitis a lot with Pixie, I can safely tell you that nothing was as painful as that first time.

I spoke to 2 different health visitors, both of whom were effectively useless, giving pointless nuggets of 'wisdom', 'You'll get it eventually.' and 'Just keep going.'

I began to loathe feeding time. I loved my son undeniably, but I HATED feeding him. I would hear his little 'I'm-getting-kinda-hungry' noises and I would start to get tense, every muscle in my body tight and uncomfortable. I would have a sinking feeling in my stomach, and get awful headaches. And Ru, poor Ru. Children are so receptive to the energies of others. He would be sat in my lap, attempting to feed, unhappy because for whatever reason, I couldn't breastfeed him.

Long story short, I battled for as long as I could, but the mastitis was the beginning of the end. I couldn't share how difficult it was with anyone, after all, breastfeeding was this natural, easy, amazing thing that I as a mother should just be able to Do. I felt like the world's worst mother. I felt resentful that my precious first weeks with my precious first child were being tainted because I couldn't breastfeed.

And then Ru started biting. *sigh*

It got to the point where Ru didn't even really want to be held by me, so great were the waves of unhappiness and resentment seeping out of me.



I was gently told by a doctor, after telling him the whole story, mastitis, cracked, bleeding nipples and all, that there was no shame in bottle-feeding. Maybe, I hear you say, he should have told me about La Leche League, put me in contact with someone who knew what they were doing. Well, maybe.

Or maybe he was gently releasing me from the pressure I had put myself under. Maybe he could see that I didn't want to breastfeed any more, that my heart was no longer in it. I couldn't do it any longer.

I remember him telling me the one most important thing though.

'You tried your best'

And I did.

And with that realisation, we bought formula and Ru became a bottle-fed baby.

He transformed from that very first feed. He became an easy-going, relaxed, happy baby, the one he was supposed to be.

I battled and tried and struggled for as long as I could. But I had to stop when my failure began affecting, tainting, my relationship with my child.

I felt guilty though. I NEVER got over it. It was there in the back of my mind that I had failed. I was a terrible mother. I was a failure as a woman.

I was judged by other mothers in public, how could I bottle feed when I KNEW breastfeeding was better for my baby?! How could I possibly BOND with him when using a bottle?! I would silently seethe 'How DARE you judge me?! You don't know me and you certainly have NO idea what I've been through!'I hated that part.

I felt like I was being judged. Ellie Lee got it right when writing an opinion piece for the BBC, "Information about breastfeeding is replete with truly beautiful imagery of mothers and their babies, indicating love and communication. But that about bottle-feeding only shows technicalities; it is all images about hygiene, showing bottles, bleach and bottle brushes, but no mothers feeding their babies with love in their eyes."

Why should I be judged as loving less because his milk came from a bottle and not breast?

But Ru and I, we bonded. I would spend HOURS reading to him, cuddled him endlessly, as well as making feeding times something special, and finally, feeding time was something Steve could be a part of too.

Months passed and Pixie arrived. Arrived with a joyful smile and blessedly easy breastfeeding. Whilst I was so happy about this, I couldn't help but feel guilty that Ru hadn't had this experience.

I later discovered, after being lent a breastfeeding textbook from a friend doing her bf-ing peer supporter training, that Ru had had an undiagnosed tongue-tie.

It was a lightbulb moment for me. A little over 2 years of gut-wrenching guilt just vanished. I hadn't been a crappy mother. There had been A Reason. A tongue-tie. Something so little had meant that he couldn't latch on properly, couldn't feed effectively, starting the downward spiral we had been on.

I was most emphatically NOT a Crappy Mother.

There is a strong case here for midwives and health visitors to be better trained in supporting breastfeeding in the early weeks, and recognising tongue-ties, and for them to share support networks like La Leche League and our local support group, Treasure Chest. But that is for a different post.

So what do I want you to take away from this?

1. Breastfeeding is hard.

2. Failing at breastfeeding is even harder.


If, for whatever reason, you can't breastfeed, I hate to say it, but you ARE going to feel guilty. I can't stop that. It's as inevitable as the tide coming in. What I *can* do, is offer you a cup of tea and a cookie whilst my BOTTLE-FED son, my intelligent, creative, bright, shining light of a child plays in front of you... maybe reassuring you that actually, you can have both a 'normal' child, and a strong relationship with that child if you have to bottle-feed.

I would encourage all new mothers to try every means at their disposal to establish a successful breastfeeding relationship. But sometimes, sometimes, it doesn't happen and bottles are the only way.

There is a horrible pressure on women to breastfeed, a horrible pressure that pushes that breast is best, and that it is easy, and you are a shitty mother if you can't, and that you are less of a woman.

But that's ok. I take your hand and tell you, It Is Ok. You Are Not A Failure. You Are Not Less Of A Woman, Nor A Crappy Mother.

Ru doesn't resent me or make me feel guilty that I didn't have a successful breastfeeding journey with him.

Your child won't do it to you.

I am pro-breastfeeding. I am not anti or pro-bottle-feeding. I am, however, VERY pro-Mamas-not-being-judged-for-their-feeding-choices.

You *CAN* have a close, strong bond with your child if you end up being unable to breastfeed.

My son is proof of that.

Emi, x

"You don't raise heroes, you raise sons.
And if you treat them like sons, they'll turn out to be heroes,
even if it's just in your own eyes."

~Walter M. Schirra, Sr.

This Week

In celebration of Global Breastfeeding Week, a few of our favourite nursing pictures...

'Jeez, can't a girl have some milk in peace?'

Ru's first feed...

Blissed out milky sleep. Heaven.

Beautiful Pixie girl...

"A baby nursing at a mother's breast... is an undeniable affirmation of our rootedness in nature."

~ David Suzuki

Sustaining a Breastfeeding Relationship

~by Kendal

‘Ideally, the breastfeeding relationship will continue until the baby outgrows the need.’ La Leche League

I have been breastfeeding Ava for nearly two years. Two years. In all that time, I have never once had to use the pithy speeches I’ve practised in my head to rude passersby who complain about me nursing my child in public. In fact, on the whole, my general feeling is that people are quite supportive and, at worst, don’t really care one way or another.

The longer I breastfeed though, the more people seem curious about my decision to carry on nursing a toddler. After all, if the average age of weaning a baby from breastmilk (for those who breastfed at all) is six weeks old, I am well and truly beyond the norm.

In my speech, I tell people how it is, in fact, biologically normal for a child to feed for several years. That none of us would be here if our ancestral mothers hadn’t done just that, protecting their offspring from innumerable diseases by their amazing immunising breast milk. I also like to add that the longer a mother breastfeeds, the more her risk of getting breast, ovarian and uterine cancer decreases. It’s a pretty well informed speech.

But all too often I get caught up with the FACTS about breastfeeding, because they are so incredible, so mind-blowing and so often unknown. I forget, sometimes, to talk about the other side of breastfeeding; the quiet, intimate, spectacular connection that it forges between you and your Little. The soft and warm and loving emotions that it produces (of course, biologically necessary too) that are so wonderful and so overlooked.

When I started nursing Ava, I was fairly well informed of these FACTS. I’d read enough to be able to navigate, somewhat successfully, all the misinformation out there about breastfeeding. But I was not prepared for the full brunt of what is involved in breastfeeding your newborn. I was overwhelmed anyway, tired beyond tired, and clambering to get through those initial days (we call them the ‘red’ days here). Feeling steadily more mad, more emotional and terrified, it is a strange thing to suddenly be so very needed by another human being.

To know that you bear the sole responsibility of not only caring and loving for your child, but also feeding and nourishing her. Athough I was grateful for the support I did have, I still felt fairly lacking in that area, having no one around me who was able to guide me by their own experiences in nursing, to offer advice and to simply encourage me that it would, definitely, get easier. Armed with a stack of books and google, I read as much as I could about breastfeeding during those lengthy, seemingly endless night feeds.

There were several times, particularly in the first six weeks, where I seriously considered adding in formula, mainly because Ava fed more than any other baby I had ever (or have since met). It was usual for her to feed for two or three hours in a row, breaking for fifteen minutes here and there and then returning. I was flumaxed, and worried that maybe there was something wrong with my milk supply.

Speaking to three heatlth visitors, one midwife and one doctor (who told me in no uncertain terms the biggest fallacy I’ve heard yet – that breastfeeding mothers usually find their milk dries up at 4 months!) I decided that no one, medical degree or not, really knew what they were talking about unless they had nursed a child themselves.

It wasn’t until I finally spoke to a La Leche League breastfeeding counsellor that I felt any sort of comfort whatsoever. Yes, it was perhaps more unusual for a baby to feed so much, but no, it wasn’t abnormal at all. In fact, in many countries where women carry their babies in slings all day long, their babies are more or less constantly attached to their nipples. As for those never-ending nighttime feeds - those were normal. I learned that the hormones that stimulate milk production are highest at night, therefore your baby is deliberately feeding more during this time as a signal to your body to keep on making the good stuff. 

Thankfully, we’d done enough research about bedsharing within those initial two weeks to feel satisfied that this was, for us, the best way to enable Ava to feed as much as she wanted, without me simultaneously going (pardon the expression) batshit crazy from lack of shut-eye.

It was only at about eight weeks in that we began to see it was getting a little easier, after all. We started to feel as if we had perhaps come to some sort of acceptance and understanding of what a breastfeeding relationship entails. Near constant access to breasts for Ava, a huge increase in my appetite and feeling a little mentally, emotionally and physically drained all the time. And let's not forget generally feeling a bit like a bloated dairy cow.

Beautiful? Maybe not in the Time magazine cover way, but spectacular, yes. Somewhere in amongst those red days, there were moments, usually in the dead of night when I was sitting half naked in a rocker, holding a sizeable nursing newborn whilst I slipped in and out of sleep, where I felt a clarity – an awareness that we had something really special going on. We needed each other. That symbiotic, miraculous in utero relationship was not over, it had merely transformed into another, equally interdependent relationship on the outside.

And the funny thing is, those first few weeks, as much as they were one long, blurry, breastfeeding bonanza, really did pass quickly. And it did get so much easier. So. Much. Easier. Feeds got somewhat shorter. Sleeping got more consistent and somewhat longer. (Not that it mattered, bedsharing is a truly blissful and loved up way to sleep and nurse at the same time. Multitasking at its best.)

My goal to nurse Ava for at least six months grew to one year, then from one to two years and now, on the brink of turning two, I still feel like it may be another year or so before we stop. Because she still needs it in some very essential ways, and I am still happy to give that to her.

That's not to say that extended, or 'sustained breastfeeding' as I prefer (more accurate, surely) does not have its own set of challenges. Even though Ava doesn't need it in the way she did at the beginning, I still can't be away from her for too long because I know she would miss both me and my breasts. That means no wild or crazy nights out, no staying anywhere overnight. And on days when I am feeling particularly 'touched out', I am all too eager for my husband to get back from work so I can take a very real leave of absence where I can sob quietly into a bag of crisps or scream into a pillow for half an hour. 

And let’s not pull any punches. This is a walking, talking, joking child I am nursing, in no way still a baby. This is a child who will squeel ‘boobies!’ whenever she sees me getting changed or having a shower. A child who tells me ‘away’ when she is done with one breast and wants the other. A child who calls her favourite breast (the right, by the way) ‘big milk’, because that’s the one she likes to stay on for a while.

I know some people are a little freaked out by the thought of nursing a child so competent and so un-baby like. There’s the idea that once a child can ask for milk, it’s too old to be getting it. Well, Ava was signing for milk from 6 months old so that makes no sense, and as a newborn, she had very specific cries to ask for milk.

It is a different thing entirely – feeding a little person who can position themselves just so on your lap and who would gladly get your ‘boobies out’ themselves if they could. But, if anything, I prefer it now, because it is such a sweet, funny and lovely thing, for both of us. It is such a source of comfort, and just as breasts are like magic wands to little babies, so are they the perfect antidote to a great deal of things now – the frustrations and upsets of a near-two year old.

There are times now when Ava wakes up angry. When the world, so huge and interesting and beguiling, clearly just gets on top of her. On days like these, she nurses a little more than usual, and it seems to calm her right down. Most of the time, she is too busy to nurse much during the day, and only nurses once or twice during the night. I no longer have to nurse her to sleep at night, even though I usually do. And although she no longer nurses for food, on days when she is being picky it is a great comfort to remember that at this stage, breastmilk can still provide nearly half of a two year old’s protein requirements, amongst many other things.

In the beginning, breastfeeding was a choice we made, (in those early, challenging weeks, it was a choice we had to make every day), but now it is not simply something that I do; it is part of who I am, part of who we are as a family. Despite societal pressures to wean much earlier, I have no desire whatsoever to wean Ava at the moment, and I know in my heart that doing so would devastate her to some degree.

Although some may say that treating breastfeeding as a panacea is giving it too much emphasis, we believed from the beginning, as we still do, with nearly two years of proof under our belts, that it really is conducive to incredibly good health in a child, and that it is, and more to the point, should be, the ultimate comfort for your developing Little. As mothers, we were given this tremendous, mind-blowing gift for a reason. Why not use it?

As a presently non-vaccing family, I rely on the immunological benefits of breastfeeding completely. But ultimately, I can think of no other way to explain why nursing is still such an important part of our relationship with Ava, both mine and my husband’s, than to simply say that it gives us all such a feeling of love. Elemental, connected, adoring love.

The closeness of my relationship with my daughter is incredible, and I believe that breastfeeding has been a huge part in that. When she looks up at me with those huge, just-been-fed eyes, and a milky contentment settles on her face, I feel immensely happy and grateful that I can still provide such an easy and primal source of comfort for her. I am ready for that to continue for another year or more, through another pregnancy, perhaps, until both of us are ready for it to stop. And, as so much of my parenting experience thus far has proven, I trust that she will know best when that time is.

Related articles

-       Dr. Sears on the benefits of 'Extended Breastfeeding' and how to handle criticisms.

-       La Leche Leauge Articles on 'Extended Breastfeeding'

-       The WHO on Breastfeeding
-    Fact Sheet on the Benefits of Extended Breastfeeding