Hello, my name is Melissa, and I chose not to breastfeed.
I truly do think we, and there are very few of us, and we are marked with a scarlet "F" (FORMULA FED), need our own support group. We know the benefits of breastfeeding, we are inundated with statistics, health benefits, and even bribes ("You will burn 600 + calories a day!"), but we have still chosen, for whatever reason, to formula feed our children.
What kind of woman, what kind of mother, chooses to bottle feed when she could breast feed her child? What kind of monster does such a thing?
Nevermind that some mothers spend weekends partying it up and leaving children with nannies or grandparents, never mind that some mothers take their children with them on illegal drug dealing vacations, never mind that some mothers leave their babies and young children in the car when they go places, even locking them in the car with the keys, but I am a terrible mother because I don't breastfeed.
Maybe women with DD cup-sized breasts just don't want to add an extra ten pounds to their chests for six months; maybe we aren't up for having to keep our arms akimbo all day because we can't lay them flat at our sides. It seems to me, and this is just my experience, that the biggest breastfeeding campaigners are also members of the "itty bitty...." fill in the rest.
Hello Melissa! I don't know if you remember me, but I am Annie (Papke) Nava, or Margo's little sister! I chose to bottle feed my baby and I don't regret it one bit! In fact he is text book healthy child, he is not obese, he has only gotten sick once. I went through the stress of other people judging me for not breastfeeding, and it was horrible. Really in the end it's not their business. He is your child and you are doing what you think is right for him! Keep on Keeping on!!!!
ReplyDeleteAnnie! I am so glad you commented on this! I went through the same thing. It was so hard to breastfeed so we substituted a lot. I remember people looking at us like we were giving Emma poison if we broke out with a bottle. But then again, thats what they do when they see someone break out with a boob. HA!
ReplyDeleteHello! I found you on Therese's facebook page. This is a funny post; I'd never thought about the fact that it might be much easier to breastfeed for us ladies who have small ... ladies. Huh.
ReplyDeleteLove to you both.
so many times people are defensive when they don't breastfeed or when they do. Maybe it has to do with breasts as a taboo subject. Amazingly i never hear people asking adults whether or not they were breastfeed... hmmmm Maybe an ice breaker for the swing moms....
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