Posted: Mar 19, 2015 11:08 am
Paul wrote:There was a woman on BBC yesterday talking about this and she was bemoaning the fact that a lot of time in ante-natal class is spent telling expectant mothers how good breastfeeding is, and not enough time telling them how to deal with problems when they apparently can't breastfeed, which only makes the poor women more anxious when they do have problems.
Can't remember what her precise role is, but she often gets called in to help mothers having difficulty and is often able to solve problems, and wishes more support was given in the NHS to doing the same thing.
I saw that as well. From what I've heard from my friends who've had kids, the support about "how to breastfeed" and what the difficulties might be, varies across the country. I think it is another one of those issues that from the outside seems relatively straightforward "baby hungry? Present breast. Baby feed" that gets waaaay more complicated in practise. I know for some of my friends, worrying that they might not be able to breastfeed caused them a lot of anxiety and occasions where their baby wouldn't latch or did latch and no milk emerged, induced full blown panic.
Then you've got breast milk itself, which if its workings haven't been explained to you, can also cause confusion for a mother.