So many good reasons to breastfeed your baby. Here are 23 of my favorites.
1. Breast milk has never been recalled.
Similac has. Oops, so has Enfamil. Ut oh, so has Good Start.
2. Breast milk has never been found to contain metal particles.
Formula has. A great reason to breastfeed your baby is that you don’t want her to be drinking metal particles.
3. Breast milk has never killed three babies, caused renal failure in 158 others, and made 6,244 babies sick.
But in this case it wasn’t from contaminated formula, right?
4. No one steals breast milk in huge quantities.
(Hmm, I wonder how thieves would pull that off?) However, because brand-name formula is so expensive, there’s a thriving black market trade in it.
5. Breast milk doesn’t get “off odor.”
The off odor can make you sick to your stomach. Breastfeed your baby so you don’t vomit.
6. Your breastfed baby’s burps don’t smell hideously of miso soup.
7. Breast milk isn’t made in a laboratory or a factory where it can get contaminated with a deadly bacteria, cronobacter.
8. Breast milk has never been found to be contaminated with common warehouse beetles (larvae and adults).
9. A calf drinks cow milk, a kid drinks goat milk, a lamb drinks sheep milk, a human should drink ______ milk. A) Artificial B) Cow C) Human.
You only get one choice.

Feed your baby the ‘bad’ formula, and he is blind at age one. Feed him branded formula, and he has picture perfect vision. This misleading advertisement of an alarmingly out-of-focus rubber ducky is a tactic used by formula manufacturers to lie to and scare new moms. Ah, but the generic and name brand formulas have the same ingredients from the same suppliers. If you want your child to have healthy vision, a smart brain, and optimal growth, breastfeeding him is the way to achieve those goals.
10. Humans should drink human milk…
In 1912 a pediatrician with twenty-five years of clinical experience, Henry L. Coit, tested the effect of feeding raw versus boiled cow’s milk on humans and other animals. He also reviewed previous experiments of giving one animal’s milk to another animal. He found that when human milk was fed to puppies they stayed alive but “in a very miserable condition,” and observed that: “All the animals fed by different methods of artificial feeding were inferior to the breast-fed animals, both at the time of the experiment and afterwards.”
11. Humans—like other mammals similar to us—have named ourselves after the very glands that produce milk.
Unlike fish or reptiles, humans are of the Class Mammalia, bearing live young (instead of laying eggs), and suckling them with milk produced in the female’s mammary glands. Mammary glands make milk, not infant formula.
12. Breastfeeding helps you lose weight.
13. When your breastfed baby is with you, he always has something safe and healthy and delicious to eat and drink.
14. Breastfeeding is less expensive.
15. Breastfeeding reduces your risk for diabetes.
16. Breastfeeding reduces your risk for breast cancer.
17. Breastfeeding helps you get more sleep.
18. Breastfeeding is cool.
19. Breastfeeding is fun.
20. Breastfeeding is sexy.
21. Breastfeeding advocates don’t “decline to comment” over and over when approached by journalists wanting to report on, say, why they are price gouging moms with newborns and putting profits, yet again, over people.
22. Breastfeeding advocates aren’t found guilty of a 5th infraction for running deliberately misleading advertising campaigns.
Nor have they been told to pay $13.5 million for lying about their product.
23. Breastfeeding, especially extended breastfeeding, makes your baby smarter.
Despite the advertisements to the contrary (see #22), adding synthetic fatty acids (DHA/ARA) extracted by processing alga or fungus with a toxic chemical, hexane to an artificial concoction of desiccated milk and corn syrup solids, does not.
What if you “can’t” breastfeed your baby?
If someone told you your breasts were broken, and you believed them, you have every right to be mad.
Here’s the truth: when a mom “isn’t able” to breastfeed, it’s a systems failure. Our society failed you. YOU did nothing wrong.
Related Posts:
The Joy of Breastfeeding Past Three
Is Baby Tylenol Causing SIDS?
Baby Reindeer Don’t Have Horns
Good for Babies, Breasts Are Bad for Business
Aluminum and Breast Cancer
Published: April 6, 2012
Last update: March 29, 2022
pregnant with my 3rd baby, I was told… by a WIC counselor, who supposedly has a degree in this area of nutrition… that I was starving my unborn baby by continuing to nurse my still under 2 yr old toddler! She harassed me at every WIC appt. One visit she even wagged her finger at me saying, “mark my words, when you have a sick, scrawny, preemie on your hands, you’ll be sorry you ignored me!” So, the day after I gave birth, I stopped by the WIC office to show her my “sick, scrawy, preemie” who came out after a total of 90 minutes (yes MINUTES, most of which were spent nursing my toddler!) of labor, all 9 lbs 11 oz of her. Yup, I sure starved her. Good thing I did, can you imagine how big she would have been if didn’t! Next pregnancy, every month, she just said, “I don’t supposed you’ve weaned yet, have you? My answer, ” nope, sure haven’t, I haven’t even weaned her sister yet!”
Breast is best!
And breastfeeding can lead to neonatal death through hypernatremic dehydration. Some women just don’t make enough milk and new mothers need to know about that possibility.
“Breastfeeding makes your baby smarter. ”
No, there is no evidence for that claim and it has been studied in great detail. As a general matter, lactivists are not honest about what the scientific research really shows.
As Prof. Joan Wolf has written in the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law:
“Medical journals are replete with contradictory conclusions about the impact of breast-feeding: for every study linking it to better health, another finds it to be irrelevant, weakly significant, or inextricably tied to other unmeasured or unmeasurable factors. While many of these investigations describe a correlation between breast-feeding and more desirable outcomes, the notion that breast-feeding itself contributes to better health is far less certain, and this is a crucial distinction that breast-feeding proponents have consistently elided.”
Dear Amy,
Actually, the claim that breastfeeding makes babies smarter has been studied scientifically in great detail.
May I refer you to the work of neuroscientist Lise Eliot at the University of Chicago Medical School. Dr. Eliot has a Ph.D. in Physiology and Cellular Biophysics from Columbia University and is the author of the most extensive book about baby brain development in print today, What’s Going on in There? How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life.
“No one disputes the association between breast-feeding and intelligence,” Eliot writes in her book. “The problem, however, is in figuring out the reason for it.”
You are right that whether the increase in intelligence is caused by breastfeeding or only correlated with breastfeeding is still a matter of some debate. But taken together the data persuasively demonstrates that when you control for all the other “confounding factors” (mothers who breastfeed are less likely to smoke, they tend to be older, more educated, and more affluent) there are aspects of the milk itself that aids a baby’s brain development.
For the most up-to-date information on this, may I refer you to the University of Oslo’s National Resource Center for Breastfeeding, an academic center that uses scientific research to disseminate information about breastfeeding to academics, health professionals, parents, government and media; as well as to the work of medical doctor and Ph.D. Gro Nylander.
When a team of Norwegian researchers compared outcomes of babies given supplementation with babies exclusively breastfed, they found that the breastfed babies did NOT have higher rates of bilirubin or higher blood sugar rates. They DID lose more weight initially but by day 5 they had caught up or surpassed their supplemented counterparts in terms of weight gain.
Norway has a near 100 percent breastfeeding rate. They do not have higher incidents of perinatal death. In fact, as you know, it is more than three times safer to be born in Norway than in the United States. In general Scandinavia and Europe have much better infant outcomes than America, for a variety of reasons.
As you already know because you have written about it (I’ve read your blog), the United States has one of the highest infant mortality rates among industrialized countries.
American women’s breast don’t work as well as European’s, I guess? That must be why our breastfeeding rates lag so far behind.
It’s been studied in detail by a wide variety of people and as Dr. Wolf points out, the evidence is contradictory. Moreover, no one has been able to control for confounding factors like maternal education. Higher educated women are more likely to breastfeed. If their children have slightly higher IQs (and it is far from clear that they do), it is more likely to be due to genetics than to breastfeeding.
There are real benefits to breastfeeding, but they are tiny.
“As you already know because you have written about it (I’ve read your blog), the United States has one of the highest infant mortality rates among industrialized countries. ”
If you’ve read my blog, then you know that most developed countries “cheat” on their infant mortality rates by excluding premature babies. When corrected, the US infant mortality rate is not one of the highest.
In addition, race is a risk factor for infant mortality and the US has the highest proportion of women of African descent of any first world country.
Finally, as you surely know, the US does not have universal healthcare as other first world countries do. That may also contribute to infant mortality.
The bottom line is that US infant mortality is NOT unusually high, breastfeeding does not provide much in the way of benefits, and there is no evidence at all that it prevents deaths.
Personally, I find the tremendous moralizing surrounding infant feeding to be extremely anti-feminist. Apparently, women have the right to control their own bodies, except when it comes to feeding their babies. Ironic, isn’t it?
I haven’t read all of your blogs but I would appreciate the links to the evidence that first-world countries are cheating. In Iceland they do an autopsy on every fetus aborted and every baby that dies. In America we do not. When a laboring mom dies in our country it is as hushed up as possible, for fear of liability. When a laboring mom dies in Europe, the death is investigated and documentation is publicly available. But in America in most states (NY and MA are exceptions) hospitals are not even required to make public their C-section rates.
But I am very interested to know if you are in favor of universal healthcare, Amy? Perhaps we can find some common ground there.
It’s the feminists in Norway that pushed for more breastfeeding support, and to have the right to use their bodies as nature intended (as one Norwegian feminist put it to me.)
What I find anti-feminist is that doctors tell women not to nurse or that they are starving their babies. I know you like to argue, but can we agree that telling a mom with an hours-old baby she is starving the baby not only goes against what we know (newborns in earthquakes have been found alive after more than a week) to be empirically true but also what is the best and most respectful way to talk to a new mom?
May I give you one example that is in the book I am writing? (You’ll have a field day disagreeing with everything in my book, I suspect. It comes out in 2013. Stay tuned.)
A mom who just had a 2nd C-section was told by her doctor she had to supplement because the baby had lost 14 percent of his body weight and the doctor was afraid his sodium levels would go too high and he would start to have seizures.
She herself was a high-powered highly successful doctor (internal medicine). So she asked the pediatrician to do a blood test. He walked out of the room, offended.
Her clinical diagnosis was that her son’s weight loss–which normally would be alarming–was because of all the IV fluids from the C-section.
The doctor refused to do the blood test.
The next day her son was guzzling like a champ. He was fine. As his doctor mom rightly suspected, her son’s only problem was iatrogenic, and the pediatrician wanted to cause iatrogenic problems.
This doctor I am sure had the best of all possible intentions. But he was sorely misinformed and relying on fear instead of evidence.
Which part of this mom’s desire to nurse her son is anti-feminist?
To point to the United States appalling infant mortality statistics and then say that the other countries are cheating is questionable at best; but you cannot reasonably assert that they are “NOT unusually high.” They stink. Stop being an apologist for the formula companies and look for solutions (assuming you’re not a paid shill for them).
You think the benefits tiny? You do not know the full benefits, because milk evolved as the ideal food for newborns, and it would be arrogance to imagine that we yet understand everything in breast milk and why it is there, much less replicate it. (Assuming you grant evolution validity, of course.)
And breastfeeding is anti-feminist? Its sad to see the legacy of the 1960s feminist wave, the women of which thought that products sold to them like birth-control pills were made solely for their liberation, and that the need to work without interference from children was feminism. The real feminist revolution will come when women can choose work, or children or BOTH, when they can choose to work in workplaces that accommodate breastfeeding, or can choose to stay home for a year to breastfeed and still have their job to return to. All we have so far is women being allowed to be like men, and being marginalized if they act like mothers.
Breastfed both of my babies for the first year — and am very proud of that accomplishment.
Dear Jennifer,
Thank you for writing such an articulate, well-researched and thoroughly documented post. As a writer and mother of a breast-feeding toddler, I applaud your post, and I can’t wait to read your next book, if it has anything to do with breastfeeding as you have hinted. Thank you again!
Best,
Jeanette
How do other countries like the Netherlands cheat? According to the World Health Organization, the infant death rate is the number of infant deaths divided by the total number of live births in a year. Similarly, the WHO definition of neonatal mortality is the number of neonatal deaths divided by the total number of live births in a year. Not surprisingly ALL live born babies, regardless of weight or gestational age are supposed to be included in these calculations. The US adheres to these guidelines, as does Canada. Most other first world countries do not. They cheat by deliberately excluding very premature babies. In other words, they classify the babies who are most likely to die as born dead (and therefore not included) even when they are born alive.
So, for example, a 28 weeker who lives for several days is counted in the US or Canadian neonatal mortality statistics, but is treated in many other countries as if it never existed, thereby artificially lowering the neonatal mortality rate.
This has a huge impact on mortality rates. That’s why other countries cheat in the first place. A paper published last month in the British Medical Journal has quantified exactly how large the impact is. It turns out that the US (and Canada) don’t have poor rankings and never had poor rankings. They actually have among the best ranking for infant and neonatal mortality it the world!
The paper is “Influence of definition based versus pragmatic birth registration on international comparisons of perinatal and infant mortality: population based retrospective study,” written by multiple scientists at Fetal and Infant Health Study Group of the Canadian Perinatal Surveillance System.
The authors investigated the cheating by determining how many premature babies were included in the mortality rates. They found that most countries besides the US and Canada exclude live born babies less than 500 gm (1 pound, the typical weight at 22-23 weeks gestation and at the outer limit of viability). More surprising, many countries exclude live babies less than 1,000 gm (2 pounds, the typical weight at 28 weeks gestation, and known to have a very high survival rate).
Here is what they found:
“Results: The proportion of live births under 500 g varied widely from less than 1 per 10 000 live births in Belgium and Ireland to 10.8 per 10 000 live births in Canada and 16.9 in the United States. Neonatal deaths under 500 g, as a proportion of all neonatal deaths, also ranged from less than 1% in countries such as Luxembourg and Malta to 29.6% in Canada and 31.1% in the United States. Rankings of countries based on crude fetal, neonatal, and infant mortality rates differed substantially from rankings based on rates calculated after exclusion of births with a birth weight of less than 1000 g or a gestational age of less than 28 weeks.
Conclusions: International differences in reported rates of extremely low birthweight and very early gestation births probably reflect variations in registration of births and compromise the validity of international rankings of perinatal and infant mortality.”
The detailed explanation:
“The World Health Organization … has long defined a live birth as any product of conception that shows signs of life at birth, with no consideration for birthweight or gestational age criteria. Although this definition remains unchallenged, countries have widely varying regulations for registration of birth that range from definition based to pragmatic. For instance, birth registration is required for all live births that satisfy the WHO’s definition of live birth in Canada, England and Wales, and the United States, whereas countries such as the Czech Republic, France, and the Netherlands specify limits based on some combination of gestational age (for example, at least 22 weeks), birth weight (for example, at least 500 g), or survival (for example, any live birth irrespective of birth weight that survives the first 24 hours after birth). Procedural differences due to longstanding traditions, social attitudes, and local incentives (including financial remuneration of healthcare providers) also probably dictate whether an infant at the borderline of viability is registered…
In summary, we observed large international differences in the reported proportion of live births under 500 g and under 1000 g birth weight and in neonatal deaths in these birthweight categories. International comparisons based on crude fetal, neonatal, and infant mortality rates yielded results that differed from comparisons that excluded extremely low birthweight and early gestation births, especially those at the borderline of viability. Variations in the registration of births at the borderline of viability and related problems compromise the validity of international rankings of industrialised countries by perinatal and infant mortality.”
Thank you for posting actual numbera from actual published studies. I recently had a baby and am breastfeeding with minor supplimentation (which is accompanied by maternal guilt). I find the extreme pushiness of the lactavists annoying and condescending. Obviously, all mothers would rather beeastfeed – it’s cheaper, less fuss (once you work out all the kinks in the first months), and more convenient – but not for everyone. For some of us, we can’t get our supply up or it hurts or, well, it’s really none of your business why I am or am not breastfeeding. How about you keep your judgemental thoughts and put downs to yourself? I welcome your supportive comments and admiring glances towards my baby. But just keep the rest of it to yourself. Use your extra energy to help get more paid leave for new mothers to create some time and security for their nursing efforts.
to “New Mom”,
I am not an expert, doctor, or authority by any means; I am an experienced Mother of two healthy teens (18,and almost 15). They only have had breast milk, and only one ear infection when they were four years old. They feed differently, my son, the younger, was a very ‘hungry’ baby. And I thought that there were never enough for him. But it’s the simple law of “supply and demand”. The more you feed the more you will produce. Get involved in La Leche League. They are nation wide and internationally. They have always been a resource and support for me and other mothers new to breastfeeding! Happy Nursing!!! You can do it!!!
Breastfeeding provides the perfect nutrition for babies, and I don’t believe anyone can argue that the real thing cannot be imitated or delivered in the same fashion. The bonding between mother and child is love at its finest in the earliest stages of life. I can still recall, more than 20 years later, the grasp of a tiny hand and the upward gaze of the eyes of my child as I nursed. I was the child of a mother who breastfed her children in the ’50’s, when formula was more popular and considered equal (as a convenience, as well as for modesty reasons) to breastfeeding. My mother had already survived cancer at a young age, and her doctor suggested she do so in order to prevent breast cancer, which was far ahead of her time. I personally breastfed my three children based on the times, which were more supportive, and the reasons Jennifer lists. I also was advised by a Swiss pediatrician to allow nursing to be my baby’s pacifier. There was no real schedule, and comfort was readily available at exactly the right temperature and moment. My oldest child needed no solid food for her first year of life. Needless to say, all three are healthy and bright! And my memories of those special do-nothing-but-nurse moments are and will remain cherished as a reminder of those special maternally satisfying moments. And I breastfed anywhere, discreetly, and believe mothers should never be relegated to the bathroom or behind curtains. How anyone can condemn breastfeeding, the most pure and natural nourishment for your baby, is beyond my comprehension.
At 31 I’ve nursed both of my sons about 1.5 years each. On nursing my first, it triggered memories of being nursed as a baby myself. Now, before you say “Ewww gross”, stop yourself and ask why on earth you’d have that reaction. Breasts are FOR feeding. That’s what biology or God, take your pick, made them for. By definition, mammals nurse their offspring. Now, there are always variations on “normalcy”. There are orphans, mothers whose bodies just don’t produce enough milk or some mothers who take drugs or other things that they don’t want the infant to consume by mistake. The fact that formula exists is fantastic for those who NEED it. The reality is that most babies don’t, and if you, Amy Tuteur, MD, are trying to say that we can manufacture a synthetic food that is better for humans than Nature or God can provide, I think you have a lot more of a case to make. What I really think is going on is that post retirement you had need of some income and you may well be getting it from companies who are desirous for your opinion to be heard loud and clear as a “skeptical obg”. I may be wrong in that assumption, but given that the doctor heard most loud and clear as an anti-elimination communication voice was employed by a diaper manufacturer, I hope you can forgive the skepticism on my part.
I agree! what a wonderful experience!!!!
Not sure that I can weigh in on the accuracy of anyone’s statistics here or on the accuracy of their analysis of said statistics. But what I can say is that Jennifer is simply making her case here. Since when is making a strong and passionate case, moralizing? I breastfed both my children for the first six-months and stopped earlier than many mothers. But in reading Jennifer’s post, I didn’t feel attacked. Thanks for making your case so clearly, Jennifer.
Thanks for making the case for breastfeeding so eloquently, Jennifer. I don’t understand why people who choose to formula feed get so up in arms. It’s your right and your choice, but you *are* making a suboptimal choice for your child in terms of nutrition and health. I make suboptimal choices in parenting every day, but feeding formula wasn’t one of them. I’m glad I was able to exclusively nurse both my children, despite the fact that when my son was diagnosed with failure to thrive, that was the first thing the physicians recommended – supplementing formula. Guess what? It wasn’t my breastmilk that was inadequate. He has cystic fibrosis. I wish pediatricians weren’t so quick to look to supplementation with formula as the solution to slow growth. In my son’s case I nursed him until he was five years old and despite having the most severe mutation for CF, he is in excellent health. I’m so glad I didn’t listen to the “wisdom” of my doctors. Also, I was the one who diagnosed him with CF and then advocated for the sweat test, the diagnostic test for CF. He would have suffered malnutrition due to malabsorption (would have happened regardless of formula feeding or breastfeeding) for longer if not for my mama’s wisdom and tenacity in advocating for the test.
I don’t get how advocating for breastfeeding is “moralizing” or anti-feminist. I was educated in women’s studies at a feminist liberal arts college in the 90s and I’m really glad I didn’t ever once think, “Gee, feeding my babies the way nature intended is so anti-feminist! I should pop a bottle of formula in their mouths instead.” I just don’t get it, sorry. I think it’s just as anti-feminist to bash us breastfeeders, if you really want to go there. Aren’t we all entitled to our choices? If you were truly a feminist, you’d give your baby formula, admit it’s inferior, and not give a crap what the breastfeeders are saying. As a science writer, I find it laughable that anyone could make a valid argument that formula is just as good as breastmilk. But I don’t proclaim to be a perfect parent, either. Seems like those who get up in arms about those who say breastmilk is superior are feeling guilty and want to rationalize their choice to formula feed. Guess what? I feed my kid Coca-cola (he’s 11). Is it as good as him drinking water? Hell no, and I would be an idiot to make that argument. We all make compromises as parents. Get used to screwing up. It’s going to happen again.
What’s more, breastfeeding needs advocacy. It is not the norm for feeding babies anymore. So it’s kind of like being a white male advocating for white male privilege, when you get all offended about people arguing for breastfeeding. Formula’s the norm. People need to get out there, like Jennifer does, and proclaim the benefits of the breast. While we’re throwing out feminist/anti-feminist arguments, formula feeding is inherently patriarchal. The white men who own the companies who manufacture formula knows what’s best for babies, right? Meanwhile millions of babies in the third world are dying from being fed formula mixed with unsafe water, formula that’s been pushed on their mothers as making babies healthier and stronger. They could be getting safe, sterile, nourishing, free breastmilk, but instead they’re dying because of the formula companies. But let’s make sure we obscure that and only focus on white educated women in the US who want a pat on the back for formula feeding. Sorry, not buying it.
http://articles.latimes.com/1991-05-19/news/mn-2981_1_formula-feed
In Contextualising risk, constructing choice: Breastfeeding and good mothering in risk society, Stephanie Knaak, a sociologist, explains that breastfeeding promotion in first world countries is about much more than what an infant eats:
” … this discourse is not a benign communique about the relative benefits of breastfeeding, but an ideologically infused, moral discourse about what it means to be a ‘good mother’ in an advanced capitalist society”
Breastfeeding promotion has taken on moralizing tone typically associated with grave threats to children’s health:
” …[T]oday’s dominant infant feeding discourse functions more as a vehicle of persuasion than as a vehicle of education, characterised by informational biases, moral overtones, and a restrictive construction of choice. Attention has also been given to the increasingly hegemonic and homogeneous character of pro-breastfeeding discourse, where alternative choices about infant feeding tend to be interpreted as acts of moral deviance rather than counter-discourses or acts of resistance…”
Since the benefits of breastfeeding are small, it is really no one else’s concern what method of infant feeding an individual mother chooses. But women cannot keep themselves from criticizing other women’s choices and they rationalize this by a conception of public health that is growing ever more intrusive:
“The increasing moralisation of public health is another part of what lends power to this feature of contemporary breastfeeding discourse. Namely, the tendency in public health discourse to increasingly frame personal health choices/practices as issues of social and moral responsibility makes breastfeeding much more than just a personal decision. Within this kind of discursive environment, breastfeeding becomes part of how good (i.e. socially responsible, moral) motherhood is defined.”
Breastfeeding activists need to ask themselves:
Why does a woman’s right to control her own body apply only from the waist down? When it comes to feeding an infant, women’s autonomy is ignored. Breastfeeding activists believe there is only one right choice want there to be no mistake about it.
Well Dr. Amy, I’ve officially lost all respect for you!! It’s so obvious that breastmilk is by far the best for your baby. Human baby=human milk. Pretty simple. I understand that not every woman can breastfeed but to minimize the benefits, well…… That’s just asinine!!
I agree….. does this doctor have a practice? Does she even have children? Just because you have letters behind your name does not mean anything……what I mean to say… Dr. Spock the famed “expert” never had children…. he asked his patients mothers what to do, and that is where his “wisdom” came from…… everyone can make up their own mind about how they are going to feed their infants. And if you can not breastfeed, God forbid, than there are alternatives. And there are more studies out there that are FOR breast feeding, because it’s natural, it is made for that child. It is “designer” milk. Each baby has different nutritional needs, and a woman’s body accounts naturally for that.
Just giving my two cents worth…. I am FOR breast feeding!!!
This was great. The only downside to breast milk is that a mother transmits her body burden to her child. I learned this fact from Stefan Jarl’s film Submission: In Defense of the Unborn. Still, here you certainly provided lots of reasons not to trust formula. If I had to do it again, I would breastfeed in a minute.
My experience with supplementation was that many women simply didn’t comment, and some women were very supportive. I connected online with women who sent me breastmilk at their own expense when I couldn’t afford to pay the shipping. I really wanted to breastfeed my daughter, but I couldn’t make enough to exclusively breastfeed. Most women can if they have the right support (which isn’t a given although things are improving).
No matter where a woman stands on her own or another woman’s choice, our commonalities are greater than our differences. Knee-jerk judgements are also part of being human, and they provide an opportunity to re-examine preconceived notions. It hurts to be judged, and it’s hard to manage this when the other challenges of motherhood are so great.
I am stronger when I stand united with other women. Where breastfeeding or any other aspect of motherhood is concerned, “How can I help?” is a lovely question.
Mrs. Tuteur,
I must say that your last post sounds a lot like the pot calling the kettle black. You incessantly spout filth about the risks of home birth very intrusively.
Wow Jennifer! What a comment section today! I enjoy your articles in the Epoch Times and here very much, especially today. What I always wanted to know about breast-feeding … but was afraid to ask! Now about Amy. It seems to me that she is the product of too much education, pride, arrogance, and lack of common sense. Who on earth can ever believe the WHO, Fauci, and the multitude of control freaks that have shown their colors about covid these last few years, and that also includes many in the “health” world that make bad choices for their patients or refuse to help them, and then ignore them. Maybe Amy is A I and doesn’t understand creation. So, long live breasts and breast-feeding. It is good to have the “elbow room of opportunity” that can help us make wise and correct choices. Thanks, Jennifer, for your uplifting article, Mike