This caused me to want to read and I felt uncomfortable and I changed and I will keep on reading and learning and talking in the hope that someone else will listen to some odd advice...but....
You know I do get a little sad as I have lots of information for you but gave up and decided it just was not worth it…that’s what I’m feeling at the moment…it is just not worth it because I feel that no one cares.
I know that we all want the best for our children…but have we ever looked at what is the best…the different types of best and how to go about doing the best in its many different forms…that is what my blog is about…me talking about the links, books and studies that I’ve found…me educating myself and sharing with others my path.
There is so much I didn’t know, I mean are your friends and family well informed and I’m a slow one just catching up?
Do all New Zealand parents (and you in other countries) before their children are born (apart from me) know that the World Health Organization guidelines are …” infants should be exclusively breastfed
· For the first six months of life to achieve optimal growth, development and health
· Thereafter, to meet their evolving nutritional requirements, infants should receive nutritionally adequate and safe complementary foods while breastfeeding continues for up to two years of age or beyond.
Exclusive breastfeeding from birth is possible except for a few medical conditions, and unrestricted exclusive breastfeeding results in ample milk production….”
If you want to check the link to see I’m not making it up.
Or am I just one of the 50 or so mothers on the forums I’ve talked to that really didn’t know …. And really thought that I would not be able to feed beyond 6 month because I probably would not have enough milk.
That following one of the current routines in some of the recent fad books like….
Gary Ezzo,author of 'On Becoming Babywise'
Gina Ford the author of the book 'The Contented Baby'
Tracey Hogg 'Secrets of the Baby Whisperer
Tizzie Hall’s book called 'Save our Sleep'
Each of these books have a routine to follow of how many hours between feeds and when the child should sleep eat and play. (With the book that we tried Tizzie Hall she is almost word for word the Plunket clock in her routine set out.)
Did everyone else know but me that if you followed these routines you are very likely to have either low milk production or 0 production. (Yes some woman can keep on prouducing many can not)
I didn’t know and I was trying to follow these routines.
I didn’t know that Dr Emmet Holt was the doctor who started the “don’t spoil the baby” concept back in the1880’s. He felt that breastfeeding was unsanitary and unpredictable and recommend bottle-feeding as a superior infant food.
If we look at our own Plunket clock we can see guidelines of how we should feed our babies to schedules as our own Dr Truby King also seems to follow Holts suggestions.
My Plunket nurse didn’t tell me of the Alert put out by the American Academy of Pediatrics, World Health Organization and la lache league in which the organizations emphatically "reaffirms its stance that the best feeding schedules for babies are the ones babies design themselves." The alert went on to say that "scheduled feedings designed by parents may put babies at risk for poor weight gain and dehydration."
Is my Plunket nurse just slack or did I miss something…there I was with a screaming baby that was not gaining weight was not sleeping and did not want to be held by me. My nurse told me to start giving her formula top ups…. not feed on demand.
Now I am asking, “Who is Plunket?” and where do they get their information?
Ok I’ll leave that…
I didn’t know that many children had an allergy to formula and it is expressed by a continuous flow of mucous i.e. a snotty nose. I thought that is was normal and that the parents just couldn’t be bothered cleaning up the mess.
I didn’t think that there was any difference between bottle-feeding and breastfeeding other than the baby is better off in the early months with its immunity. I didn’t realise that formula feeding was linked to high child cancer and diarrhoea deaths in developed and undeveloped countries. I didn’t realise that the use of formula leads to many children and adults health problems…. so my child is going to grow up with these people she and I are going to have to pay for their health care…she is going to possibly marry a person who is potentially linked to more health problems than breastfeed people. (I’m not saying that we will have better health but like smoking you do have a far greater risk)
I thought that once we passed 6 months of feeding that my breast milk would not really up to standard and it was really just some strange personal choice for people to keep going…not that breast milk changes with your growing baby to suit its needs and the more time you spend close to your baby filling its needs the better your milk will be for your baby.
Do I worry when I hear a friend say “…oh no I’m going to feed my baby properly… she’s not going to have coke in her bottle”. She did not say breastfeed….but well I would have to say that formula is way better than coke.
What can I do about it…nothing … because it’s a parents choice to do what they want.
Parenting style seems to be such a personal thing that no one else can tell you help you or point you in the direction of help without offending.
What do we do…how do I feel when I see friends and family telling other new parents…”to put them on the bottle”…”you need a routine, here is a great book that will help you with it”….”oh your baby is just snacking you need to hold out for longer to make sure they get a good feed”…how do I take this?
How do I feel when I remember back to when I had heaps of milk and my baby was happy and then my midwife told me that my baby was snacking and I needed to hold out.
Look at what an anthropologist says about that. (quote: Katherine A. Dettwyler, Ph.D. - The way in which some young infants are fed in our culture -- trying to get them to shift to a 3-4 hour schedule, with feedings of 15-20 minutes at a time, goes against our basic physiology...says in reading this website which is pretty bad but also M. Smalls book which she talks about other cultures feeding their baby onces every 15-30mins for small "snacks" day and night ).
This was the start of our baby crying…and crying and me wondering what the heck I was doing wrong and how come my milk was not good enough now and well jeepers how about we try a dummy…and she must have colic…no no its reflux
Oh dear me.
When I see friends who are taking this advice now inside I feel sad and I try my best not to show it on my face, as I know what it is like to be holding on to a screaming baby and all you want is for it to stop.
I don’t want to be better than anyone…I just want to learn and I want to share.
I do feel that we have a problem but it is not with individual parents it is with our culture and what our culture feels it must do to its children in order to get a self-sufficient baby as soon as possible
I didn’t know that I was trying to get my baby to be self-sufficient with only 25% of its brain connected (quote Meredith F. Small - Human infants are born neurologically unfinished - that is, they are born, some say, about 3 months too soon or if you move down this web page for more of the same information.) and what she really needed was her Mum and Dad close by to tell her that it was all ok.
This concept also runs over into the sleep department as well...leaving a new born baby to cry-it-out is like smacking my cats paw every time he pulls my fish out of my pond and puts it in his dinner bowl....he just doesn't get it.
Some friends may see me as “holier-than-thou” as I express my ideas and thoughts on my blog when all I really want is to share and learn with others to educate myself and ourselves…I do not want to be better than another I’ve no interest in competing over our welfare.
Its none of my business that our health system, our legal system and potentially my future son and daughter in-laws will be over loaded with problems….
I feel that it is OUR problem..... It’s a society cultural problem.
I am scared for the future and I’m trying to do something about it.
If it means I must make people feel uncomfortable then that is what I feel I must do.
I did read and I felt uncomfortable and I changed and I will keep on reading and learning.
Global warming is happening now…by the time that Ara is 40 there is a strong prediction that there will be no fish in the sea…what are you doing to help stop that?
I see violence, family disharmony, selfishness (I’ve linked this to global warming) and mental health problems tie in to the way we raise our children and for me what I am doing to help the world is write, talk and discover the information the studies, the research and bring them together on my blog and talk about them with people who want to listen.
Maybe you didn’t read all that was written here.
Maybe you still don’t feel that I have any right to feel concern and express on my blog.
Normally I would not write like this to you…but you for some reason I feel that you might understand. But I don’t know. .
Happy birthday, Sesame Street!
7 hours ago
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8 comments:
Thank you so much for sharing your experiences. Families have lost their intuition to hold their babies, feed on demand,and cosleep. One of my greatest challenges as a family physician is to have my patients truly grasp the concepts you've so eloquently written. In the end,it is survival of the fittest. Those of us who understand these principles will raise well adjusted children who have a deeper sense of bonding and responsible parenting, and ultimately more fulfilling lives.
Anne Eglash MD
I need to tell you that you are not alone. Eigther in your feelings or out here in blogland. I often feel a lot of frusteration sometimes thinking that all the effort and information I'm putting out there to try and help my child and our society is going completely down the tube because frankly, no one is really listening. They may be reading, but they're not listening. Or so it feels sometimes.
But....
Let me tell you something I think you should know.
About five months ago I was teedering on the line between co-sleeping and crib sleeping. I desperately wanted to co-sleep. I felt in my heart and knew in my head that it was right and healthy. But I was constantly torn between doing what my heart felt was right and doing what was considered proper in our society. I struggled for the first year of my daughters life with this. She, being breastfed, was up a lot at night. We were tired during the day. I often felt resentful, just of everything, the whole situation. When I came across your blog, I felt like for the first time my chest opened up and I could breath. I felt like I finally had permission to do what my inner most instincts had been telling me to do since my daughter's birth. She's been sleeping with my husband and I ever since. It's changed our lives. It's changed our family. I honestly believe that finally deciding to co-sleep our child was one of the best parenting decision we've made yet. I don't know if I would have been able to take that step without finding someplace out here where someone was willing to nudge me that extra inch I needed. Thank you.
Please remember, all you have to influence is one person. That person can influence one more, or two more, or maybe a whole society.
Your blog's informative is very rich in contents. I like your way of
presentation. At times I disagree with your views but thinking about it who
presents views that are acceptable to everyone. Keep posting your good
blogs.
I feel this way too, like nobody gets it. And I just can't sit there and do nothing. so i was a little unpopular at first but there finally starting to come around, sometimes. Its great to know there are like minded people! Thank you
I feel the same way, and I do understand. Thank you, I needed to read this today.
Hi Megan,
I like your blog and that you're telling moms to trust their instincts!! Right on! I was recently amazed by the parenting section of the Barnes and Noble bookstore in my area. There are rows and rows of books filled with often contradictory views from a multitude of "parenting experts" who are telling mothers how to raise their children. I thought you might be interested in learning about the Holistic Moms Network (www.holisticmoms.org), a group that advocates parenting from the heart. It was founded by a handful of moms in 2002 who were yearning for the support and friendship of other like-minded moms who were co-sleeping, practicing attachment parenting, extended breastfeeding, questioning vaccinations, and living holistically and eco-consciously. They just published a nice cookbook too called Growing Healthy Families which has a section in the back on how to make your own baby food, wipes, non-toxic cleaners and herbal remedies!
I cannot thank you enough... PLEASE keep on doing what you are doing. As a young mum of a 6 month old who wants to be on me 24/7 I've been made to feel that it's my fault- that I've 'made a rod for my own back' by tending to his needs as best I can. This has made me doubt myself and be inconsistent in an effort to make him more independent. In fact, I came across your blog whilst researching Tizzie Hall's 'Save Our Sleep'. I look forward to following your findings and finally feeling good about the way we are.
My chillins are NOW 27 and 29 and I found that "Nursing Your Baby" by Karen Pryor to be a wonderful book about breastfeeding. She spoke about baby's sleeping with one too. My children slept with me alot. I LOVE what you've written.
I wrote a response to someone who's trying to get their 5 month old to sleep alone and the infant is crying for 3 hours a night. INSANE huh?
I did my best as I told her in an earlier comment what I thot of this practice.
I feel I am an advocate for the baby. All they can do is CRY! Is anyone listening???
They are within us for 9 mos and then thrust into the world - what makes us think that they can be independent or anything very soon??? Holding them close is very important.
Plunket clock - my Mom must've raised me according to that harrowing device - what a DUMB name.
Okay - keep up the GREAT WORK! I love your writing... God bless you.
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