Discussion post
I want to hear your comments, opinions, and rebuttals. Please let me have it.
When Emily Oster published “Cribsheet” in 2019, I eagerly bought the book and read it. Then I became angry. Really quite indignant that she downplayed the benefits of breastfeeding in her first best-selling book.
She blew holes through many of the health benefits to infants and children that breastfeeding provides. These had been reported by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) for the prior ten to twenty years, as research studies came out that delineated these better health outcomes in breastfed infants.
Pediatricians everywhere were trying to convice mothers that breastfeeding was worth the effort. Emily Oster made it sound like it was not!
So, please let me know what you think about this topic. Next week, I plan to outline the latest findings form the meta-analysis of recent studies of breastfeeding benefits to infants and children done by the Kiser Family Foundation. It was recently published in Pediatrics and it sheds considerable light on this topic.
Let her rip. Please give it to me. Whatever you feel about the benefits of breastfeeding, or lack thereof. I want to hear it. You can make a comment anonymously, if you want.
I hate the phrase fed is best. Hate it.
Fed is first! Fed is Essential! Breast is still Best. Now, do we as mothers do the best, perfect things for our children? No. And that's ok. And our kids will be ok.
AND
Breastfeeding reduces illness and mortality across the board for infants. It just does. So we should still advocate for breastfeeding. And I think just saying breast is best doesn't help. We need to support moms. I think we need to talk about breastfeeding at prenatal appointments. I'm a dentist, I had unmedicated deliveries, and for me... breastfeeding was easily the hardest physical thing I have ever done. It was brutal in the beginning, and I didn't great lactation support. But when we figured it out, breastfeeding was amazing.
I feel like fed is best negates all the effort that goes into the struggle to get breastfeeding going.
Also I did laser tongue ties for years. An element of my practice was just leveling with new moms and recognizing that breastfeeding can be really really hard. And I think that was healing in and of itself.
I breast fed both my babies. They were healthy solid little guys with lots of energy and I treasured my time with them while they nursed. With my first baby it was hard because she slept a lot and I was producing way too much milk, I was engorged and uncomfortable and leaking like a sieve so the first week or two were challenging. Then we got into the swing of things and everything settled down. Then the second baby was so much easier. It would have been easy to give up but I never once thought about quitting and I had great support from my friends. I would never judge another woman we all get too much judgement from everyone else but if you can get through the first couple of weeks definitely try!