Moral Landscapes

I am always a bit sceptical when anyone is so black and white and adamant about an issue, as you are about formula. Life is seldom so clear cut.

I have two children and breastfed them both although with my son after a while I supplemented breastmilk with formula as he seemed so incredibly hungry and I was not making enough milk.

Certainly in an ideal world it is best if a mother can breastfeed, but to make mothers who can't feel inadequate is very destructive.

I am an older mother and it is my experience of talking to women who had children in their late 30s and early 40s the feedback loop which ought to function - baby sucks more, mother makes more milk - does not seem to be so effective. Older mothers are often very aware of the advantages of breastmilk but their bodies can let them down. Also, in order for that mechanism to function, you seem to need to relax a lot and eat a lot and be like a calm cow. If you are a working mother, or simply looking after other children, this is often not possible to do. You can't just sit around and relax and eat muesli to make sure your milk factory makes enough.

I am a regular reader of Psychology Today but I was very disappointed by the negative and hectoring tone of your column.

Yes, this post was very blunt but it is so because we are so very far from the appropriate baseline for raising children, yet few people realize it. You illustrate what happens when people know something but the forces are against them--rationalize the status quo. The status quo is not good enough for our children. Society must change-- and WE must change it-- so that support for breastfeeding is universal (e.g., breastmilk banks everywhere). ALL moms should be able to give breastmilk to their children, including older moms and working moms. We should not give up until this is the case. Don't you agree?

Oh my god, this article is VERY preachy. You are doing new moms a great disservice by using that tone and putting that amount of preassure to breast feed. There are a whole lot of aspects that have to change (as you said, America is not a very welcoming country when it comes to breastfeeding), so using this scare monger tactic will only make new mothers more anxious (doubt that employers& companies will care)

As a professional who works primarily with postpartum women, AND as a strong advocate for breastfeeding, I am appalled that a fellow professional would compose such garbage, and even more disappointed in Psychology Today for publishing, I find this completely irresponsible on their part.

I'm just wondering, should suicidal..or worse, psychotic women, choose breastfeeding over their own health? I'm thinkin' that a dead mother..or worse a dead baby might be a little worse than choosing to use formula.

You probably want to overturn Roe v. Wade too, women's bodies are not their own, they are slaves to reproduction.

I have an idea, because you think formula feeding is abusive, how about you offer up your breast for my clients that really want what is best for their babies but are so sick that they need medication to stay safe.

Opinions like these are better kept to yourself, as an expert in Ethics I wonder if you are aware of the ethical implications of sharing such biased opinions....

It's not clear to me what you are complaining about as "garbage" and "bias". Of course the blogs are biased towards what is natural and evolved and best for kids. But of course there are extreme cases where women cannot breastfeed themselves but there should be other options for obtaining breastmilk. Are you saying that we should encourage formula for everyone because there are a few mothers who are in such straights they cannot breastfeed their children? That is what it sounds like. That seems to be the status quo, the status quo that is putting our children and nation at risk. We need to think about all the options to help moms use breastmilk, not give in to the status quo of formula feeding. Maybe you have some ideas to share on how to help moms get breastmilk for their children.

You have a lot of negative energy that you're throwing at moms here, implying that mothers who use formula are doing so for "bad" reasons (or reasons that are, at the very least, not good enough for you). There are MUCH healthier and more helpful places you can put this energy.

1) toward hospitals - where the infamous sample bags are still given out.

2) toward doctors, nurses, and lactation consultants - who often have bad or out of date information that hinders a mother's best efforts to breastfeed, instead of helping.

3) toward formula companies - who use immoral, and even illegal, tactics to market their products to vulnerable parents.

4) toward a society that values parenthood so little that we only receive 6 weeks of maternity leave (if any). How about lobbying for family-friendly laws and regulations?

5) toward people who shame mothers for breastfeeding in public - essentially dooming women to being locked up at home with their infant for the first 6 months, until they can feed him "acceptably" in public.

6) toward pharmaceutical companies that don't bother to test their drugs' effects on lactating mothers and their babies.

We spend all this time throwing stones at other mothers, when really their choices are none of your damn business. You don't know if that mother is on lifesaving medication that happens to be incompatible with breastfeeding. You don't know if her baby is adopted. You don't know if she's the aunt or the grandma when you see her give a bottle in public. You don't know if she had to return to work after 3 days because she's self-employed, and if that interfered with her ability to successfully nurse. ALL of these situations have happened to women I know personally. Unless you're Dionne Warwick or one of her psychic friends, why not aim your vitriol at the folks who really deserve it, and leave the poor moms who are honestly just doing their best for their babies alone?

(And I say this as the daughter of a LLL leader, who is currently serving my 58th month as an active breastfeeding mom, so don't tell me I don't know.)

As an aside, the tone of this post is extremely unprofessional and not what I have come to expect from Psychology Today. Are you just letting any flake post these days? I'm going to unsubscribe if you can't raise the bar. You're supposed to be a professional publication. First the thing about "unattractive" African women, and now this? Really??

Is Psych Today just letting any idiot post these days?

I am a breastfeeding mom (58 months, 3 kids, still going...) and I find this article offensive.

Blaming mothers who have trouble breastfeeding is victim blaming - these moms are the victims of a society that discourages breastfeeding; of corporations that actively try to interfere with breastfeeding (with every single kid I got a formula sample in the mail right when they hit a big growth spurt and wanted to nurse constantly. Coincidence?); of doctors, nurses, and lactation consultants who give harmful, stupid, outdated advice. And it makes as much sense to shame and blame these mothers as it makes to blame ANY victim. It's cruel, stupid, bullying behavior, and it's NOT HELPFUL TO ANYONE.

Take this energy and lobby Congress for more family-friendly laws, and leave the poor moms alone. They're just doing the best they can.

I hate to tell you that PPD is not an "extreme case.". It happens to be the most common complication of pregnancy. I'm not sure which post you read (I suspect it was just an attempt to attack my argument and better your position) but no where did I say that that we should push formula on every new mother, in fact, I am suggesting that we not "push" anything on new moms, we need to educate and support without judgment. I also clearly stated that I am a supporter of breastfeeding and if you must know, I breastfed both of my children - the free bag that the hospital gave me didn't influence me at all, it was nice to have a free ice pack though, made traveling with expressed milk a lot easier....

Currently there are not "other options for obtaining breast milk" and when you post such a strongly worded opinion without offering women an alternative then I consider that biased and garbage. It's useless and your entire argument has been lost because you attack the very women you intended to help. I think it's garbage because you attack formula feeders instead of offering solutions and then have the audacity to ask me to share my ideas to help moms get breast milk for their children...seriously? You are the one bashing formula, maybe you should have considered the other options before you posted this. I have seen many women suffer unnecessarily over the choice to be well or to breastfeed, I really hope you didn't put a nail in someone's coffin today...

I am very disappointed in Psychology Today. I think that it should produce the research to back up these claims if this piece is allowed to remain in it's content. It is a journal intended to help people, and this article only hurts. It is judgmental, opinionated and one-sided. It does not take into account the damage that it can have on a vulnerable, depressed, anxious mother. I hate to sound so extreme, but after working with many women suffering from PPD, I can tell you with certainty that propaganda like this is surely going to lead to feelings of inadequacy, failure, panic, and obsessive worry. Let's get the facts straight, yes breast is best, try hard. However, if it cannot or does not work for you and your situation - a healthy mother is what a baby needs to thrive. Please, Ms. Narvaez, produce the statistics that report babies who are not breastfed have lower IQ's, greater risk for depression and a greater chance of cancer. It is biased garbage like this that perpetuates the over anxious, obsessive mother who loses all sense of herself. That, in my opinion, is far more damaging to a child than what he/she drinks. I am not going to write a manifesto on my beliefs though because I don't have the research handy to back me up. Where is yours?

I am struggling with how I feel about this post on PT. When I first read it, I was shocked. I felt the tone was very judgmental. There seems to be a bullying tone, which is not conducive to healing or discourse. I mean sometimes a woman struggles so much with milk supply, possibly b/c of stress, and this article seems shaming. But then, I re-read it, and you know, most of this information is accurate. As clinicians we all know there is complicated relationship between feeding, infants, mothers, depression,milk supply, stress, etc...We know formula is not good for human babies. There is enuf evidence out there abt this. and we all know this. The fact is, there are nutritional deficiencies in formula. It is patronizing to women to pretend this is not true. The WHO suggests 2 years of bf, the US 6 months. Read any of Dr. Alison Stuebe's work (from UNCH), and early weaning is named as a public health issue, along with lack of public policy to support women & families, to protect them from stress and lack of healthcare. I work exclusively with women in the field of maternal mental health. In fact, I work in an ob-gyn's office. I also suffered from PPD for two years as I would not seek help, long ago, 17 years ago. I breastfed my baby and that was something I would never give up.This was something I needed to learn how to do. And I look back with happiness on the nursing relationship I had. I changed careers to support women and developing families. I went thru the trouble of going to grad school jumping thru all the internship & licensing hoops, etc. Of course, I would never impose my beliefs on any of my clients. If they need to move into a different feeding method, then well, they do. But it is my responsibility to have as much education about the issues of the mother-baby dyad, infant feeding, infant sleep & PMDDs as I possibly can. So I've read up on the valid & reliable research about lactation, sleep, and depression in new mothers on www.uppitysciencechick for some research on this topic.

"Maybe the source of disagreement between us as well is that you are equally supportive of using formula (that's how it sounds). If you know all these things (from all the week's posts) about breastmilk and breastfeeding, how can this be?"

Because I don't believe in starving babies, which is what I'd have to suggest to my clients if I didn't encourage them to use formula when their need for medication was unavoidable -

Do a little more research about PPD, please, I cannot possibly begin to educate you on it and its causes - your assumptions that this is a new phenomenon are incorrect, it also exists across cultures - ask around, many women have suffered in silence until recently, and so did their children. Oxytocin is great, but if it were the cure to PPD, well its not, so there goes that theory.

As the subject heading suggests, I am not even sure where to begin. I thought this post was possibly intended for The Onion or an equally satiric online news magazine but alas, it is not. To make matters worse, PT blogs are typically not a platform for propaganda, so this leaves me wondering, are you interested as a psychologist and one who seemingly specializes in ethics, to actually help women realize their full potential as mothers or perpetuate the multiple manifestations and experiences of shame and oppression already experienced by women and mothers on a daily basis? In fact, as I am writing this comment, I think this post is antithetical to your so called professional efforts and engagement in ethics and quite unprofessional to boot. In your numerous publications, is there anywhere that states as a therapist the ethical thing to do when you think your client may be headed down a path that you subjectively perceive as being “wrong” or disagree with is to tell them what they are doing is “evil”? Is that what you were teach your university students?

As a mother to a beautiful, healthy, happy and immensely smart formula-fed 5 year-old, therapist, feminist activist and researcher my work on a daily basis centers around advocating for the health and well-being of both women and children nationally and globally. Among many of my professional and personal efforts is to offer education and advocacy around the benefits of breastfeeding, as well as the benefits of knowing your own personal physical and psychological boundaries and what works for you as a mother and woman in the environment that you live. While I have no problem with bluntness, as you suggest you feel you need to be, I too believe in bluntness. So, not to consider women in their social, political, physical and psychological environment and to flat out say with such seemingly lack of consciousness and naiveté “Moms, if you hate to touch and be touched, you can change. If you, like me, developed an avoidant attachment style, you learned to shun intimacy. With a loving partner, you can change. You can learn to cuddle and enjoy it.” Really?! Do you have a magic silver bullet treatment to work quickly with adults who have an avoidant attachment style in time for women to feed their kids before they starve to death, because since formula is risky, evil, junk, they shouldn’t eat until their mom’s attachment and relational style is repaired, right?

If this is sounding like a personal response, that’s because it is. I take very personally the messages that are sent specifically by women on behalf of other women that functions to take away any opportunities for choice and agency, let alone women who are in positions of power. While there is definitely a time and a place to offer women, new moms and moms-to-be objective information, as well as supportive and encouraging words and resources to implement this important and life-giving information so that they can make the best decision for themselves and their families, this is not what you did. You used terror tactics. I didn’t know we as therapists were in the business of needing to cure individual’s misgivings with terror and hurt? What you did was more like providing an environment of shame, fear, hurt and indignation. Was this really the only option of communicating the importance of breastfeeding? I really hope that you are able to reflect on your post and see if you can not reconsider your approach in working with women around breastfeeding and maternal mental health, we really need each other to support, nurture and care for one another’s overall well being without fear of attack, shame and guilt.

Hmmm, one article...and about risk factors..not causal links...only correlative data...

And who was blaming BF? Are you reading the posts? No one blamed BF. I simply said that some women are too sick to breastfeed and that they deserve to be cut a break. I'd love for you to come up with affordable options for milk banks, they don't exist and my clients are sick now, they cannot wait for the change and I'd prefer that they are not guilt tripped for making the only choice that is currently available.

Until you sit on a room with a woman who is coming out of her own skin because her symptoms are so unberable you will never be able to understand. I will continue to support them in deciding to get well, even if it means they need to give up BF and in the cases where they can continue to BF I will support that too.