I do not have a baby but my sister does, and she has done SOOO much research on breast feeding. I had no idea how fantastic it was for the baby until she had a baby! She can even tell me how her eating and drinking habits affect her breastmilk. Her baby was fed exclusively breast milk for 6 months (though sometime the breastmilk came from a bottle) and he is the healthiest baby I've ever met. Breast milk is positively a miracle food! 

I completely agree with you and I especially liked your paragraph about women "not producing enough milk." That is a HUGE pet peeve of mine because, you're right, women have done it for centuries and nearly everyone can breastfeed if they try hard enough!  Now, I know many women have had breast reduction surgeries and therefore do not produce enough, but they knew the risks when they went under the knife, so I feel less sympathy for them.  Many women who think they have supply issues actually have perfect supplies...they just have babies who prefer to nurse every hour for 3 minutes at a time, or a fast let-down that lets a baby get what they need in 5 minutes (like me), or like you said, can't get baby to latch properly (although for the most part, a baby who latches improperly still gets the milk, it just hurts Mama).  A nursing mom should NOT introduce formula unless it's the last possible resort to their baby starving...once the baby starts taking formula, the mom's supply will drastically decrease and eventually dry up.  I know, it happened to me with my first baby before I knew my body well enough to realize my milk supply wasn't the problem.  (She was going through a growth spurt and I mistook her grumpiness for hunger.  Gave her formula and my supply was gone within a month.)

Well I guess you don't have to worry for future generations, since our mandatory health/biology education in high school covers information on mammary glands, the antibodies from breast milk is the main reason since babies immune system isn't fully developed until after 6 months since birth. We're also taught about what we shouldn't be putting into our bodies that can affect the chemical make up of breast milk which could put the baby's health in danger. Ha! I still remember this stuff after 5 years =] you got nothing to worry about. 

edit: Well.. I guess some schools don't have mandatory health education o_O''' we can worry about those xD

I'm breastfeeding baby #2 right now. =) My first, I nursed for 17 months. I remember I had to give her formula once because I was very, very sick. She took one suck, and gagged. She hated the taste. LOL. =) Both of my kids have never been really sick (knock on wood) and I really think it's because I breastfed for so long.

@Brilliant_Innocence@xanga - I had a similar issue, she was in teh NICU I didn't have a pump of my own and the hospital wasn't able to provide one to me until 48 hrs after Ev was born.  I also wasn't even able to hold her about about 24 hrs after she was born and then wasn't able to feed her until about 30 mins before getting the pump.  That there was the start of the struggle.  After going home I pumped and pumped set my alarm to do it ever 1-2 hrs though the night.  I thought I was doing great i was able to bring about 12 ounces to the hospital for her every morning.  I spent the full day at the hospital with her (8 am-10 pm) and fed her on demand while there, but while I was gone she got the bottle usually with breast milk unless I they ran out which they seemed to often which made no sense to me 12 ounces was enough for 6-8 feedings at that point but I guess if they got her 2 ounces out and she only drank 1/2 of it they had to throw the rest out.  I wasn't upset that she got formula, I just hated not being able to give her the breast myself though the night, the hospital wasn't very accomedating.  We continued to breast feed while at home and I'd pump between feedings in mid January (ev was about 6 weeks) I had surgery that put me out for about 3 weeks, I couldn't eat I couldn't sit up with out vomitting, and I was in no position to breast feed I tried to pump as often as I could still to be able to at least make an attempt to hold on to my supply and after that I could no longer get her to properly latch and it was nearly impossible to pump even an ounce even if I pumped for 2 hrs at a time.  I tried herbal supplements and still nothing.  Lactation consultant helped where she could and still nothing.  I gave up after about 4 weeks of trying ot get back to normal even pumped every 3 hours for 30-45 minutes at a time, put her to breast as often as I could.  Then when she was about 4 months old with the help of my lactation consultant we gave a go at relactating and failed miserably at that.  I still feel loads of guilt and I'm sure theres something I could have done differently but now this is what works for us.  Shes fairly healthy and right on target for her age with weight and even above in some areas with motor skills.  I'm just thankful we were able to breastfeed in the beginning when its so crucial, I just still wish she breastfed. . as 1 year was my goal and then I would have made the decision to continue or not once we reached that. . . hmmph I'm still rather upset about this but we did what we needed to do and what worked for us.

I had a lot of the same problems other women have-milk coming in late (day 5), a baby who couldn't get enough to eat in the evenings when my supply was low, pain for almost the full first 6 weeks in spite of a fairly good latch, taking a medication, and worries about supply after returning to work. But I studied my butt off, even watched some of that guy's videos, and we hung in there. We had to use formula sometimes too, and just knowing the pitfalls, and making sure my supply got enough stimulation prevented any problems there.

The myth that really made me want to quit was the one that breastfed babies will never sleep through the night. I am relieved to say that one isn't completely true either

My milk supply was 2 days late, and because I'm totally inverted on both sides he had trouble latching on, I tried all the products available out there to fix this problem but nothing seemed to help, one nurse told me i was as inverted as they come so I pumped exclusively for 7 months, every 3 hours for 15 minutes at a time, then at that time my hubby had an emergency appendectomy so the stress of that decreased my milk supply so i supplemented with formula but still provided as much pumped milk as I could till he was 14 months. Alhmadullilah he's healthy and I'm pretty happy with my decision to pump even as tiring and impractical it was.

@The_Knight_In_Plaid_Armor@xanga - i heard someone say once "i'm going to get a surrogate to have my children because i don't want to lose my figure." i was like "really? so you're gonna ruin some other poor woman's figure because you're too vain to have your own kids? you probably shouldn't be having any then."

the way i see it, as long as my husband still thinks i'm attractive after we have kids, i'm doin' fine.

@soyeahthatswhathappened@xanga -  i agree on the fact that a child shouldnt be breastfed until 4 years. my cousins kid is almost 2 and she is still breastfeeding. even though my son didnt take to breastfeeding, i hadnt planned on doing it longer than needed (12-18 months). as soon as he was able to get majority of his nutrients from baby food/real food i had decided that i would start to wean him off the breast.

@viarah@xanga -  I didn't find my hospital very accomodating either.  I would constantly wonder when I was able to finally wait to put her to the breast.  I, of course, had to wait till she was off the breathing tube.  Once I finally got the green light, I had a time limit.  Most of that time was spent just trying to get her latched.  The nurses would help me, but it was hard.  She would fuss, latch for a minute, unlatch and sart fussing.  They would say, "okay, that's enough, we need to get her to eat".  They had a 30 minute window to get the babies to eat, and if she didn't eat enough, they wanted her on a feeding tube.  It was FRUSTRATING.  I also never knew they had a room where I could go to pump in.  I wondered how I could visit my daughter, but also pump every 1-2 hours.  We had to go home a lot so I could pump, and a few days before they released her, I was finally told about a room where I could go and pump.  I couldn't believe no one told me about it and since I wasn't roaming all over the blasted NICU, I never saw the room.  That would have made it so much easier if i had known.

There was also a time where I had brought in several bags of pumped milk, and they mixed it all together in one bottle and it totaled 1oz, which is the amount she was having every feeding.  I was so thrilled that she finally had a whole bottle of JUST breast milk.... and then, she didn't finish it all.  They threw the rest away.  I was thinking about how much work went into just getting that 1 oz for 1 feeding (several pumping sessions) and just wanted to cry.

In the end, I did what research I could, and like you, often wondered if I should or could have tried something different.  The past is the past though and there's no reason to dwell (It took a lot of time to get over the guilt and there are still times where It's hard). I'm sorry you had to go through all that you did, but you and I both know we made the best choice and did what we could and we shouldn't forget that.  :)

@Brilliant_Innocence@xanga - @Brilliant_Innocence@xanga - @viarah@xanga - 
in my years of working with childbearing women, this is becoming more and more clear.  There are still WAY too many hospitals that don't promote themselves as "baby friendly".   There are still way too many hospitals that don't understand how to support a mom who chooses to give her baby breastmilk while baby is in NICU.     Mothers should be taught how to hand express that very important colostrum in the first few days and be shown how to properly give it to their babies.  I wonder how many medical staff are aware that a newborn's stomach is the size of a chickpea?  I still see nurses attempting to feed a 2 day old baby 30 cc's of formula!   Their stomachs can't handle that!      Then mothers should be given pumps within the first 12 hours to start helping to increase their supply when they cannot put baby to the breast.

My theory on why hospitals/staff aren't making the change to a "baby friendly" place, is because it's more intensive and time consuming.  It's much easier for them to say "forget it ...here's a bottle of formula"  or a tube feeding procedure instead of the time to support and encourage a mom in the process of providing breastmilk and increasing her supply ---- and then after all that to still teach a baby to breastfeed.

The problem is multifaceted ....but the key is in education ..not just for parents, but also for the nursing/medical staff.

@soyeahthatswhathappened@xanga -  you wrote:  "your childs lifelong health is dependent on
your decision." i think that's a bit unfair- simply breastfeeding
your baby doesn't mean that their health will be good for the rest of
their life. clearly it is beneficial, but it's not all that determines
the health of your child. health is a lifelong commitment, it's not
ensured after infancy.

I undestand your response, and would just like to briefly respond to this,  Formula is relatively new -- perhaps less than 40 years. Researchers are just now starting to see the life long implications of no breastmilk.  You're right,  breastfeeding will not ENSURE a perfect health ......but, we underestimate the importance of breastmilk in favour of making formula an equal counterpart, which it is not.   We've recently learned the lifelong benefits of breastmilk - as compared to shorterm benefits.    You can google "lifelong benefits of breastmilk" to see what I mean.   As a starting point, you can go here:   http://www.naturaltherapypages.com.au/article/Benefits_of_Breast_Milk

I believe as a society/culture we're only just starting to truly understand the lifelong benefits of breastfeeding, and so I still stand behind my original statement and make no apology for it.