Hospitals pressured to end free baby formula

[laundry_queen]

107. In your experience.

In mine, a single feeding in the hospital meant a baby that simply couldn't suck from my breast. Luckily I had so much milk it just poured into her mouth. She finally began to latch properly when she was 6 months old. She was my first. With my fourth, same thing. With my middle 2, no bottles, no problems. At all.

Statistically, babies who are fed even one bottle feeding are more likely to get nipple confused and be weaned early. Scientific studies, not anecdotal. That's just facts. Go ahead and get defensive over facts. The fact is you don't know which baby WILL have a problem with that single bottle feeding. Some will, some won't. You were lucky and/or determined, that's all.

Not to mention nurses and doctors are woefully undereducated when it comes to breastfeeding. The hospitals I stayed at were pitiful. My best friend became a lactation consultant just because she, as a child birth educator, was so tired of the sabotage that went on in the hospital - for women who WANTED to breastfeed. I ended up helping her out with her classes as well. A HUGE lack of education, especially about newborns/dehydration/allowable meds/nipple confusion etc. The hospital ended up calling US for info, that's how bad it was (small town). Hospitals are a really terrible place to get breastfeeding/supplementation information.