Hellobee Boards

Part of my reason for being EBF was the supply and demand nature of breastfeeding. Introducing either formula or donor milk will often result in less stimulation of the breast and therefore a corresponding drop in supply. Here's a link to a blog post that explains it quite well:

http://nurshable.com/2012/06/18/when-donor-milk-is-no-different-than-formula/

My other reasons were that EBF is the norm for my family (but not necessarily my circle of friends) and that I'm extremely pig-headed so wasn't going to go down without a fight! I also believe that I had no need or reason to formula feed once I got past those rough first few weeks.

For me, I think it was severe stubbornness, like @kemma. I kept telling myself "women have been doing this for years, this is what my body is made to do, you grew this damn child from nothing and now you can't even feed him like you were designed to?!"

I grew up just assuming that is what I'd do. My mum BF me, then twins then my brother for 12 months each. It's just what was done. I never considered anything else. And what kemma said about supply and demand.

Plus I'm a cheapo and couldn't stomach the idea of spending money on formula when I had perfectly good milk right there

@Kemma: This (supply/demand) was my primary reason as well.

Also, while I think this aticle (http://www.naba-breastfeeding.org/images/Just%20One%20Bottle.pdf) is a little over the top, allergy sensitization and the whole gut flora thing did/do give me pause about supplementing unless I absolutely need to (i.e., baby is hungry and adding nursing or pumping sessions isn't enough). So far I've been lucky to avoid it, but if I need to I will and I know it won't be the end of the world.

@78h2o: that's a great link!

Yup supply/demand is my biggest motivator. I think sometimes in the heat of the moment women will reach for the formula to give themselves a break and while I totally understand that, I believe it can often be the beginning of the end of breastfeeding. But I also have a very good friend who supplemented early on because her milk came in late but now has a healthy 9 month old who hasn't had any formula since she was about two weeks. For me I just keep telling myself that my body is made to supply her all the milk she needs. If she's a little short at daycare one day she'll just make that up with an extra feeding that night an I'm fine with that.

I'm due at the same time as you, but I already know I WANT to ebf. Luke others its mostly so I don't mess up my supply. I've know way too many moms who supplemented with just a little formula in the beginning and ended up pretty much exclusively ffing. Maybe they would have anyway, but I want to give me and the baby the best chance at bfing for a year and so much seems to be determined right at the beginning when it's hardest.

Because LO never really wanted a bottle and I didn't want to clean them! EBF was easier in the long run for me.

I have been fortunate to not have to supplement thus far, although we did give one bottle of formula in DS' second week because I didn't understand the witching hour/comfort nursing thing and thought he was still hungry.

For me, quite frankly, I wanted/would like to avoid supplementing because of the cost of formula. It also seemed like a slippery slope where, like others have mentioned, it would impact my supply and also it seemed like a pain in the butt -- baby eats so frequently in the beginning that I didn't want to be nursing every hour on top of mixing formula and having to figure out how much to give and all that. Breastfeeding can be stressful enough without introducing another feeding aspect! If I had had to supplement, I may have just gone to formula entirely.

Now that our breastfeeding relationship and my supply are established, though, if going back to work ends up affecting my supply, I would supplement and continue to nurse/offer pumped milk to the best of my ability. I would be willing to go as far as offering formula at daycare and nursing when LO and I are together, but if it came to not even producing enough to satisfy LO when he's getting it from the tap, I'd need to re-evaluate things. Pumping is such a PITA that if I could only generate a bottle's worth from 3 pumping sessions, I'm not sure I would stick to it. I feel comfortable enough with the benefits that LO has received so far with breastfeeding, many of which studies suggest can last as long as 3 years of age.

FYI DS is 13 weeks.

Virgin gut theory, which people have mentioned... also I am stubborn and I don't want to pay money for an artificial product that is inferior to what I have to offer naturally. (Obviously if I had had some problems that would have not been so easy to say!!) Also supply... and having heard from too many people that a little formula here and there turned into more and more and baby started refusing the breast. I really didn't want that to happen.

I have to say before I became a mama I didn't understand any of this either. I remember when a friend's baby had food intolerances and I was like, just give the kid formula! I don't know why the switch then flipped for me

Laziness. Don't want to have to worry about mixing bottles, cleaning bottles, shopping for formula.
And greediness. I like to hog my baby.

@ladyfingers: Your "if going to work affects my supply" scenario is what eventually happened to us- DS got only breastmilk (nursing if I was around, bottles of pumped milk at daycare or if I wasn't around for whatever reason) till he was 7 months old, and then I just couldn't keep up with pumping and had exhausted my freezer stash, so I continued to nurse at night and in the mornings, pump a few times a day and get about 1/3 of what DS would drink from bottles in a day, and just supplemented for the rest. It would have been great if I'd managed to pump more for longer, but I feel pretty good about what we did and I wasn't willing to spend the time or energy on doing everything possible to increase supply at that point. By then, breastfeeding was easy, and he was pretty equally happy to nurse, take a bottle of breastmilk, or take a bottle of formula, so I didn't have to worry about one affecting another. We may have started supplementing earlier than I'd have liked, but the whole process was very easy.

@oliviaoblivia: I must admit in the beginning especially, there was a bit of martyrdom to it -- "OMG it is so hard being the only one who can feed my baby!"

Well, my LO had formula for the first 10 days of her life because we couldn't get her to latch. I began to hand express some milk once we got home so she was able to have both breast and formula until we had an LC come and help us.

So, she was exclusively fed breast milk from 10 days until a little after she turned 1 (and now is on breast milk and cow's milk). I wanted to feed her exclusively because

1) My body makes milk specifically for my baby. How cool is that?
2) I wanted that magical special bond I heard about
3) How many times have I heard breast is best?
4) I wanted to keep my supply up for as long as possible

Breastfeeding was super hard in the beginning but luckily I am so stubborn that even though I would cringe in pain and want to throw my baby from my breast, I was not giving up. I'm glad I didn't. Plus it was way easier for middle of the night feedings to just pop a boob in her mouth.

@oliviaoblivia: Yes! I could hog my baby simply by saying, "Oh she needs to eat." Loved that.

1. I knew the supply/demand aspect, that even though I didn't have supply issues for me to make it the long haul I *needed* to tell my body to lay lots of prolactin triggers by nursing alot! (These prolactin triggers that the same ones the body relies on when you have dips/sickness/nursing strikes later on down the road).

2. I'm one of the few moms around here that is actually against formula use unless medically necessary. I don't see breastfeeding as "best" but as the standard so to me it' the "risk of not breastfeeding".

I also read a great study by the NIH on this & how attitude has greatly affected how our society sees breastfeeding. It helped me change my attitude to (which was part of my unsuccess with my first)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2812877/

3. I had plenty of reasons to quit, and many moms in the same position do quit, but these reasons just made me want to keep with it more. I felt like b/c of the intolerance issues we had with P that my milk was even MORE what she needed & that she deserved me making the sacrifice to continue to provide for her.

Now I didn't successfully breastfeed DS, so I fully understand when a mom is unable to continue. In my case though it was more about getting awful counsel from our pedi & my lack of education/support. I just wasn't okay with having that happen again so I changed my perspective on it & basically refused to not breastfeed. The only drops of formula P has had were when we were in the hospital and ONLY because the doctor ordered a clean catch urine & they had already tried once to get it... to me the risk of needing to do a third catherization far outweighed the risk of giving her formula.

For me and my family, formula isn't an option unless 110% medically necessary...and only after donor milk. I saw no reason at all to give formula when I could breastfeed.

it wasn't intentionally ebf, but we were lucky enough to be able to do it at this point (5.5 mths).

milk didnt come in right away so ds was on formula for a day after we found out he'd lost a lot of weigh tin the first few days. after that my milk came in and i stubbornly told myself that i was going to give it 200%.

since day 5 pp, we've had no-lil issues, it saves $$, i love the time with DS, and he take a bottle no problem. we have no reason not to ebf at this point.

My reason was that formula costs money. Breastmilk is free, so there wasn't really any choice in it for us.

It's also so much easier...but I was/am a SAHM, so I didn't have to pump reguarly.

Virgin gut and supply/demand. If a baby has ever had even one ounce of formula, they are not considered EBF. One solids are introduced, they are not EBF anymore. Yes, every ounce counts and any ammount of BM a mom can give is great, but "EBF is special" (quoting Nancy Holtzman).

Moneys! And health benefits. I didn't have any problems BFing, though...if we had needed to use formula, we would have done so.