The Beautiful Letdown

A breastfeeding blog that dabbles in tandem, extended nursing, gentle parenting and much more

“What is the Goal in Breastfeeding?”">“What is the Goal in Breastfeeding?”

August2

Ever since my hus­band set up this blog for me, I have got­ten a kick out of read­ing the searches that direct peo­ple to my blog.  I get a lot of searches about dairy free breast­feed­ing and donat­ing blood.  I also get a lot of searches about let­down and breast­feed­ing although I have writ­ten very lit­tle on that sub­ject (but plan to do more if it in the future).  The other day, I was look­ing at the search results and I found this one:  “What is the goal in breastfeeding?”

I loved that ques­tion, because I think it is such an open ended ques­tion.  One thing I would sug­gest to the per­son who typed it in is that she (?) ask her­self “What is MY goal in breast­feed­ing?” Breast­feed­ing is a method of feed­ing a baby, but it is also a very per­sonal expe­ri­ence.  It is a rela­tion­ship between a mom and a baby.  There is def­i­nitely a place for a sup­port par­ent (mom or dad) in the breast­feed­ing rela­tion­ship, but the pri­mary rela­tion­ship exists between mom and baby.

There are many rea­sons peo­ple choose to breast­feed.  Here are a few:

  • Money sav­ings (even if you sub­tract the cost of a pump)
  • Just because I always knew I wanted to
  • Breast­feed­ing can help some moms lose weight
  • In some stud­ies, breast­milk has been linked to lower rates of SIDS, fewer ear infec­tions, fewer aller­gies, lower rates of dia­betes, lower rates of obe­sity, and lower rates of cer­tain can­cers
  • Breast­milk changes in com­po­si­tion over time, so as baby grows, the milk becomes just what he or she needs at that age.  New­born milk is dif­fer­ent than 6 month old baby milk or 1 year old milk or tod­dler milk
  • Breast­fed babies’ dia­pers sink less.  Lets face it, poop is poop.  Some is just less nasty
  • Palate for­ma­tion
  • Less envi­ron­men­tal waste (no for­mula pack­ag­ing or pro­cess­ing, no trans­porta­tion, no energy used to heat)
  • It is a way to be with baby and pro­vide for baby when a mom is at work or away for other reasons
  • Breast­milk is the stan­dard that for­mula strives to equal.  There are no health ben­e­fits for formula.

If you search for rea­sons to breast­feed, there are lists and lists of rea­sons out there on the inter­net.  Some rea­sons may rea­sonate with you more (Breast­feed­ing decreases both a mother’s risk and the breast­fed daughter’s risk of devel­op­ing breast can­cer) than oth­ers (That’s what breasts are for).  Both rea­sons are true, but I find some rea­sons to be a lot more per­son­ally rel­e­vant than oth­ers.  I am con­cerned about aller­gies, asthma, eczema, and can­cer.  To me, these things are some of the rea­sons I keep on going on some of the tough days.

I also joined the Jan­u­ary Breast­feed­ing Car­ni­val and wrote a post on my own goals for nurs­ing.  These were goals spe­cific to my sit­u­a­tion at the time.  I had a 3 year old tan­dem nurs­ing with a 1.5 year old.  My goals may be dif­fer­ent than yours.  These weren’t always my goals, but they are now at this time at this place in my rela­tion­ship with my boys.

So, I would sug­gest to the per­son who was search­ing for that answer to do her research.  Dig into the research that sur­rounds breast­milk.  Talk to friends and fam­ily who have breast­fed.  Con­sider your own sit­u­a­tion.  The goals that were right for oth­ers are not nec­es­sar­ily right for you.  That is the amaz­ing part about par­ent­ing.  You and your baby work together in a part­ner­ship.  You learn about each other. You respond to each other.  You form a mom/baby pair unlike any other.  Then, you change.  You keep on chang­ing as each of you grows and matures and devel­ops new desires and needs.

Think­ing back to the time before K was born, I can share with you my goals for breast­feed­ing.  Please, God, please let me make it to six weeks.  That was my first goal.  I read some­where that a mom should keep on breast­feed­ing through the first six weeks, because those are the hard­est days.  After that, things seem to set­tle down and it becomes more rou­tine and more man­age­able.  I am so glad that I heeded that advice.  My first six weeks with K were hard.  Once I reached that point, I was able to set a new goal, and I decided that I would nurse him until at least 3 months, then 6 months, and a year.  After that point, my goals became less time based and more behav­iorally based.  Be there for him.  Breast­feed on demand.  Be pos­i­tive even when I didn’t feel positive.

I know I have said it over and over again, but breast­feed­ing is a rela­tion­ship.  When baby is young, the baby’s needs take prece­dence much of the time.  As baby gets older, it becomes an ever chang­ing rela­tion­ship that can be molded and formed to meet the needs of both parties.

So, what is the goal of breast­feed­ing?  To me, it is to meet the needs of my chil­dren in the moment that we are expe­ri­enc­ing. What is it to you?

posted under Breastfeeding
11 Comments to

““What is the Goal in Breastfeeding?””

  1. On August 2nd, 2009 at 9:50 pm desiree fawn Says:

    This is such a fan­tas­tic post — thank you for shar­ing all of that information!

    Everyone’s goals are dif­fer­ent — but I think we all have one thing in com­mon, as most mamas do — we want the best for our babes!

  2. On August 2nd, 2009 at 10:11 pm Casey Says:

    @desiree fawn -
    I hes­i­tated to write the post, because I didn’t want any­one to think that my goals are THE goals for breast­feed­ing, but I also wanted to open up a dis­cus­sion on what breast­feed­ing is and how it works dif­fer­ently for dif­fer­ent women and babies.

  3. On August 3rd, 2009 at 7:02 am desiree fawn Says:

    I think it’s a great thing to get women think­ing about what breast­feed­ing means for them and their famililes :)

  4. On August 3rd, 2009 at 8:08 am Away2me (Deanna) Says:

    My goal is nour­ish my twin boys with breast­milk till they no longer need it. Like you, my first goal was six weeks, then 3 months. Now at 5 1/2 months I’m in no hurry to end the process. I worked so hard to get this far, why would I want to stop?

    Nurs­ing twins is not easy, but boy is it worth it. My boys are exclu­sively breast­fed (we did have to sup­ple­ment the first 3 weeks do to latch­ing issues). But I look at my healthy, chunky-thighed, smil­ing, shiny faced babies and grin.

  5. On August 3rd, 2009 at 8:16 am Mom On The Go Says:

    We had trou­ble for the first few days after Reid was born, as I sat pump­ing because she wouldn’t latch, I decided that she would have breast­milk for the first year at least, even if it didn’t come straight from me. Once we got the latch worked out, I decided I’d stick it out for a year. But some­times, I just had to make it until dawn. Even­tu­ally, I real­ized that what I needed to do was nurse Reid until she didn’t need it any­more. We reached that goal when she was 4 years, 2 months. There is no goal that I’ve set in my life that I am prouder of achiev­ing. I’d read about the health and social ben­e­fits of nurs­ing on demand and they’re impor­tant but ulti­mately, my goal was to give what she needed.

  6. On August 3rd, 2009 at 9:41 am PoppaBlog Says:

    This is a fan­tas­tic post, I’ve passed it to my wife. We’re hav­ing some dif­fi­culty get­ting our daugh­ter to take a bot­tle (of breast milk) in prepa­ra­tion for her upcom­ing time with the nanny and a week­end home alone with dad. Sad­dest part is, I don’t even want her (my daugh­ter) to have to spend a moment feed­ing that isn’t with her mother. It is truly a mag­i­cal time for mom and baby…and to be hon­est, before becom­ing a father, I just thought that breast feed­ing was no big deal, just a way to get baby fed with­out drop­ping a ton of cash on for­mula. Now, as a father and I see the bond and the beauty of it, it’s truly an incred­i­ble thing.

  7. On August 3rd, 2009 at 11:55 am Super Healthy Kids Says:

    My biggest regret is not breast­feed­ing longer. I did bet­ter with each child. First kid, 3 months, sec­ond child 6 months, and third child 9 months. They all turned out great, and it all worked out. But I can’t believe all the money I spent on for­mula, when I could have got­ten their food for free!

  8. On August 3rd, 2009 at 8:21 pm Allie Says:

    Great post!

    My goals were sim­i­lar, for my son who nursed until 2.5 yrs old nurs­ing met so many of his needs. Phys­i­cal, emo­tional and devel­op­men­tal mile­stones were all linked to nurs­ing for us. As well as being some­thing we shared and bonded with.

    SO for us the goal was to meet his basic needs as well as a tool for par­ent­ing for me.

  9. On August 4th, 2009 at 6:41 am Susan Says:

    LOL — I found you when search­ing about blood donation.

    My goal was to give my daugh­ter the best start pos­si­ble in life. Now I guess my goal is to allow her to con­tinue as long as she wants.

    It is so true about the first few weeks being the worst. I can totally under­stand the peo­ple who give up in the first few weeks.

  10. On August 4th, 2009 at 5:53 pm Wendi Says:

    Hey, Casey! I found you via Twit­ter and I had to click over since I’m from North Dakota, too. (I left when I was 16.)

    Any­way, I have two boys who are now almost 6 and 8, and they breast­fed exclu­sively for a year each. Now we are rock­stars at our pediatrician’s office because we’re only there once a year for check-ups. Both boys have been on antibi­otics just once. I loved doing it.

  11. On September 6th, 2009 at 12:32 am Future Mama Says:

    Wow! what a great story! I love read­ing about rela­tion­ships moms build with their babies while breast­feed­ing! I’m totally with you on research­ing before hand! I know I’m a lit­tle early but I still love learn­ing about it! I can’t wait to expe­ri­ence that bond! Thanks so much for shar­ing this post! I linked to it on my blog! :)