bare minimum bfing duration

little background here. A friend of mine recently had an emergency c
section and she had one heck of a time delivering the baby. now they
are doing fine. the baby stayed in icu for few days and for the lack
of knowing better they gave the baby a bottle and guess what! ended up
with nipple confusion. I warned her about this problem but still..

Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
get breast milk? I told 6 months.

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

Thanks.

"ted" wrote in message
om...
What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

I don't think it's really quantifiable. I mean, some babies are never
breastfed and do OK, so it could be argued that the bare minimum is no time
at all! It all depends on what you consider acceptable.

Personally, I suppose a bare minimum for me would be to nurse until she can
thrive on a balanced diet of 'real' food, since I never want my baby to have
formula. That's just me though, and even that is not a specific time limit,
since it depends on my baby's readiness.

Considering the problems your friend has been having, it probably wouldn't
be wise to tell her she has to nurse for x number of months. It might be
best if she just concentrate on getting the baby to the breast and take it
one day at a time.

Just my opinion.

Lucy

"ted" wrote
What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

LLL have a saying: 1 year is better than 1 month, 1 month is better than 1
week, 1 week is better than 1 day, 1 day is better than 1 hour.

IOW, each additional feed adds to the previous ones but even 1feed is better
than none.

Jean - who took it one *minute* at a time at one stage

--
HOLLY: Nothing wrong with dog's milk. Full of goodness, full of
vitamins, full of marrowbone jelly. Lasts longer than any other type
of milk, dog's milk.
LISTER: Why?
HOLLY: No bugger'll drink it. Plus the advantage of dog's milk is when
it goes off it takes exactly the same as when it's fresh.
LISTER: Why didn't you tell me, Holly?!
HOLLY: What, and spoil your tea?
(Red Dwarf: Series 2, Episode 1)

ted wrote:
snip

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?


I think of one year as the barest bare minimum. I get sad when I hear
about children under the age of two being weaned. But then, I'm a
zealot :-)


Emily

ted wrote:

But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

As long as she can. There's no magic cutoff date.

Phoebe
--
yahoo address is unread - substitute mailbolt

"Emily Roysdon" wrote in message
om...
ted wrote:
snip

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

delurk

When I had my first child I had terrible problems getting him to latch,
partially because I didn't have much for him to latch on to, I had also had
a c-section which meant finding a decent position was much harder and
partially because the midwives kept sneaking him out in the night and giving
him a bottle, but then berating me when he wouldn't latch properly. This
was 10 years ago, and UK midwifery policies have changed a bit since then.

At the time also, it was recommended to breast feed for 3-4 months if
possible, rather than the recommended 6 months now.

I ended up struggling on through the colostrum stage (expressing mostly) and
then moving on to formula after that. In retrospect, I think I would have
struggled to keep him fed and happy after 3-4 months on mere milk, he was
taking 8x 8oz bottles a day by then.

I'm certainly going to try again this time around to b-f, but I think the
most important thing is to not have any expectations about what will happen
in the future.
I will give it my best shot, and if it works out then great. You can't
predict how things are going to turn out, and to my mind, you have to just
go with what's best for the baby while you can. Trying to put a timescale on
it adds un-necessary anxiety which if it doesn't go according to plan can
make the mother berate herself for "failing" and can add extra pressure to a
time when pressure is the last thing you really need. Feeding the baby
should be enjoyable, and no-one should feel guilty or unhappy if things
don't go the way they hope.

JMO

UberMinx

relurk

ted wrote:
Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
get breast milk? I told 6 months.

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/1974976.stm suggests that
breastfeeding up to 7 months increases IQ with each additional
month, but that breastfeeding beyond 7 months does not confer
additional benefit.

This agrees quite well with your six month estimate.
- Dan

Anyways, despite the pain and everything my friend is diligently
pumping and giving the baby ebm. When I called her last time we talked
about nursing the baby, quitting the bottle etc etc. She asked me how
long, in my opinon, is the absolute bare minimum that the baby should
get breast milk? I told 6 months.

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?


My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would allow a
baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk, period,
so they really must nurse.)

But really there is no set minimum. I think 6 months is a wise "bottom", but
I couldn't imagine weaning my daughter at age 6 months.

I think the ideal is to give breastmilk until the baby is old enough for
something other than formula. That usually means age 1. But is it reasonable
to expect a mother who pumps exclusively to pump for a full year? I don't
know. Obviously some babies never get breast milk. Others nurse for 6
years+. But as for biological minimums? I think age 1 is sort of the bottom
limit I'd accept for a baby without a tendancy to allergy and 2 years is the
absolute earliest I'd think about considering a child "self weaning" vs.
"nursing strike" in my family because we *all* get allergies.

Jenrose

"UberMinx" wrote in message
...

"Emily Roysdon" wrote in message
om...
ted wrote:
snip

What do you think? I agree that it would be best if the baby nurses
until he/she self weans. But for whatever reason if the mother just
can't do it, how long should she nurse the baby as a bare minimum
time?

delurk


I ended up struggling on through the colostrum stage (expressing mostly)
and
then moving on to formula after that. In retrospect, I think I would have
struggled to keep him fed and happy after 3-4 months on mere milk, he was
taking 8x 8oz bottles a day by then.


Given that my daughter was able to triple her birthweight in just over 4
months (She was not quite 8 pounds when born, was 20 pounds at her 4 month
check), you might be surprised. With a bad latch, it can be difficult to get
anything out. With a good latch, it's very difficult NOT to meet the needs
of even a "huge" baby. Or twins. It is rare, when a latch is good and a baby
nurses well and frequently, for a mother to not simply be able to produce
however much milk her kiddo needs.

If you were already expressing in the colostrum phase, I'm guessing that
nipple confusion added to whatever initial difficulties there were. What
kind of nipples do you have? (I know, odd personal question, but my breasts
are very large and my nipples very small, and if you've got the same, I can
probably tell you some ways of figuring how to make it work better next
time.)

FWIW--nursing was torture for me the first week. Then someone helped me fix
my latch (and my nipple shape turned out to be completely irrelevant to what
was making the latch bad) and poof, it worked and didn't hurt.

Jenrose

"Jenrose" wrote in message
s.com...

My *personal* minimum is two years. But that's the youngest I would allow
a
baby to wean (I won't feed any child of mine under age 2 cow's milk,
period,
so they really must nurse.)


I'm certainly not disputing your minimum of two years. I am, however,
disputing your claim that a child *must* nurse simply because they are not
drinking cows milk. You can get Vitamin D from sunlight and calcium from
cheese, yogurt, etc. and what happened to good old fashioned water for
hydration? Milk should certainly not be compared as a substitution for
breastmilk, nor should it be construed as a staple food for humans.

Shannon