"Time Wasting Rules" - from Real Simple Magazine - NOT GOOD!

I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings." They go on to quote Boris Petrikovsky,
chairman of the department of obstetrics-gynecology at Nassau
University Medical Center, in East Meadow, New York, as saying, "The
biggest downside of not breast-feeding is that the mother misses out
on some of the bonding."

You can check the article out yourself by visiting
http://www.RealSimple.com - use access code easyfood to view the current
issue.
I strongly urge you to write letters of protest. You can reach the managing
editor, Kristin van Ogtrop by email at , or by snail
mail at:

REAL SIMPLE, Time & Life Building
Rockefeller Center
New York, NY 10020-1393.

Be sure to include your full name, address, and home telephone on any
correspondence for verification purposes.You might also consider contacting
Clinique, JJill, Sephora, Eucerin, The Container Store, and Brita, major
advertisers in this magazine, to let them know about your displeasure.
Please make everyone aware of this shameful behavior on Real Simple's part."

Please, folks, let's bombard the mag with the REAL facts...not some drivel
written to grab attention & sell mags.

Corinne


************************************************** ***
When mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

In article ymHPa.38200$H17.11890@sccrnsc02, "Corinne"
wrote:

I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings."

Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

meh
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

dragonlady wrote:

In article ymHPa.38200$H17.11890@sccrnsc02, "Corinne"
wrote:



I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings."



Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

meh



Actually, that's the one thing I agree with. My first child was
formula-fed, and my second
breastfed. The formula-feeding was definitely simpler for me. But
then, it might have
made my life "simpler" to plop the babies in a playpen in a soundproofed
room and close
the door. What's simplest is not always what's preferable.

Clisby

In article ,
Clisby Williams wrote:

dragonlady wrote:

In article ymHPa.38200$H17.11890@sccrnsc02, "Corinne"
wrote:



I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings."



Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

meh



Actually, that's the one thing I agree with. My first child was
formula-fed, and my second
breastfed. The formula-feeding was definitely simpler for me. But
then, it might have
made my life "simpler" to plop the babies in a playpen in a soundproofed
room and close
the door. What's simplest is not always what's preferable.

Clisby


I don't want to dispute you -- I believe you -- but I can't figure out
how formula and bottles could be simpler than breastfeeding, especially
if you spend much time out of the house, but even if you are home all
the time.

Can you explain how it was simpler?

meh
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

dragonlady wrote:

In article ,
Clisby Williams wrote:



dragonlady wrote:



In article ymHPa.38200$H17.11890@sccrnsc02, "Corinne"
wrote:





I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings."




Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

meh




Actually, that's the one thing I agree with. My first child was
formula-fed, and my second
breastfed. The formula-feeding was definitely simpler for me. But
then, it might have
made my life "simpler" to plop the babies in a playpen in a soundproofed
room and close
the door. What's simplest is not always what's preferable.

Clisby




I don't want to dispute you -- I believe you -- but I can't figure out
how formula and bottles could be simpler than breastfeeding, especially
if you spend much time out of the house, but even if you are home all
the time.

Can you explain how it was simpler?

meh



Sure. The major thing, of course, is that if you formula-feed a child,
you don't have to do
it all. Until my daughter was about 7 months old, my husband did the
majority of the
feeding (he was the SAHP for most of that time.) How could BF possibly
have been simpler for me?

With my breastfed child: for the first 3 months, breastfeeding was
very difficult. YMMV,
but I can't consider something that caused that much pain to have made
my life simpler.
The second three months were much better, but still not easy, by any
measure. And again,
I had to do it all. That's the huge downside of breastfeeding. I
think it's easy now; but
I have a 17-month-old who only nurses 3-4 times in a 24-hour period, and
probably wouldn't
care if I cut it back to twice.

In my experience of reading these newsgroups, people who talk about the
inconvenience
of formula feeding typically are grossly exaggerating the amount of time
and bother it takes.
Here's the kind of thing I read:

1. You have to sterilize bottles. (No, you don't.)
2. You have to get up in the middle of the night and fix a bottle.
(Only if your definition
of "fixing a bottle" is: reach in the refrigerator, pull out a
bottle, stick it in the baby's
mouth. If you have a picky baby, maybe you microwave it for 10
seconds first.)
3. If you go out with the baby, you have to wait until you find
somewhere to warm up
the bottle. (No, you don't.)
4. You have to go to the trouble of buying the formula. (Oh, give me
a break.)
5. You might run out of formula. (Never happened. How much
trouble is it to remember
to buy the only food your baby eats?)



Clisby

"Clisby Williams" wrote in message
...


dragonlady wrote:

In article ,
Clisby Williams wrote:



dragonlady wrote:



In article ymHPa.38200$H17.11890@sccrnsc02, "Corinne"
wrote:





I was alerted to this article on an email group I'm part of....I was
AMAZED
and greatly disappointed to read the following:

"The August 2003 issue of Real Simple magazine, currently on
newstands,
contains an article titled "20 Time Wasting Rules to Break Now."
(page 136)

What's one of the rules to break? Breastfeeding. The article states
that with bottle-feeding, "you know exactly how much food the baby is
eating, and Mom may be less tired because Dad has no excuse to sleep
through 3 a.m. feedings."




Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea
anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

meh




Actually, that's the one thing I agree with. My first child was
formula-fed, and my second
breastfed. The formula-feeding was definitely simpler for me. But
then, it might have
made my life "simpler" to plop the babies in a playpen in a soundproofed
room and close
the door. What's simplest is not always what's preferable.

Clisby




I don't want to dispute you -- I believe you -- but I can't figure out
how formula and bottles could be simpler than breastfeeding, especially
if you spend much time out of the house, but even if you are home all
the time.

Can you explain how it was simpler?

meh



Sure. The major thing, of course, is that if you formula-feed a child,
you don't have to do
it all. Until my daughter was about 7 months old, my husband did the
majority of the
feeding (he was the SAHP for most of that time.) How could BF possibly
have been simpler for me?

With my breastfed child: for the first 3 months, breastfeeding was
very difficult. YMMV,
but I can't consider something that caused that much pain to have made
my life simpler.
The second three months were much better, but still not easy, by any
measure. And again,
I had to do it all. That's the huge downside of breastfeeding. I
think it's easy now; but
I have a 17-month-old who only nurses 3-4 times in a 24-hour period, and
probably wouldn't
care if I cut it back to twice.

In my experience of reading these newsgroups, people who talk about the
inconvenience
of formula feeding typically are grossly exaggerating the amount of time
and bother it takes.
Here's the kind of thing I read:

1. You have to sterilize bottles. (No, you don't.)
2. You have to get up in the middle of the night and fix a bottle.
(Only if your definition
of "fixing a bottle" is: reach in the refrigerator, pull out a
bottle, stick it in the baby's
mouth. If you have a picky baby, maybe you microwave it for 10
seconds first.)
3. If you go out with the baby, you have to wait until you find
somewhere to warm up
the bottle. (No, you don't.)
4. You have to go to the trouble of buying the formula. (Oh, give me
a break.)
5. You might run out of formula. (Never happened. How much
trouble is it to remember
to buy the only food your baby eats?)



Clisby






Sorry I certainly don't want to say that breastfeeding is time wasting. I
have every intention of breastfeeding my second for as long as possible.

However I do agree, bottle feeding was easier for us. For pretty much the
same reasons. I made up all the bottles at once and then he had the same
amount at the same time very day, very simple. I did breastfeed him at first
before he got into a pattern, I imagine bottle feeding on demand in the
early weeks is a bit more complicated though.

Judy

In article , Clisby Williams
writes


In my experience of reading these newsgroups, people who talk about the
inconvenience
of formula feeding typically are grossly exaggerating the amount of time
and bother it takes.

But that works both ways - I honestly think the truth of the matter is
that whatever you do routinely ends up being well practised and not
seeming to be too much bother. I pumped exclusively for months, and by
the end of the time I was pleased that I could get up, feed DS a bottle,
express and change his bum in 15 mins, now if I'm still awake 10 mins
after starting to feed ds#2 it feels like a long time - I guess it's all
subjective

Here's the kind of thing I read:

1. You have to sterilize bottles. (No, you don't.)
I know in the states it's not always done, but here the 'official'
advice is still to sterilise up to about 6 months, even if you don't
have to sterilise you still have to wash them. Not everyone has a
dishwasher.

2. You have to get up in the middle of the night and fix a bottle.
(Only if your definition
of "fixing a bottle" is: reach in the refrigerator, pull out a
bottle, stick it in the baby's
mouth. If you have a picky baby, maybe you microwave it for 10
seconds first.)

Still have to prep the bottle before going to bed, get up to fetch it,
and that's more than if you're co-sleeping, not so much more though if
baby is in another room.

3. If you go out with the baby, you have to wait until you find
somewhere to warm up
the bottle. (No, you don't.)

True, but you do have to plan how many bottles, and carry them with you.

4. You have to go to the trouble of buying the formula. (Oh, give me
a break.)

Trouble, no, expense? Yes.
5. You might run out of formula. (Never happened. How much
trouble is it to remember
to buy the only food your baby eats?)

Depends how disorganised you are - we occasionally run out of nappies
even though it should be obvious when we're getting low on them.
--
Jenn
UK

On Fri, 11 Jul 2003 23:30:47 GMT, dragonlady
wrote:

Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

Well first of all, I didnt clean bottles. I used the replaceable bags
and had enough nipples to lst a long time.

Secondly (and this is a benefit, having done both), my younger
children could be held and fed by their dad, by me, by their ten year
old sister ..you get the drift.

I got much more sleep as a formula feeding parent, and much more free
time.

This is not a statement about the value of one kind of feeding over
the other, just a statement on my experience with the "time" factor.

Barb

In article ,
Barbara Bomberger wrote:

On Fri, 11 Jul 2003 23:30:47 GMT, dragonlady
wrote:

Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.

Well first of all, I didnt clean bottles. I used the replaceable bags
and had enough nipples to lst a long time.

Secondly (and this is a benefit, having done both), my younger
children could be held and fed by their dad, by me, by their ten year
old sister ..you get the drift.

I got much more sleep as a formula feeding parent, and much more free
time.

This is not a statement about the value of one kind of feeding over
the other, just a statement on my experience with the "time" factor.

Barb


I can definately see how formula and bottles would be a time saver and
simpler for the mother in a household with more adults (or older kids)
than babies; I know how much I enjoyed feeding my younger brother and
sister -- and if mom had nursed, I would not have had that particular
pleasure. I guess I was just thinking in terms of "person hours" --
the total time spent -- not just "mother hours".

meh
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

dragonlady wrote:

In article ,
Barbara Bomberger wrote:



On Fri, 11 Jul 2003 23:30:47 GMT, dragonlady
wrote:



Aside from everything else that's wrong with this, I can't, personally,
imagine that bottle feeding is LESS time consuming that breast feeding
-- assuming you aren't "propping" your baby, which is a bad idea anyway.
I know I visited households with twins the same age as mine who were
being bottle fed, and the amount of time devoted to mixing formula,
cleaning bottles, buying stuff, and, in one case, keeping the two
formulas seperate -- it just looked like a real time consuming effort
compared to plopping a breast (or two) out.


Well first of all, I didnt clean bottles. I used the replaceable bags
and had enough nipples to lst a long time.

Secondly (and this is a benefit, having done both), my younger
children could be held and fed by their dad, by me, by their ten year
old sister ..you get the drift.

I got much more sleep as a formula feeding parent, and much more free
time.

This is not a statement about the value of one kind of feeding over
the other, just a statement on my experience with the "time" factor.

Barb




I can definately see how formula and bottles would be a time saver and
simpler for the mother in a household with more adults (or older kids)
than babies; I know how much I enjoyed feeding my younger brother and
sister -- and if mom had nursed, I would not have had that particular
pleasure. I guess I was just thinking in terms of "person hours" --
the total time spent -- not just "mother hours".

meh



Yes. It's just like hiring a cleaning service makes life simpler for
me. Of course somebody
else is putting in the time cleaning - but the important factor is that
it ain't always me.

Clisby