London - Maxine Lattimer’s first experience of motherhood was blighted when hospital staff refused to accept she was unable to breastfeed her newborn son Nicholas.
Maxine was told she would not be allowed to leave hospital until she successfully fed her baby. “In the end, after four days, I discharged myself,” says Maxine, who has a PhD in social anthropology and is married to mathematician Timothy.
“I fled. I felt as if I was escaping from prison. I couldn’t feed Nicholas, but I’d been told I had to stay in hospital until I succeeded. My nipples were almost inverted and it was impossible for poor Nicholas to latch on. Yet every time a shift changed, a new midwife would come and give me different advice.
“The first one said I needed to use nipple shields, but this made Nicholas gulp air and gave him colic. The next midwife insisted I try a breast pump, but I produced hardly any milk. I was deluged with conflicting advice.
“I was manhandled, Nicholas was grabbed and shoved. Staff who weren’t nurses woke me in the middle of the night and forced Nicholas to try to feed.
“They said: ‘All women can breastfeed if they want to do it enough.’ I felt stressed, exhausted and guilty. Friends were saying I looked ill, Nicholas cried every time I went near him and he was losing weight - but formula milk was never offered.”
Maxine’s experience is not isolated. As the NHS sets increasingly unrealistic breastfeeding targets - the theory being 99 percent of mothers should be able to breastfeed - her story is being repeated. Mothers are falling short of the expectations imposed by health workers, so rising numbers are being made to feel negligent if they opt to bottle-feed.
But is this guilt justified? The NHS line is unequivocal. It says breast milk is the only natural food designed for babies. It reiterates the long-held view that breastfeeding protects infants from infections, provides health benefits for the mother and creates a strong bond between parent and newborn.
But a controversial new book from the US calls this idea into question. In Is Breast Best?: Taking On The Breastfeeding Experts And The New High Stakes Of Motherhood, author Joan Wolf says the science underpinning the whole debate is dubious.
“I don’t claim that there are no differences between children who have been breast or bottle fed,” argues Wolf, who came to her conclusions after examining medical studies and data on breastfeeding. “Thousands of studies find the average breastfed baby is healthier than the average formula-fed baby.
“What nobody has found is compelling evidence that breastfeeding causes better health. The breastfeeding advantage could be due to a whole raft of other things that breastfeeding mothers are doing, not to the breast milk itself.”
She adds: “For example, if you ensure everyone who touches your baby washes their hands first; if you keep your baby away from supermarkets; if you have someone to care for your baby in your home, you’re probably doing a lot to reduce your baby’s chances of getting an infection.”
In short, Wolf is suggesting that most responsible parents will see no difference in the health and intelligence of bottle and breastfed children. And she has some supporters in this country.
Dr Ellie Lee, senior lecturer in social policy at the University of Kent, who carried out a study into women’s experiences of formula feeding in the early weeks of motherhood, says: “The NHS ideal is that new moms should breastfeed for the first six months - but 98 percent don’t.
“By imposing unrealistic targets you’re creating a gold standard which is unattainable, unworkable and undesirable.
“The official line is that 99 percent will be able to so with the right help early on. Yet I’ve spoken to lots of women who’ve had plenty of support - many even employ ‘lactation consultants’ because they so desperately want to succeed.
“In addition, many women see the ‘help’ they’ve received in hospitals as coercion.
“They find it difficult to convince healthcare professionals that they don’t want to - or can’t - breastfeed. I’ve heard of women who’ve been told they can’t leave hospital until they’ve shown they can feed.”
Writer Jai Fagan, 31, who, like Maxine, eventually opted to bottle-feed her son Isaac, had a similar experience. “After a traumatic birth and invasive treatment, the last thing I wanted to do was try breastfeeding,” she says.
But staff at St Michael’s University Hospital, Bristol - where she says she had otherwise excellent care - had other ideas.
“I was told that that if I didn’t succeed in breastfeeding, then I probably wouldn’t ever be able to,” she says. “They refused to give advice on formula milk.”
At the heart of both Maxine and Jai’s experiences were feelings of inadequacy. Maxine says: “My husband and I are not stupid - both of us have PhDs - and we’d read that children who aren’t breastfed are more likely to have low IQs, suffer asthma, obesity and allergies. It’s nonsense.
“When you go on to have subsequent children, you realise this and assert yourself. All my other babies were bottle-fed and all have been healthy. But when you’re a first-time mother, you’re vulnerable.”
Mom-of-two Clare Axworthy, 31, agrees. She bottle-fed her first son Eddie, six, but breastfed Sam, two. “I hadn’t made the breast or bottle decision with Sam,” she says. “But milliseconds after he was delivered he was thrust on to my breast by a midwife, who barked at me to get him to latch on as soon as possible. I felt bullied and insecure.
When Clare got back to her home in Crouch End, North London, she began to enjoy breastfeeding. What she objects to is the compulsion that accompanied her early efforts.
“I didn’t breastfeed Eddie because I didn’t want to,” she says. “I was 25 when he was born, and overwhelmed by motherhood and everything it entailed.
“But now I’ve got two strong, healthy boys, one breastfed and one not. Is Eddie harmed because I didn’t breastfeed him? No, of course he’s not.”
Dr Lee believes the whole issue of breastfeeding has become politicised. “The risks of failing to do it are exaggerated,” she says. “And what exactly is this contention that breastfed babies bond better with their mothers?”
These views resonate with Maxine. After her experience with Nicholas, now ten, she wrote a letter of complaint to St Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, and received an apology. Since then, she and Timothy, who live in Maidenhead, Berkshire, have had a further three children: Tobias, nine, Edward, seven, and Melissa, two. Maxine’s fifth child is due in March.
She says: “When Tobias came along, I refused to be swayed by all the propaganda. By the time Edward arrived, the hospital staff began to accept they’d lost the battle with me.”
So endemic is the belief that breast is best, many bottle-feeding mothers feel uncomfortable about publicly doing so. Maxine says: “I went to a baby-massage class and it was as if all the breastfeeding moms had won the gold stars. If you bottle-feed, you’re treated as if you’re giving your baby cocaine.
“The NHS has lost the plot - it’s not poison. It’s milk.”
Bottle-feeding moms are, says Dr Lee, assailed by a gamut of emotions. “Some are angry or guilty. I’ve spoken to women who feel that for the first time in their adult lives they’ve been treated like children, just because they’re unable or unwilling to breastfeed.
“Healthcare professionals, in turn, have different views. Many think formula milk is poison and their views will influence the way they talk to mothers.
“But there are others who would be prepared to give help on bottle-feeding - if only, of course, there wasn’t this agenda forbidding it.” - Daily Mail