Adoption
HTT (early) Breastfeeding as an Adoptive Mom?
I saw THIS.
Basically, it talks about a hormone that will make you lactacte so you can breastfeed even if you haven't given birth.
Even if I weren't skeeved out by that, it's off the table for me. Past illnesses have made it *very* unwise for me to undergo any kind of hormone therapy.
My SIL (who knows this about my body and synthetic hormones) is trying to convince me to give it a shot - but she's kindof extreme about breast feeding.
It just seems - to me - unnatural to be lactating if you've never given birth.
What about you?
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Re: HTT (early) Breastfeeding as an Adoptive Mom?
I think we HTTed about this a few weeks ago. I know that others are open to it on here, but we are not (though we do believe 100% that breast milk is the best milk):
- there is a small percentage of women that can be induced to lactate without hormones or other medications but I think this is rare, at least according to my doctor and research I have read unless you have breast feed before,
- because your body will not have gone through the 'normal' hormonal process as you would with birth, induced lactation is said to not have the same nutritional value nor the same level of colostrum,
- there is not enough evidence, in my opinion, about the effects of the hormones and medication in your system on the baby as they grow into adulthood or even if it might impact their fertility or their children,
- however, it can be a beautiful way to bond with baby and the skin to skin contact encourages a healthy system and growth of brain connections for the baby (though this can be accomplished just as well through mom/baby masssage and other skin to skin contact),
I don't in any way consider this 'unnatural' because I think wanting and even trying to nurish your baby through breast milk is the most natural thing a mother can do.
Again, I think this is another hot topic that will have lots of beliefs and positions. My beliefs and positions should not infringe on others and their desire to try to induce breast milk for their baby.
DEAR NEST: PLEASE FIX YOUR SEARCH FUNCTION!
sorry for the duplicate. I missed that HTT (although now I wish I hadn't) and it didn't turn up on the search...NOTHING turned up on the search.
https://community.thebump.com/cs/ks/forums/thread/13147520.aspx
Here it is. : )
I'm actually interested in the opinions of those who are going to do it, but who aren't then going to go on and on about how Formula is bane of existence. You know - I'd like to hear from the rational people ;-)
I should clarify my point here re: unnaturalness (spell check thinks that's a word) - it's because it's synthetically induced. Your body didn't grow the person that it's now feeding. While I believe that emotionally, and as far as bonding is concerned - the fact that you didn't grow this person doesn't make you any less of a parent. But you're forcing your body to do something it hasn't prepared to do...it just doesn't sit well with me.
but like I said - someone rational might change my mind. Or at least make it less odd to me.
Immunities and Bonding are good points....
You Rock.
That was a rational discussion. If the hormones weren't off the table I might be more open to it...I'm certainly glad I have the knowledge.
Thanks!
I BF my DS and gave extra to my DD. I attempted trying to get her on the breast but she didn't understand.
I don't think BF'ing of any kind is odd, in fact it's what a woman's breasts are made to do. I think it's strange when other people find it odd to BF since it's the most natural thing for a breast to do is to provide nourishment for a baby.
BF'ing is based on a supply and demand and you have to have something to stimulate milk production, either a baby or a pump. Yes the pregnancy hormones help with that (just like artificial hormones would), but the baby has to eat in order for the milk to come in and keep continuing. I didn't just have milk because I had been pregnant. My DS had to suck (nearly round the clock) for several days for it to come in and then what felt like round the clock for several weeks for my milk supply to get established and meet his needs.
I see what you're getting at, but the same argument could be made against a bio mom taking meds to help lactation. I nursed both of mine, and despite round-the-clock nursing and pumping, my supply tanked at 12 weeks both times. I tried herbs, extra pumping, etc. I ended up having to take Reglan (the drug that acts like domperidone - but you can't get domperidone in the U.S.) just to keep up with the baby's needs. There was nothing extra to freeze and use later. So even though I gave birth to those babies, I had to "force" my body to keep making milk after it quit on me. Sure it was technically unnatural, but nursing was a very fulfilling thing for me and for my babies. I don't regret it. (Though by 6 months I'd had enough of medicating and pumping the hell out of my poor boobs and was more than happy to move on to formula!)
It's like anything else; important to some and not important to others. As long as your baby gets fed and bonded with - in whatever fashion - nobody should be judging you!
But you carried one child naturally, so it's different than what I - who cannot have children -will be doing.
Vaguely related: Salma Hayek was visiting Sierra Leone and she breastfed another mom's baby and I think that what she did is *very* admirable.
Link here.
If I had given birth and then had trouble producing milk I would probably do that, too. It's the not having given birth part that stumps me.
I've considered it, and gone back and forth on if I would want to do it. I see nothing wrong with it- but I'm not real thrilled about taking hormones to get it started. I've wondered about just starting now in hopes that we get matched in a reasonable time frame, but since we are in the process of selling our house, finding new jobs and trying to relocate back to be closer to our families, and all of that will put the adoption on hold for a few months once things start falling into place. I don't really want to gear my body up for it and then either start all over again or keep it up during the time that we are settling into a new home and getting all the necessary paperwork changed to reflect our new situtation.
Getting in on this late, but I second what PPs said re: it being no more unnatural than a mother who has supply issues taking hormones/herbs to try to increase her supply.
I also think it is no more unnatural than giving expressed milk to an adult cancer patient. I feel blessed to be a BF'ing mother who will be able to express extra milk so that our two adopted kids can get some of the benefits (despite being 5 and 8) once they are home. I won't be doing it forever, but at least for the first few months until we see some improvement in their health. We will also be getting them the best medical care possible until they are in better health. To me they are equally natural.
And Fredalina, excellent point on the cow's milk. Drinking human milk is much more natural and yet for some reason it grosses many people out. I truly believe it's all as a result of social programming.
You can see my feelings on adoptive breastfeeding in the original post someone linked to. I am entirely for it, but it isn't a good option for me and my family.
Your comment above bothers me though. I guess I don't understand how breastfeeding at all is unnatural, whether it's your biological baby or someone else's and whether it's been achieved by pregnancy or induced via stimulation and herbs. For centuries women have been wet nurses for each other's babies, orphans, as employment, etc. If a child is hungry, feed it. Before they had bottles, they shared breastmilk. Today you can BUY breastmilk to feed your child if you are unable to breastfeed. To me it all boils down the same point -- breastmilk and breastfeeding are natural. Whether it's done simply for bonding or for food.
Our bodies are designed to breastfeed and can produce milk, quite easily (maybe not volumes of it, but it can be done) without ever having been pregnant. There is nothing unnatural about it. Even women who were pregnant and delivered, are unable to produce breastmilk and have to use herbs and stimulation and sometimes even they fail. But it's more natural for them to breastfeed because they physical carried and birthed the baby? It just doesn't make sense to me.
ETA: Just read your responses above (I posted before reading the entire thread) -- so basically you don't have an issue with a woman breastfeeding another woman's child...as long as she has been pregnant and that's the reason she has "extra" breastmilk? You just find someone inducing breastmilk who has never had a baby to be "weird" or unnatural.
That sort of mentality is the reason that many people will never see our children as our "own" because we didn't carry them. I know that you don't believe that and that isn't your intent, but I think there is a connection between all of these little things that people find weird or creepy or unnatural about adoption, and those same people being unable to see our children as OUR children, regardless of how we obtained them.
Sorry, PP, but I think you're taking things a little too far with the last bit. You're waaaayyy overanalyzing an individual's lask of desire to ingest chemicals to force her body to do something it wouldn't naturally do. If I understand correctly, it's not the breastfeeding--it's the induction of lactation.
Yes, our bodies were intended to breastfeed--AFTER birthing a child. Lactation in the absence of childbearing is not something that occurs spontaneously in a healthy woman. In fact, if drugs elevate prolactin as a undesired side effect it's considered a fairly significant adverse event with potential health concerns.
Is it social programming to find this distasteful? Probably. At one point in history, posh women used SLAVE LABOR to feed their children--and that was seen as socially desireable. My point is that cultural attitudes toward breast feeding wax and wane, and the Internet is a powerful tool in casting judgement.
My kids are my kids--if anyone suggests they aren't my "own" it's because of the racial difference, not because I neglected to suckle them at my breast.
FWIW, personally I'm on the side of not ingesting chemicals to make my body do something it wouldn't "naturally" do.
As I stated early on in my post, she could go read my original opinion in the original HTT. But I do think that there are things that society finds distasteful or unnatural that adoptive parents do that make people see our children as less our own and that was the point of my post. Some people think it's unnatural for caucasian parents to raise children of different or mixed ethnicities. Some people thinks it's unnatural for adoptive mothers to breastfeed a baby they didn't give birth to. Some people think it's unnatural for adoptions to even occur at all, that children only belong with their biological parents. In my ideal world, we would start changing those opinions by changing the mindset of all adoptive parents.
Perhaps I was overanalyzing it, but I think the parent/child relationship is natural and beautiful in whatever form it comes -- whether someone chooses to breastfeed, or chooses to parent with a same-sex partner, chooses to parent a child of another ethnicity, and I stand by my statement. The love and bond and relationship that are formed are natural. My prior statement wasn't about breastfeeding or not...it was about thinking breastfeeding is unnatural just because you haven't been pregnant. You can induce lactation without ingesting chemicals as other pp pointed out. It had nothing to do with being judgmental about the chemicals. (And just to point out again, I will NOT be breastfeeding -- so it's not about the act itself.)
1) I never said it was weird. I said the use of chemicals to force breastmilk is unnatural. And if you notice, everyone up there who is lactating from pregnancy/thinking about purchasing breast milk gets a hearty thumbs up.
2) Your last paragraph is specious and I'm not arguing it.
First, please don't assume to know what my diet is like, or what choices I have made about my diet once I was informed and able to dictate what goes in my body.
Second, if I wanted to talk about animal hormone practices, I'd start a thread.
As for the rest of it -- if you'd phrased it as a question -asking those who are using the hormones or considering the hormones for their side, that's what I asked.
Except for that part about imbuing my body with hormones to force breast milk. Not. Happening.
I hope you mean the obsolete meaning of specious (#3) and not #1 or #2. Yes, I had to google...I'm not as smart as you are!
Also, weird was my own word -- that's why it was in quotes. I also used unnatural, which I think is the word you had used. Seriously didn't mean to offend in any way -- we often correct each other's thought processes and language choices here when it comes to adoption. I was just offering up my opinion on adoption as a whole and one of the things that I personally have come up against (when I was considering it) was breastfeeding -- and how many people commented that I couldn't or shouldn't breastfeed if I hadn't given birth to the baby that we will adopt.
[edit] Adjective
specious (comparative more specious, superlative most specious)
Positive
specious
Comparative
more specious
Superlative
most specious