Episode 5: Breast is Best?

The term "breast is best" is used a great deal.  But is it true?   This episode looks at early chestfeeding and formula feeding through science, spiritual and feminist lenses.

Show Notes:

Emily Oster: Is Breast Really Best?

The music you here at the start of this and every episode was created by the "Wonderful" Obediya Jones-Darrell. You can check out his work here.

Transcript

0:31

Welcome to this episode of Evidence-Based Crunch. I'm your host, Emily Gold. This episode is going to be the first in what will be a series of episodes looking at how we feed our children. That is a popular topic. Getting nutrients into those little beings is. A huge topic. There are a whole series of books about this. There are debates, there's whole industries., I was debating different ways to do this, and I broke it down into a couple different ways. And what we're going to be talking about this week is breastfeeding or chest feeding versus formula feeding. The early months of feeding you are babies. For the first six months or the first year, I am going to do my best to use the inclusive term chest feeding. I will note a lot of the research I use still used the term breastfeeding. So when I'm quoting things, I use that. And when I refer to my own experience which I probably will do a few times in this episode, I'm probably going to use the term breastfeeding. I always like to start these episodes by checking my own biases. So I will say for this one, I am a huge fan of breastfeeding. I even have a breastfeeding tattoo. I will post a picture on Instagram and Facebook. When it came to breastfeeding my babies, I was doubly lucky. In one that it came pretty easy. Both babies latched straight away. I had a little bit of a problem with them only really liking one side, but I was also very, very lucky here in Brussels to have tons of support. We had midwives that came to the house every day for the first 10 days or the first week, and then a few more times in the first two weeks. That's standard in Belgium. That included a midwife who was a lactation consultant who could help if we needed a little bit more help. So we were, I was really lucky in that as well. I will also say this episode is just going to be about chest feeding, like I said, for the first six months or the first year. So that time when our babies need something, need either breast milk or. Formula. But I will also say that I breastfed my first child till he was about two and a half, and I'm currently still nursing my second child who is a little over a year right now. So that's just where I'm at. And that said, I'm going to check my biases and come at this with a beginner's mind. We're going to be doing some separate episodes about extended chest feeding, and a separate episode about weaning, introducing food to babies. So that's not gonna be talked about today. I wanted to look a little bit at what the science says about chest feeding and what the science says about formula feeding. We hear a lot the term. breast is best. So what does that actually mean? There was a time that that was used by all the public health agencies, the World Health Organization. We saw that locally in countries all over the world, and this phrase really came about to debunk a lot of claims that Formula companies had made. There's going to be a whole separate episode about the history of formulas. That's going to be a really interesting one, but that's not what we're doing today. But just for a very, very brief episode, there was a long while in the 20th century where formula companies were using a good deal of misleading information, oftentimes false information to advertise and promote formula. This often had tragic and even fatal outcomes in lots of countries all over the world. So that's not what we're talking about today. But the term breast is best really came about to counter a lot of the claims that formula was best. So what are some things that we actually. breastfeeding can help. There are some benefits to early immunity related to the benefits that come from the antibodies, from the chest feeding parents. So specifically if you've been vaccinated for certain things or you've had certain diseases that you still have the immunity for, some of that can pass down and be absorbed by the infant, and that's really only true for the first six months. And what else we know about the milk that comes from chest feeding is that it is specifically designed for a baby's body, so it has all the nutrients that a typical baby would need for the first six months after that, less so, And it is also easy for the baby to absorb the milk that comes from chest feeding. There have been studies that said that chest feeding was better for baby's nervous system. There were studies that were all the rage for a while saying breastfed babies were more intelligent later on in life. So these studies have actually been debunked. There were some studies that said that breastfed babies had higher IQs. They were more likely to get better grades in school, but it's actually been shown that these claims don't hold up when other factors are controlled for. The wonderful Emily Oster in her book, her second book, crib Sheets, talks a lot about this. She also wrote about it in an article in The Guardian, which I'll post in the show notes. But basically what we can say is, Like usual, it's more about the resources than the specific action. That once again, capitalism wins We see that the people who have the time and resources to put into chest feeding also often have the time and resources to put into their children's education and development Because what we know is that chest feeding can often be a lot of work and require a lot of resources. So even me who I said at the beginning, I had a lot of help and support and a relatively easy take. Breastfeeding still takes a lot of time, especially in that fourth trimester. You are basically glued to your couch or your bed or your. basically 24 hours a day feeding a baby when they cluster feed. So you basically feed them 10 minutes later, they're hungry again. You're doing that basically all day. That takes a lot of time if you need support and you're in a country where it doesn't just come to your house and is covered. Lactation consultants are amazing. They're also rather costly. Oftentimes, even though chest feeding, comes from your body, you still might need lots of extra things. You might need a pump if you're going back to work or even if you're not, if you have supply issues, you might need special clothing. Nursing bras, nursing shirts, nursing pads are very much a requirement. All sorts of things that you might need. Those don't come for free either. it takes a lot of time. You have to have an employer that if you are going back to work, you can keep pumping. Or the kind of benefits that let you stay home from work or not have to work or work remotely so you can nurse your child. So these are not just things that come for free. So the ability to have those things is also the same sort of resources that's gonna give you a lot of times to put your children in early preschool, to spend a lot of time reading to them, to spend a lot of time really checking in with their development, with their milestones. These studies really got by looking at. Parents who didn't chest feed their babies, but still were able to provide lots of other resources to their children. And it showed that really the IQ scores were about the same. The education levels were the same. And like I said, I'll post Emily Oscar's article, which breaks that down. When it comes to the term breast is best. A lot of that also has to do with the safety of formula feeding, and that comes back to how formula was introduced in much of the global south that doesn't always have access to clean water or regular supply of formula. So people might be feeding their babies in ways that were not actually safe, and chest feeding would actually have been safer. All that said, in terms of the science, when you really get down to it, there are some minor benefits to chest feeding, baby's digestion, like I said. The chest milk is made for babies, so they do tend to have slightly better digestion, and along with that, some less rashes, but it's very, very minor compared to some of the big claims that you sometimes hear for advocates of chest feeding. I was thinking a little bit about what society says about chest feeding versus formula feeding. and this is a tricky one because I think there's some stigma stigmatizing on both sides. So when it comes to chest feeding, one of the things we come, that comes up a lot, is the real sexualization. Of breasts. So a story usually pops up every few months about someone being kicked out of a store or a restaurant or asked to cover up or go feed their baby in the bathroom because I don't want my child to see your child being. Breast fed, or I don't want my husband to see that, or I don't wanna see that. You have to cover up. That has really more to do with people thinking that breasts are a sexual organ and not an organ that really exists to feed our babies. So in some ways, people are expected to not be chest feeding in public. And that doesn't even get into when babies are older. This is really just little babies. So there's definitely some stigma there. And at the same time, I think there's also people who are really stigmatized for not chest feeding. Tina Faye has a really funny thing in her book, bossy Pants, where she talks about how she was unable to just feed at least her first daughter. That's who she's talking about. She jokes that she had been watching too much entourage and it made all her milk dry up, which I think is hyster and possibly true. But she says that she actually started telling people that her baby was adopted, so that they would stop giving her a hard time for formula feeding because that's like the only way that you are quote unquote, allowed to formula feed without shame. So I think this is one of those things where you're screwed if you do and screwed if you don't. Either way, really what it comes down to is we're shaming parents for doing something different than what we want them to do. Or different than how we think we would parent or how we would want to parent. And when it comes to feminism, it's the same thing because I've seen feminists talk about how chest feeding literally ties you to your baby chest feeding literally. Keeps you in the house, keeps you from going anywhere. And that formula is this amazing invention that, frees the woman from having to care for the baby. And then the flip side of this, when we look at it from a feminist lens, is that people deserve the choice of what they want to do with their bodies, and that would come back to chest feeding, especially in public. But really, however you wanna feed your baby and however you wanna use your body to feed your baby would certainly be a feminist issue. So turning to feminism didn't really give me too clear an answer either, and I spent some time exploring the spiritu. Of chest feeding and formula feeding. And I know for me personally, breastfeeding my babies is a very spiritual ex experience. At least. A lot of times it's, it can be quite mindful, especially in those early days. In the middle of the night, you have this time where it's just quiet and there's nothing to do really but nurse your baby. So you really are very, very mindful and there's also still this sense that you're connected to people all over the world. Chest feeding their babies. There's a cartoon, I'll see if I can find it, that sort of shows this one lonely mother nursing her baby and then it zooms out and there's lights on and the houses all over the world of all these other moms doing the same ti. So there's like this global connection. There's which, which to me feels like a very spiritual experience, a very spiritual practice. At the same time, nursing can feel really miserable sometimes, and you can wanna jump out of your skin. I know for me, especially in the early days, it felt like that and I would just put on the TV and plop the baby to my breast and wish I was anywhere else. So it wasn't always a spiritual experience, and I don't think you actually have to be chest feeding to have it be spiritual or meditative experience holding a baby and feeding them and they just breathing with them and they fall asleep on. You can be spiritual even if you're feeding them out of a bottle. That still can be this moment in time if you can have the mindfulness there. and having someone else feed that your baby is also really spiritual. Whether it's your partner because you're opening up your family here, you are all connected, a parent, someone else, you're, you're having this connection as a family and to me that feels extremely spiritual and it also gives you a break, which is the most amazing thing at. So I think one way that feeding these little babies is really spiritual is it's one of your first times that you really get to connect with your baby. You two really work together. So maybe that means you are trying to chest feed and it's working well together. Maybe it's you deciding. You wanna mix feed, or formula feed, but it's this time where you are taking your own needs and your child's needs together. And that's really what the spirituality of motherhood and parenthood is all about. I will say with all of this, that chest feeding is. I said in the beginning of this episode, I had an easy go and it was still really hard. So people really shouldn't feel pressured to do it if they don't want to. That said, I would like to flip that and also say that people should have the resources to do it if they do want. And they shouldn't be pressured to not breastfeed if they don't want. I know that I have been called a activist before, just for encouraging tired new parents to keep trying. I had a. Close friend who really wanted to be nursing. She was trying so hard to do it and it just wasn't working. And she was in a place where she didn't have a lot of support. It was basically just me on the phone and online trying to help her. And her mom, who I also know, contacted me and was like, you have to make her stop. She has to stop trying and. This was something that this, this new mom really wanted to do, and she was supplementing with formula so her baby was being fed. She wasn't doing anything extreme. She was just really doing what she could do to get this baby to nurse. And I think that's okay too. I think that when it comes to what someone wants to do with their body, if it is important to them, especially. If they can take a step back and say, why is this important? Is this just important because society says I should do it or because I think I should do it? Then maybe it's not the right thing, but if it is something you really wanna do, it is also something you can put time into. I've worked with lots of parents as a doula and as a yoga therapist that didn't really care that much about nursing. And if it came to them, great and if it didn't, they formula fed and that wasn't a big deal. And I was happy to support all of them too. So I really think it has a lot more to do with what the intention. I think this is one of those topics where the science and the spirituality can really be weighed by you. The science is murky. There's, some minor benefits, but they're not huge things. When you take a step back and look at how you're raising your child in general, the spirituality has to do with what appeals to you, what your motivation is. One of the things we hear. Just feeding versus formula feeding is everyone always likes to claim that their side helps babies sleep better. Formula fed babies sleep better. No breast fed babies fe sleep better. I couldn't find anything conclusive one way or another about sleep. So that's a wash. And I thought that was really interesting that because there's no conclusive information that's like the big sell on both sides. So I just wanted to add. Really, this is just to say like so many issues, but possibly even for the ones we've talked about the most so far. This is something that you really get to dive in with your own values. So you know, how much do you wanna weigh the science? How much is the spiritual connection important to you? Where do you feel like your feminism lands? Where does your own priorities. And there's no wrong choices, which is nice. So I wish you the best of luck wherever you are on your feeding Your Child journey. Thank you for listening. Please rate and review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast and you can find me on Instagram and Facebook at Evidence Based Crunch.