July 15, 2008

Today I've seen a lot of traffic on message boards about the issue of formula vs. breast feeding and I am honestly a bit shocked to see how much of an issue this is for people. All of this got me thinking about why I am choosing to formula feed and I decided to put those reasons out here in the open. In part for myself because its my blog and I'll post whatever I want :-) and in part so that others who are trying to make the decision can see the reasons why I chose to formula feed.

1. I am choosing to formula feed because I want other people to be able to share the responsibility of feeding my child. I am going to be on my own with this baby and so I am going to take any and all help that I can get from family and friends and if I have the opportunity to take a shower, do laundry or otherwise care for myself, the baby or our home while someone else feeds him I am going to take it.
2. I am choosing to formula feed because I strongly feel that the bonding experience between a mother and child comes from the act of being cuddled and cared for, not from the child nursing from the breast. I want my son to bond and feel loved and cared for by his entire family, not just me and I want my family and my husbands family to have the opportunity to bond with him as well.
3. I am choosing to formula feed because my work situation is not conducive to pumping. I have my own office but there is a floor to ceiling window next to my door. Taping pieces of paper over the window every time I pump is not going to cut it for me, especially since the culture here is more of a knock as you are opening a door rather than waiting to be told to come in.
4. I am choosing to formula feed because I am going to be going back to work part time at 3 weeks and full time at six weeks. Am I happy about this? Of course not, but when my husband is deployed we hope for the best and plan for the worst and I want to have leave set aside that if God forbid something were to happen to him, I would be able to go to be with him. I also have to be realistic in that if our son gets sick, I am the only one who can take off from work to be with him. Yes, I could breast feed him for three weeks, but after reading how delicate newborns digestive tracks are why would I willingly make him switch between breast milk and formula at 3 weeks old?
5. I believe that making the decision to breast feed is truly making a decision to live a particular lifestyle. I don't mean this in a negative way, but when breast feeding you do need to commit 100% to doing it. Because of all of the reasons listed above, I know that I would not be able to give that 100% commitment to breast feeding and that the result would be additional stress on me and my son. Which let's be honest, I don't really need at this point in my life and would only make me less able to be a good parent.

I could probably come up with a number of additional reasons why I am choosing not to breastfeed, but right now those are the major ones. There are obviously a lot of reasons to breast feed instead of formula feed, but for me I feel that the right decision is going to be to formula feed. And at the end of the day, I think that making the decision that will allow you to best care for yourself and your child is what makes you a good parent.