Our parenting class is coming to an end. We have one more meeting next week and then we're supposedly ready. Overall, this has been a valuable experience for us: 10 meetings about labor and delivery, baby care and breastfeeding. We've had 3 different instructors and met our lactation specialist yesterday. She told us proudly that she still nurses her 3-year-old son!!! Wow, there's just no way in hell I would breastfeed that long.
Of course, we got the rundown of all the benefits of breastfeeding that research has (supposedly) shown. I've read that a lot of these studies are flawed and I just look at Dave, who wasn't breastfed and has a great immune system. We also heard the statistic of how much money breastfeeding saves over bottle feeding. I forgot what amount the lactation specialist mentioned but it was impressive. Then I asked if they had considered the cost for additional food for breastfeeding moms, who need an average of 500 additional calories a day (not to mentionn the cost of nursing bras, nursing pads, breast pumps, which are horrendously expensive, etc.). It turns out they hadn't factored that in, they were treating it as if breastfeeding doesn't cost anything. Bad research like that really annoys me as a researcher! Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to bash breastfeeding, but I definitely feel that the pendulum has swung to an extreme position...
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