Breastfeeding Grief
These two words look strange when put together in a sentence but this is a growing phenomena described by experts such as Professor Amy Brown when a mom has to stop breastfeeding before she is ready.
Grief is a natural response to loss. It's the emotional pain you feel when someone or something that has a high level of meaning, value and importance to you is taken away.
For many women breastfeeding is so much more than getting food into their baby - it’s a core part of their mothering experience. It’s the milky snuggles, the connection, the knowledge that on a primal level you are providing your baby with the ultimate nutrition for their future health - and those chunky rolls of deliciousness.
When breastfeeding is going well it feels like a superpower. Baby is cranky - boob is the answer, baby is tired boob is the answer, baby is sick…it’s so much more than food. But when it’s not going well the feelings that emerge can be harmful for women and their babies.
Breastfeeding is a core function of the female body, so if it doesn’t work out women often feel their body has betrayed them and has let them down (more than 99% of moms have the ability to breastfeed). If you lost physiological functioning of any part of your body your Doctor would run tests to find out why. He wouldn’t just say “oh well that’s too bad.” But they don’t - why not? Because low breastfeeding rates have a lot less to do with biology and a lot more to do with psychology. How you feel about breastfeeding will determine how deeply you experience those feelings of loss. Not every mom will experience these feelings - for some breastfeeding wasn’t important to them and stopping can feel like relief. But for many mothers the decision to stop breastfeeding can feel like a significant loss.
Often times women don’t realize how important breastfeeding was to them until they couldn’t do it. They feel like they failed their baby, they feel angry at a system that doesn’t seem to care but keeps shouting “breast is best”. Women are angry at misinformation provided by medical and midwifery staff. They feel angry with their body. They can also feel a deep sadness and shame that they couldn’t do ‘the most natural thing in the world’. These powerful negative emotions put women at an increased risk of postpartum depression and the unintended consequences of the impact on their baby’s mental health too. These feelings can last long into parenthood.
This may all be news to you but this isn’t news to anyone involved in health care promotion. Until we value mothers this is the future of breastfeeding looks bleak.
Potential Solutions
Initiatives to improve breastfeeding rates have traditionally focused mainly on social policies, support and health promotion activities. But therapeutic interventions especially self-compassion are only beginning to be explored. Self compassion is associated with more emotional flexibility and improved mental health. When so many women are experiencing so much psychological distress why isn’t there more focus on ways to prevent that distress. And if a new mom is experiencing breastfeeding grief how can we help to soothe some of those emotions.
Increasing self-compassion might be one way.
Compassion describes the act of recognizing our own suffering, or that of another, and being motivated to alleviate that suffering (Gilbert 2014). Self-compassion is a way of reducing our distress. Kristen Neff describes self-compassion as being kind to oneself instead of judgmental and self-critical; being aware of our common humanity, as opposed to isolation; (that you’re not alone - many women also experience these difficulties and being mindful - noticing these difficult thoughts and emotions but without engaging with them.
Evidence suggests that low self-compassion is associated with increased severity of complicated grief experiences.
Low self-compassion is associated reduced appreciation of body functioning and is linked with higher rates of postpartum depression. It’s estimated that the risk of perinatal depression is four times greater in women who experience body dissatisfaction (Elise et al., 2019).
This suggests that high self-compassion could play a protective role as a buffer against distress for women planning to breastfeed. Other research on self-compassion suggests these practices moderate thoughts and feelings related to the body (Homan & Tylka, 2015; Liss & Erchull, 2015; Siegel et al., 2020).
What would it look like if society really valued mothers and breastfeeding?
There would be more investment in breastfeeding education from an early age.
There would be a lot more investment in mothers: Society would stop selling breastfeeding to mothers without adequate support in place for mothers as they establish breastfeeding.
Biological nurturing would be taught as the default breastfeeding position for the early days to reduce pain and keep things simple. Complicated holds and positions complicate breastfeeding.
Self-compassion skills would be included in all breastfeeding preparation. Increasing self-compassion and body functionality appreciation may help more women stack the odds of meeting the demands of early postpartum and breastfeeding by optimizing mental health. For many women self kindness and self-compassion isn’t always something that comes easily, however self-criticism does. As pregnancy is a time of accelerated neuroplasticity neural pathways associated with self-compassion can be developed with specific imagery and intentionally generated feelings.
What else would you add to this list?
Tracy
Resources:
*Why Breastfeeding Grief and Trauma Matters - Amy Brown
