Secret Mum Club with Sophiena - BONUS: Breast Feeding and Mum Guilt

Episode Date: November 3, 2023

The topic this week leads the ladies down a myth-busting trail, as they take on the age-old question is breast best? Plus Emma and Sophiena tell us about their experiences of feeding the babies to help Mum Kara feel less guilty about it all! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

hello this is the secret mom club i'm safina and i'm emma and welcome to our bonus episode each week we're going to take a different topic and we're just going to chat about it and share our thoughts that's right it can be absolutely anything last week we was prepping for the for the baby arrival the baby's very apt for. Yeah. So let's jump right in, shall we? Hit us off. What is it? The topic this week is... Yes. Drum roll, please.

Breastfeeding and mum guilt. Oh my goodness. We were just talking about this. Weird. I know. We didn't even know. So this one was suggested by Cara. Here's her message.

She says, hello Soph and Emma. Love you guys. Oh, thank you. Thank you. i have two boys seven and five years old and i was diagnosed with a rare condition with both pregnancies with my seven-year-old it was touch and go if i'd make it had to have c-sections due to a womb lining issue anyway i couldn't breastfeed because well my nips were too large orcs lol she says orcs lol not me oh just say that's a bit bit rude there on

your you've spoken about your burger nips before yeah yeah openly talk about my burger nips uh cara says um i feel because i didn't breastfeed or gave birth naturally my kids are failing at school i know breast milk is gold dust and i'm wondering if my lack of feeding is having an impact the mum guilt is real and still to this day i fight myself thinking i've let them down oh my goodness help thank you cara oh no cara not in a million years a fed baby is a happy baby regardless we were talking about because i've got leaky boobs already and i've never breastfed yeah you were thinking about it this time weren't you i was i did consider it i just can't get over the udders i can't i just don't want and i take my hat off to and i say this all the time i truly take my hat off to people that breastfeed babies but i just can't i can't get the thought of a cow out of my head but i've just got my massive udders and i

generally do think my burger nips are just too big do you yeah like i i have all the round bit but i don't have no nipply bubbly bit right okay do you know what i mean i do yeah it's all is it areola all areola but no nipple actual nip yeah yeah i had some really so i really struggled to breastfeed i did breastfeed joseph for six months but i found the beginning so difficult i had to go and see a lactation consultant and it was just really really hard but i so wanted to persevere with it that i stuck with it and thank god I got the help when I did because otherwise I was just going to give up it was like toe curlingly painful every time he latched on and I feel like just in hospital like the midwives to be fair tried their

best they were like yeah latch looks good great so I went home thinking I was doing it fine yeah I wasn't and because I'd never breastfed before I didn't know what that was supposed to feel like. And people said, oh yeah, it'll be painful at first, but then your nips will toughen up and you'll get used to it. So what was painful, I just thought was normal. And I just carried on for ages, just thinking like, it can't be right that it's this bad.

And I would cry getting the baby latched on and he was really hungry. So he'd be really upset and we'd be trying to get the latch and it's just so stressful. And Stefan would say to me like, he can have a bottle, don't worry about it. on and he was really hungry so he'd be really upset and we'd be trying to get the latch and it's just so stressful and Stefan would say to me like he can have a bottle don't worry about it we did combi feed so he did have formula as well but I just so so wanted to breastfeed that I was like no I'm gonna persevere I'm gonna stick with it saw this amazing woman through my local council

and she just like saved my entire breastfeeding journey just Just looked at me, sorted out the latch. From then on, it was like a totally different thing. And I loved it from that point onwards. But some of the advice that I got from various helplines and stuff before that was just really damaging, I thought. Like one of them I called and they were like, well, maybe your nipples are too big

and you and your baby just aren't compatible for feeding. Oh, fuck off. Which made me think like, well, great. I'm never going to get it then. Which obviously turned to be rubbish because i i did get it in the end yeah but there is so much pressure and so much guilt around breastfeeding even formula tins say breast is best do you know what isn't it funny i literally have spoken about this on my instagram this morning it's mad but it what i see i'm on the other end of the spectrum not only have you got all of this going

on with your whole feeling like your whole organs are falling out of your ass you've been given this brand new baby you've got so much to already take into consideration to then take on but not have enough support as to to feed in feeding the baby and i just i just personally won the whole others for me just isn't the one I just can't get it out of my head but I just didn't want the extra stress and I thought do you know what I want Chris to be able to feed the baby I want my mum to be able to feed the baby my sister you know I want everyone to be able to feed this baby and bond with them as much as me bottle is just going to be best for me yeah um and I just think sometimes the pressure of breastfeeding makes you feel like you are a bad

mum yeah makes you feel like you're failing but mom. Yeah, makes you feel like you're failing. But there is so much. Like this morning we were talking about not only, you know, breastfeeding. It is breast is best. No, it's not. A fed baby is a happy baby. Happy baby is a happy mom. Happy mom, happy wife, happy life.

You know, that's what I always think. But there's so much around. Like I get obviously lots of questions asking about how far gone we are like you because we've not really talked about it yeah we mentioned it on Monday's um episode last week and I don't want to tell people because I don't want people to go gosh your bump's big you're having two oh gosh can see you're eating for two no I don't want the stigma why can't we just embrace what the person carrying the baby wants to do and I think that's with breastfeeding. I don't think, me personally, just from my point of view, and I can speak about this quite honestly now,

is I've got a seven and a five-year-old exactly like Cara. Colby is excelling at school. He does incredibly well. He wants to learn. And I've got Dottie who's not bothered. She goes in for the coffee morning. I'm not, and do you know what? I'm not stressed because I had me and my brother growing up with a twin brother who was academically so so so clever even now he's so insanely clever and school just wasn't my jam and I think

if children want to learn they will learn yeah and I think there's so much pressure to put on children at school you must learn all of this stuff everything that i know now i've learned out of school yeah i don't use square root of 69 or something square oh there's a song in there i don't use pie i just eat it's shit loads of pie mash um but yeah i just think there's so much pressure and i don't i don't think you should i don't think you should be putting that pressure on yourself. No, there are so many other factors that aren't just about how you fed your baby for six months or a year. Nope. It's not. And I think at every stage, no matter, I think even now at 35, I'm learning every single day.

I'm still learning now. And I just think it's just their way of learning. And they're not the same as my five and seven year old. They are completely different. They are two individuals with their own personalities. And I just think sometimes we just have to just accept that. Yeah. And just love them and embrace their journey and where they're going.

And all we can do is support them, can't we? Because I think sometimes as well, putting more pressure on a situation like breastfeeding, you just get a negative reaction from it. Yeah. It you off doesn't it like you're saying you were pissed off yeah because it's just demoralizing but it's i think there's something going on with your hormones when you have a baby you're like you feel like you're failing you're like why can't my body do this this is supposed to be the most natural thing and it's not working why can't i do it my baby's crying my baby's not satisfied i'd really greedy hungry baby as well so we wanted feeding all the time it was a nightmare but formula is absolutely

fine there is still so much out there that makes you think that it's not and it is there are so many formula fed babies that are absolutely fine obviously yeah never even never even sucked my and they're doing fine and you're so right Cara about natural birth vaginal birth versus cesarean as well again so much stigma around cesarean I had a cesarean my baby seems to be doing fine he's doing perfect yeah and this is the issue and again people say having your baby early there's develop obviously if it's a preemie baby then there is there is that risk of having development problems um not development sorry what is it um like slow slow to pick things up from the other children just because they came out a bit early but people say the difference between a vaginal birth to a

cesarean birth they're both born at 38 weeks there ain't no difference yeah and to be honest i don't think it even matters and i just think they just take on the things that they want to take on at their own speed yeah and I just think being proof of somebody that grew up with my sister older sister my brother who were both academically so cut out for school which I just was not in the slightest and I think because I because I've I've had my bear of that like I struggled all through my life with that I was so it made me so sad like I used to say to my parents like I don't get it I don't understand why I can't read a book but Richie and Roxanne can like it really really really stressed me out and I'm now to a point in my life where I just think do you know what I don't I honestly don't give a shit it's the children go to school and they're happy they treat others with respect they're kind they

have fun and they come out and they're smiling every day yeah that is all i want from them i don't want anything else i don't want them coming out and knowing the fucking square root of 62 at bloody five years old thanks yeah i want them to go out and climb a tree and ladder their tights and scrape their knees yeah who cares who gives it honestly who cares and i i hope i just hope that makes cara feel better yeah i hope so society needs to move on from the vaginal birth and breastfeeding is best because there's so much of that out there i did the baby course that won't be named there are various ones out there but i did a course about um you know leading up to having a newborn baby can meet other parents all that

kind of thing and they only really focus on breastfeeding and vaginal birth oh i didn't do them for that reason yeah there was nothing about cesareans and nothing about breastfeeding and nothing about bottle feeding really which i just think is terrible because if you've got that in your mind that that's what you want to do you come out of it thinking oh am i wrong to want that for my baby yeah it's yeah it's it's it's bad that there's still so much of that out there and like i feel like older generations as well are very much like oh you know it'll be better if you can have a natural birth even the fact that people still know a natural birth no drugs yeah exactly you and i said again i said this on this is what your body's meant to do no no my body isn't meant to tear and be in loads of

pain i'm not meant to burn the watermelon it's it's funny because i literally spoke about this on my Instagram this morning is people keep asking me about how, why don't talk about the labours of my children and the births of my children? Because it's irrelevant to anybody else. And I think there's so much stigma on, you know, how you birthed your child

and what happened. And did you stick to the plan? Did you have whale music? Were you in the ocean sucking in every jellyfish no i wasn't i just had what to me was incredible births because my babies arrived into the world safe and happy yeah and regardless of how you get there it's so intimate between two people that who gives a shit as long as the babies are here yeah and i think sometimes as well there's so much pressure put on you to have your birth plan before you go into hospital and then your heart's broken when you're now 38

weeks your baby's breach you've got no option but to have a cesarean that's fucked your whole birth plan and that is the first time mum is soul destroying yeah so i just went into the midwife and she was like do you have a birth plan no just get the baby out safe and sound yeah as long as i'm well the baby's well. Exactly. That's all that's important. I bought into that whole thing. I was like, I'm going to have a water birth. I'm going to breathe this baby out.

Not everyone can do that. No. Especially not when your baby's 98th percentile head size. All right? And weighs nine pound one. He was a whopper. Yeah, that ain't coming out. That ain't coming out of these hips.

No. So, but even now I find myself going like, oh, I had a cesarean because blah, blah, blah, blah because blah blah blah blah and he was really big and i'm like i don't need to explain myself i'm gonna have a cesarean this time yeah because it was bloody easier than pushing a baby out of my vagina it was a dream she went in with her makeup her towel yeah loved it honestly highly recommend honestly if i could opt for a cesarean i would but i think if everything's okay i've got i've got no choice but to just go well i mean you can that's another myth it's like you actually can you actually can just say I want a cesarean but the NHS obviously doesn't advertise it because I didn't know you know they want people to have a vaginal well I've done it twice now I feel like third time let's just go you might as well I mean

I've heard the third baby just slips right out oh so I think you'll be fine and what with my leaky vagina after the bath anyway I'll be fine you'll be fine i'm pissing myself now on the reg my mum says i just flew out so don't worry about it listen you've got to stop talking about your mum's vagina poor woman she's had all her personal information she has asked me to stop talking about it um but yeah i hope that i hope that's reassuring to you and it is hard and it's i unfortunately would love to say that the information is going to stop and people will stop but it probably won't but it's not going to it's not going to change just know that you are doing fine you are doing incredible your babies are perfect yeah and that's all that matters and don't put

any guilt on yourself soak it up because i always think right there's going to be a time when we look back and you're going to sit and regret this moment of you worrying about this yeah and as easy as it is for us to sit here and say don't worry about it it's fucking hard yeah but try just try and just just relish up your beautiful babies because honestly they're only this little once and it goes so fast i know i don't want to be that cliche person but it does it really does And just relish up your beautiful babies. Because honestly, they're only this little once. And it goes so fast. I know. I don't want to be that cliche person, but it does go. It really does.

It really does. It does. But thank you so much for your lovely question this week. And I hope that we've helped in some way. So there we go. So thanks to Cara for sharing her story. We know lots of you will probably feel something similar. Yes.

If you have any thoughts or feelings based on Cara's story, do get in touch. You can email us hello at secretmumpod.com or with secretmumpod on TikTok and Instagram. We love hearing from you. And this bonus episode is for you to suggest topics for us to discuss. It really can be anything at all. And we'll be back first thing on Monday with the main episode

and our bonus episodes are out every Friday morning. So we'll see you next time on the Secret Mum Club.