Here in San Francisco, breastfeeding is well-supported for the most part. Nobody cares if you nurse in public. (In fact, if you give your kid a bottle someone will probably scold you for it, which I don’t like either.) However, once women go back to work it is hard to keep nursing. Most people I know have jobs that require a lot of presence and “face-time”. It is really difficult to take several breaks a day to pump. And the women executives are the worst as far as not being empathetic to new moms. (Especially those who have kids. I think the idea is that they gave it all up for their work, so you should too.) This is the main reason I decided to quit my job when my son was born.

And this is not just about breastfeeding, but being able to spend time with your kids.

The only reasons that can TRULY make you fail at breastfeeding is part of number 1 (if you can produce milk, stressing to much about it can dry you up) and number 6. Other than that, success depends on the amount of commitment that the woman has towards breastfeeding for a whole year.

I would add, too, that an observation that one year is “not enough” is not helpful. I breastfed for a loooong time, but it was alot because of convenience. I think that if someone is really busting their ass to make it happen (pumping at work, blah blah blah) if they can go a year, they should feel like they’ve done a really good job. To diminish the value of going a year can kind of take the wind out of people’s sails, and if you want to lobby for maternity leave (paid or subsidized) you’re not going be able to negotiate more than a year…

I breastfed twins on demand, 24 hours a day, for 16 months. I think there are a few factors that allowed me to do that: I had the support of my husband and my mother, an SCN nurse (my husband helped me tremendously when my son had trouble latching, and it really was painful and difficult in the first couple of weeks), I was very determined to breastfeed, and possibly most importantly, I didn’t have to go back to work. It’s also part of my personality to not care what strangers think, so I had no trouble nursing in public – I can really understand how some women might, though. I don’t think everyone has the perfect set-up to be able to breastfeed for a year. It seems like most people have to go back to work long before a year is through.

Comments Yes, there are a lot of cultural and institutional shifts that need to take place, and we all need to work together to Beat the Booby Traps(tm)–the barriers to breastfeeding success–not moms. The AAP recommendation of one year is not too long, the problem is that women are being urged to breastfeed but set up to fail by 70% of hospitals that perform poorly on breastfeeding support, by a healthcare system that doesn’t fully cover lactation counselors, by the IRS that allows penis pumps to be tax sheltered but not breast pumps, and by parenting websites like Babble.com that put forth a negative and discouraging “Breastfeeding Guide” littered with formula advertisements that are geared towards increasing the bottom line for formula companies, not breastfeeding.

I breastfed all 3 of my children until they were a little over 3 years old. Like another comment posted at the end all of them only wanted breastfeeding for comfort and to rest. Getting started with my 1st child was hard. I had no role models growing up. No one I knew had breastfed their children period. Latching on was a ightmare, engorgement was uncomfortable. I remember that even though I had stated I was going to breastfeed only that the hospital sent formula home with me. I read every article, book and handout I could find and succeded. I was alone in my struggles. I had a sister in law who had tried to breastfeed her 2 children that were a few years older than mine but had not seen her trying as I was living in another state. I moved back while I was still breastfeeding my oldest child and went on to breastfeed my 2 younger children. At some point I was even tandem nursing my youngest 2. They are only 16 mos apart in age. Breastfeed through pregnancy even. My sister in law had 2 more children herself after all this and she breastfed them only. Sometimes you have to be the role model.