Making sense of your longing to breastfeed your baby

Do you find yourself longing for your baby to be satiated and to grow by drinking your milk directly from your breasts only, without needing to put expressed breast milk into a bottle or to supplement with formula?

We can make sense of this longing in terms of contemporary scientific discourse. It goes like this. "We want our baby to have every opportunity for the healthiest possible development. Human milk offers your precious child the gut microbiome, immune system and metabolic protection which the physiology of the Homo sapiens infant evolved to expect in our environment of evolutionary adaptedness. The least time intensive, most convenient way to deliver this is from our breasts directly into the baby."

But the longing to breastfeed your baby can also be understood as a powerful evolutionary drive, hardwired into your brain and body, coded into your two-million-year old genetic inheritance. (Of course, women who don't experience this longing are no less loving or normal - just differently placed on the great spectrum of ordinary human variability.)

This ancient genetic coding explains why the desire to feed your child directly from your breasts is a great wave of emotion which smashes with devastating force against the obstacles of ongoing and severe physical pain, or baby's distress each time you try to breastfeed, or baby's failure to flourish on the scales. It explains the powerful dimensions of your grief.

Self-compassion is essential when you want to breastfeed but can't

In the meantime, as you work through the practicalities of Possums Breastfeeding & Lactation and reach out for help from health professionals, here are some resources that might help with the emotional distress you feel.

• You can find out about the difference between the goal of breastfeeding and how to live according to your values even if either exclusive breastfeeding, or breastfeeding at all, isn't possible here.

• You can find out how to practice self-compassion through this very difficult time starting here.

• You can find out about living with very painful feelings or grief here.

There are many other articles which I hope will be helpful for you in the Possums program Caring for you, in addition to the Possums Breastfeeding & Lactation articles which give you practical strategies for dealing with the breastfeeding problems you're facing.