I haven't read this entire thread in detail...
I'm in my first semester of nursing school. It's been briefly mentioned in class that there are no immune benefits associated with breastfeeding after 6 months. I believe the baby's immune system is supposed to really kick in around 4 months. It wasn't said in a negative way at all and there was no implication that bf'ing should stop at that point.
This also doesn't mean there's no nutritional value in breastmilk after 6 mo. I also got the idea that when an infant receives the mother's antibodies during the first 6 months, even if bf'ing is stopped, the child still has those antibodies and can benefit from them a few years later (and perhaps not catch chicken pox?). Don't quote me on this part... I'm not 100% sure of it
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However, I'm not sure that my fellow students, especially the ones who don't have kids or aren't pro-bf'ing, would have been able to "read between the lines" about what our instructor was saying. She didn't go into much detail, because this isn't the focus of first semester. Second semester includes OB, so it will be interesting to see what we're told.
We went into a little more detail during the reproduction part of my anatomy & physiology class. Unfortunately, what I remember most about that was a heated discussion started by some of my fellow students (one who's already been working as an LPN for quite a while, though in geriatrics). They were making comments about how their OB-GYN's tortured them after birth by refusing to give meds to dry up their milk supply. My instructor tried and tried to explain to them that they weren't being tortured, at the very least they could have pumped just enough milk to relieve the pain and pressure, but he gave up because everything he said made them more pissed. Seriously, I think it was the most heated, tense discussion I've seen in a college class.
And nurses who think bf'ing is gross??? That's just baffling to me, considering all of the truly disgusting things that nurses see and do. Maybe I worded that a little harshly, I don't want any potential patients to misinterpret it
, but I'm just saying... if you enter a field that regulary deals with a myriad of bodily fluids and don't have a problem with that, how could breastmilk possibly be gross?
Okay, done rambling.
