I wished I could have picked a few answers.

Initially I think EDUCTAION is a big one. When my milk first came in it was the most painful thing ever and something I was totally unprepared for. Noone told me about that in the lead-up to birth and the only pain I knew about was that I would experience in labour. I can see why it would scare a lot of women into stopping BF without giving it a propper shot. Luckily I didn't have huge problems with attachment, but for those women who experience extreme pain with engorgement AND attachment issues, I can understand that they would jsut want to stop, especially not knowing how long the pain would last for and when (or IF) it would ever settle down. Once someone has had bad experinces BF (generally form not knowing what to expect) it makes it harder to want to do it again with subsequent babies.

Once you're over those initial issues, then ADVICE OF FRIENDS/FAMILY would be the big issue. I remember starting a fitness class with mums and bubs when my sone was 6w old (and alot of teh woment tehre had abbies teh same age). A couple of them were talking about giving formula to make babies sleep through, so quite a few dropped off breastfeeding and switched to formula because they were sick of broken sleep. Many found that their babies still woke up anyway (they were still so young!) but once they had stopped breastfeeding, there was no going back. I also agree with PP coments that everyone telling a breastfeeding Mum to stop and FF instead to eliminate the issues with tiredness/soreness is quite influencial. It would be much better if friends and family SUPPORTED the BF mum by perhaps offering to help out around the house while she fed or rested (BF does take longer to do than FF), or instead of telling them to stop, offered solutions of things she could try to help elliviate some of the problems. The problem is that so many people have FF and it's hard to find someone close to you that you trust and can be open with who has successfully BF.

Finally when you get past all of those issues and are still BF, you go back to work, and there is nowhere to BF baby (or bub isn't allowed on your worksite for a feed), and the only place you can expres milk is the toilet! Makes it hard to keep up the supply when you don't have access to a comfortable and private expressing area.