Hello, I'm new here and would like to ask for some advice and thoughts about my situation.

I have an eight month old son and set out with the best of intentions. I wanted to breastfeed, babywear, and so on - it just made so much sense! However, after a caesarean section and poor treatment at the hospital my son wouldn't latch on at all and developed 'breast aversion'. The poor little mite would scream when I tried to feed him, and although I did try to find help, support in this area is very poor. I felt so rejected, so devastated, and I still that to this day. I exclusively expressed until my husband went back to work, but after that we moved to formula.

I think I felt really low, but I felt that I didn't know what this little baby wanted of me. He would cry, and we didn't know what to do! Now we know it was tiredness, but in those early days we would walk him around for hours, trying to keep him from fussing. It taught him to fight sleep, which made it all the worse! The fussing and crying has made it so hard to care for him. He seems angry all the time. He won't be comforted by being cuddled, and only wants us to hold him if he's ill. It's our fault - we've taught him that that's not really what Mummy and Daddy are for (or that's how I feel). He now expects us to be constantly entertaining him while he's awake - and by that I mean he's not happy to be in the sling as we're going about - he wants to be directly interacted with and isn't happy with anything else.

I can't interpret his cries even now, and I feel like I don't know my baby. As a result, people's well meaning advice has really gotten to me, and I feel as though I don't know what's right or wrong any more. Over the past months I have shouted at him in frustration at it all, and now I feel as though he's not bonded with me and doesn't trust me to give him consistent love and care.

What can I do?