Are you a MIL who hates their DIL breastfeeding?

[ClaySquish]

There are often posts by women who are going to have or have had a baby, are planning to breastfeed or have started breastfeeding their baby, and subsequently their MIL has made it clear that they are not happy about it.

Who are these women? (As in, these MILs). I mean, maybe they're just not on Mumsnet, but no one ever seems to post from the other side saying "my DIL is breastfeeding her baby and I think it's totally unreasonable/selfish/revolting/attention seeking/whatever".

So. If you are harbouring/have harboured secret resentment towards your DIL for breastfeeding, I implore you to speak up so that I can be satisfied that you actually exist, and you might even answer some of my questions about why you have these views!

No but mine hated that I didn't.

I chose to FF and she was the only person, inc all the doctors and midwives and HVs who said anything.

She bonded far better because of breastfeeding, loved the experience, couldn't have imagined any other way, etc etc.

I just ignored her. My baby, my choice. As it is for you and every other mother.

It’s very odd. My breastfeeding days are long gone but both my mother and mother-in-law were very supportive of it.

When/if the time comes I shall encourage my daughters to breastfeed for as long as possible.

My DMIL didn’t really like me breastfeeding, but by her own admission it was because it meant she couldn’t feed the baby. (Little did she know she wouldn’t have been able to feed it if it had had a bottle!) Also, she had not been able to breastfeed her own DC - I think that might have had something to do with it as well.

Not long ago! Those are women born 1948 and 1952, had their babies 1976-1983 and grandchildren from 2013-19.

My MIL made me feel very uncomfortable breastfeeding DD. She told me there was nothing wrong with formula, if it was good enough for her two sons then it was good enough for me and I should stop breastfeeding. She got very difficult with me over a lot of things in the early baby stage, but I just ignored her and carried on.

Having said that, though, she's never had a kind word to say to me all the time I've been married to DH (21 years now) and I chose to go NC with her about 10 years ago. I felt I didn't need that kind of spite and nastiness in my life, and feel so much happier for not seeing her any more. Apparently DH said she was the same with his first wife and her other DIL.

My MIL was just funny about it I used to get “oh you might want to go in another room as FIL/BIL will be here soon” “Will she/he not take a bottle then”.

i ignored it, as did her other daughter-in-law, and between us we breastfed seven babies!!

My own parents were brilliant about it (my mum breastfed us) so I didn’t GAF, and DH was very supportive too.

I once heard another woman similar in age to my MIL once say her lunch out was ruined because the woman at the table next to her “had her baps out” so it is definitely a thing!

My Mum thought I was rubbing in the other mother’s face in hospital because I was breastfeeding easy and wasn’t hiding somewhere to do it. Then of course not just cover up but ordered to another room when in my own home. This was annoying with visitors.

I didn’t enjoy breastfeeding everything leaks you’re like a milking cow and yes people can be funny about it.

She wouldn't let me drink water and kept leaving my fridge door overnight when it contained expressed milk.

There really are some vile witches out there

My MiL never said anything to me, but after every visit DH would say all sorts of nonsense that I knew it came from his mum, especially as one of the comments was I should be aware about how often I breastfeed in front of his sister as she’s still upset she was never able to…

My MIL had a difficult time with labour and breastfeeding her children and it caused her a lot of resentment which turned to judgement as she aged.
When I was pregnant with my first, she kept telling me (unsolicited) about her awful births including episiotomies, tearing ect. When she asked about my birth plan, I told her I planned to have an unmedicated water birth. She laughed in my face. She said i'd be begging for the drugs.
When my DH called her to tell her the baby had been born the first thing she asked was how the labour had gone and when DH told her I had an unmedicated water birth with no interventions / no pain relief/ no tearing she got in a huff.
It was similar with breastfeeding. I breastfed my first until 1 years old and my second until 2 ½ years old. She constantly questioned why they still needed breastmilk and suggested I was feeding them for my own pleasure. My kids both had CMPA so I couldn't eat dairy while breastfeeding and she would constanly offer me food she knew I couldn't eat just so she could roll her eyes when I said no. When we went to a restraunt and I asked for an allergen menu she suggested I was attention seeking. When she was called out she 'helpfully' offered to go to asda to buy formula so I could eat cheese. When I pointed out Asda formula would also have CMP so the baby couldn't have it, I got rewarded with another eye roll

My two DIL’s both breastfed. I had nothing but admiration for both of them because it can be a hard slog and difficult to do with a velcro baby and attachment issues. I didn’t need to bottle feed my grandchildren to bond with them. I find that now they are older - Quavers and chocolate buttons do the job quite well!

Not pure hell since I was talking about doing it myself. Almost as if you're being nasty and overreacting for no reason!

Most women at my classes bottle feed but that's irrelevant...

No need for therapy here although I'd say the same to you if your DD decided to FF with your attitude.

My mother was anti BF, thought it disgusting and dreadful. Step had the same view. I was bottle fed. There were remarks and cat's bum faces.

My MIL was a natural mother and breastfed three children with no issues at all. She was very anti formula, pain relief in labour and felt women who needed help "couldn't perform".

I desperately tried to breast feed ds1 and did so for six to eight weeks. The midwives and HV were breast is best and formula is second class whilst at the same time being unable to provide helpful or consistent advice in relation to sore nipples, painful breasts, engorgement and then mastitis. I ploughed on for 8 weeks through infective mastitis and then a breast abscess and breast that were excruciatingly painful deep within after a feed (this was probably thrush of the inner breast tissues). He switched to bottles at 8 weeks and I was made to feel extremely guilty and it tipped me into depression. However it was easier and he settled better. So wonderful to be free from pain. DD was much easier, probably because I had researched it more thoroughly, did not listen to midwives or HVs and was more experienced.

When my DIL has a baby, she can feed it however she wants and in whatever way makes them both happiest and most comfortable.

I will visit when invited and take food and make tea, pour water, and do the dishwasher and washing machine if she's happy for that. I'll also book myself into a local hotel.

I was told off by a Drs receptionist once for quickly bf my baby when she was crying after having jabs, in the Surgery waiting room, I did it very discreetly, nobody could see anything. When I asked her why, she said "some of our older patients might be offended". In a Drs waiting room!

My MIL never commented on my decision to bf. FIL clearly felt slightly awkward but never made any comment. Spent a lot of time looking out the windows though!

DH wasn't around for the birth stories, those were saved for lucky me 😂
DH has little patients for his mother and would often suggest she kept her opinions to her self although sometimes her ideas got into his head and when we were alone he would suggest I stop breastfeeding for my own sake but he accepted that I didn't want to do that.
My FIL was cheap a typical Yorkshire man and would constantly talk about how expensive formula was and how great free milk was, encouraging me to breastfeed for as long as it remained free. I think that only wound MIL up more

In 1998 when feeding dd in the M&S cafe, with a shawl over her, two elderly ladies came and told me I should be doing it in the toilet. I asked if they wanted to eat their lunch in the toilet so they called the manager, who found them a table where I was out of their line of vision. It was all rather awkward and I felt the manager would have preferred me to leave but wouldn't have dared suggest it.

My MIL thought ‘only tinkers did it’, was horrified that it had never occurred to me not to BF, and was weirdly self-congratulatory when I never managed to have a supply, despite a couple of months of trying everything.

He grew up with her so he more than aware how she can be. He and his father spend a lot of time winding MIL up so this only gave them more ammunition to get her all flustered

I think breast feeding did go out of fashion for a time. One of my aunts told me she thought it was degrading. I bottle fed all my four and didn’t care what any one said or did. I feel the same about my dils now.

My MIL didn't understand it - her phrase - she'd fed her eldest for 6 weeks and then went onto bottles so PIL and her mother could help. She then went onto give birth to 6 babies in 6 years which might not have happened if she'd kept on breastfeeding! She wasn't vocal, but SIL was. Her dad died when she was pregnant and by birth she was on antidepressants and her MIL said she shouldn't poison the baby, and her bereft DM was around all the time wanting the baby and she had no other support and gave up breastfeeding within days - and clearly regretted it. She seemed to want me not to bf just to validate her not doing it.

My mother on the other hand who was the most difficult critical unsupportive arsehole ever had absolutely no issue with it.