to ignore my DH's views when it comes to breastfeeding in public?

[SpamMarie]

I don't have any children yet, but I was discussing the possibility with DH, including the fact that I'd be pretty dead set on breastfeeding.

He is very happy about that - breast is best after all - but we disagreed on one rather important point. Breast feeding in public is, in his view, Not Going To Happen. He says he doesn't have an issue with women who breastfeed in public himself, just that he doesn't want me to do it because it will attract negative attention, there may be perverts about, it's all society's fault etc. He is concerned for me and my safety. He reckons as long as we're organised with our feeding times and outings, there shouldn't be a problem, and I can always just pump in advance and take that out with me.

I don't think DH knows very much about how breastfeeding actually works. Breastfeeding in public was not something I was initially overly keen to do myself (purely because I'm shy), but the more I read about how breastfeeding works, the more I see that it would be a hugely positive thing to embrace unless I wish to remain trapped in the house for 12 months. According to him, I can just pump to solve that issue. Never mind missing out on bonding, the risk of nipple confusion, the general faff and equipment needed, and the fact that I really don't like the idea of pumping unless really medically necessary.

Also, I am not AT ALL bashing women who choose this method of feeding. I just want to know AIBU at my husband's attitude?

"Ah ha ha ha ha ha.

Sorry. Just the idea of being able to plan feeds and give milk to baby in a bottle if out."

It's not that funny, really.

There are women who do this by choice :(

Not that the OP should, and I totally agree with Shouty that his views on this betray a worrying sense of ownership of your body.

No way would I let this drop with some "let's see when the time comes" plamas bullshit.

Tell him you will be breastfeeding, and that you (in collaboration with your baby) will decide when and where it happens.

The fucking cheek of him thinking he gets a say in this decision. What a twat.

I found pumping easy and convenient (unlike a lot of women) but you can't do breastfeeding right if you only do it behind closed doors. Having a permament supply of free milk at the right temperature in appealing packaging that involves no bottles is wonderful and he has no right to demand you don't take advantage of it.

Even if it wasn't good for babies, it would STILL be worth doing.

my bf was much the same way.....until he he watch me nurse our little girl in the middle of a hospital ward infront of everyone and realised no-one else was watching! battle 2 infront of his dad.... he clearly didnt even notice as he asked for a cuddle when i was nursing her. battle 3 out shopping with a baby screaming as we got stuck in traffic getting there, leading to a much needed herbal tea in costa coffee and a feed for my little girl....no-one noticed! There are lots of nursing mothers out there that give us descreet feeders a bad name,and woudlnt advise feeding oublicly until ur really confident had dotn have to lead ur LO 2 much and NEVER lop ur boob out over the top of ur top, and i often think the nursing aprons just draw more attention to what your doing doing, i found a good old fashioned baggy top was far more descreet, and comfy!!!!! in 19 months of nursing i only received 1 comment (and i fed in public nearly every day!) and even then teh coffe shop manager came to my aid and asked the gentleman in question to leave, i think u'll find peoples opinions have changeda lot! Good luck, once he sees it for himself he'll realise what a wonderful thing it is

I'm too tired to read all the replies, but just to say, OP, that when pregnant with DD, DH said he would support me whatever I did, but that he wasn't keen on me bf in front of his friends - would just feel weird. I told him, if DD was hungry I would feed her. Wherever and whenever. I went on to bf for 14 months.

When your DC is here, he may well feel different. And if he doesn't, so what? He should be proud of you for doing it, and hopefully these feelings will come to the fore when DC is here.

After a short time (maybe 6 weeks or so) his 92 yr old grandpa would even sometimes come over and stroke DD's head while I was bf (only if he arrived on a visit, not just whenever he felt like it - not sure if he even realised!) - might sound weird, but no one batted an eyelid, which I would much rather than resistance and discomfort - DH was fine with this - hope yours come round too.

Oh please tell me EssexVic where I can go to see all these breastfeeders that give us discreet breastfeeders a bad name.

I have never seen anyone proudly bfing in public, it would be such a refreshing change from hiding away in toilets and changing rooms and in the car or under a blanket or the dreadful mama scarf!

OP, I have had this conversation with my DP before. We also do not have any children, but I have been pregnant several times (all ended in MCs, unfortunately), and the first time I was pregnant, I broached the subject of breastfeeding. Initially, DP was, I think, a bit startled - he had never known anyone who breastfed - all of his siblings have children, but none have breastfed, nor did his Mum (which is fine, btw, and totally their choice). His initial reaction was 'oh, but you will express, won't you? So you can feed in public, and so (oh, the best bit!) my Mum has a chance to feed the baby'.

So, I asked him to go and read up on the subject, which he did. He grew to understand the benefits of BFing, and why I wouldn't want to express just to make feeding in public easier, or so his Mum could 'have a go' at feeding (with all of her GC's, she 'needs' to 'have a go' at feeding them as soon as possible [her words]).

Recently, we had some good friends to stay, with their 6 week old son. DP brought our breastfeeding friend shopping, and had no problem strolling around the shops with her while she fed her son. In fact, he didn't bat an eyelid anytime she opened her nursing bra (she has inverted nipples, so needs to put on a plastic 'thingy', sorry, I don't know the technical term, to ready her breast for feeding) before her son latched.

Sorry, that was a lot of rambling - essentially, encourage your DP to read up on breastfeeding. You have plenty of time to do so. Hopefully, as with my DP, it will educate him and make him more aware of and open to breastfeeding.

I think subtle B/F is easy with infants, but gets a lot harder/more obvious once they are walking/talking/big so that's when DH is likely to get much more uncomfortable.

I don't know anyone who found expressing worked easily or well.

Meant "easy to do unobtrusively"

does he get controlling about anything else? he doesn't tell you what to wear does he?

you could always tell him that you don't want him to urinate in public toilets in case there are perverts in there and if he is organised he should manage to pop home every time he need the loo whilst he is out. after all, you are only thinking about him and want to protect him.

:o right on, blackeyed - and if he can't make it home he should piss into a bottle he brought expressly for that purpose, and dispose of it when he gets home.

Also DD2 didn't drink from a bottle until she was 5 years old. She took one she was using for her dolls apart and poured her squash into it.
Because she failed to put on weight several medics as well as me and DH tried to get her to take a bottle, she hadn't a clue.

To the PP who thinks they've never seen anyone proudly breastfeeding in public, you almost certainly have, you just haven't noticed it.

I fed DD on the bus yesterday, and noticed myself on the CCTV screen. Even I couldn't tell what I was doing! It just looked like I was holding her in the crook of my arm.

Have you ever seen a mum breastfeed in public??? Bet you have, but just not realised it. Its not a case of 'getting them out', its a case of getting baby comfy, you comfy, and baby having his/her dinner. And, no, I AM NOT BF MUM, , both my kiddies were formula fed. No harm to hubby, but he needs to support you on this, not pander to ignorance.

He's concerned for your safety?!

Given that you've reached adulthood and are still alive I think we can safely assume that you have a rough grasp of how to look after yourself and keep yourself safe.

And given the fact that news stories rarely (if ever ) report on marauding groups of perverts endangering the lives of breastfeeding women, we can also safely assume breastfeeding is a relatively low-risk activity.

This soooo isn't about your safety or whatever other nonsense he is trying to worry or guilt you with. It's about his own issues, full stop. He's entitled to have issues on whatever he wants - what he's not entitled to do is NOT address them himself and instead make you modify your behaviour.

Agree with the others who say cross the bridge when you come to it. If he's in any way a reasonable and sensible human being, he'll realise the error of his ways. If he's not, then you have a much bigger problem on your hands than not being able to breastfeed in public.

Oh he's in for a ride on the learning curve

I agree with nocake back on page 2. When the time comes to seriously discuss it - check out your local Surestart Centre. You and he can get lots of sensible advice and he will see (or most likely not ) lots of discreetly feeding mummies, and realise he is being a bit of a turnip!

Don't worry about it for now. When the time comes he will realise what a silly thing it was to say!

Tell him that he has to come everywhere with you then. And when it's time for you to bf, he can take off all his clothes and just sit there nekkid. No one will pay attention to what you're doing then, I bet. :o

I breastfed all sorts of places in public and it was super convenient. Often people don't realize you're doing it and with a bit of practice you show very little. Only place I felt awkward was when we visited winsor castle in the rain and I was very promptly shown where the brestfeediing room was.

My dh was much the same before we had our kids. He had 3 from previous relationships who were all bottle fed. He was sure that if I was going to bf, it was going to take place only in a closet in the dead of night on alternate tuesdays. That is, until ds was born and then dh, who had had to do all the night time bottle feeds with his first 3 kids, realized that he didn't have to do anything. After about a week of not being woken up at night, he was getting much more cheerful about the whole bfing thing. And by the time I was able to go out in public (had an emergency cs, so was bedridden for awhile), dh was a full blown advocate of exclusive bfing. We could be in the most crowded builders' cafe and if ds even looked like he might be thinking about being hungry, dh would tell me to "whip them out, he's hungry" and glare about the room at anyone who might dare to be offended. Kids are older now, but he still goes around like a born again, telling everyone about the virtues of bfing.
Give you dh a chance (and make sure he spends time around other fathers whose wives don't bf and who have to do all the night time bottles) and he will come around by the time your first baby appears.

that's a lovely story SofiaAmes.

Wow I'm lucky DP is so supportive! DS is 10 weeks tomorrow & so far I've fed at his Grandma's, Costa, Frankie & Bennys, Debenhams, the pub, Nando's, motorway services, a garden centre, Cribbs Causeway...

OP, I'm sure your DP will come round once your baby arrives & realises that a breastfed baby will not stick to any sort of feeding schedule no matter how hard you try & that a breast can usually stop any crying (magic boobies!) he'll have to. As others have said, you display so little when feeding, especially if you do the two tops trick someone has already mentioned. Only one woman has ever noticed I was feeding DS & she shot me a lovely 'I remember that' kind of smile & only one person has ever come out with a stupid comment of 'bitty' (I wasn't feeding DS at the time but he asked if I was bf'ing) My main tip for feeding in public is just get on with it, ignore any stupid comments & do not feel you must ask for permission or similar as most people will never notice.

Didyou, do you even know how breastfeeding works? Just giving a baby some formula while out could cause serious milk production issues, let alone the poor Mum who is engorged which can cause mastitis. Please do your research before opening your mouth with unhelpful suggestions.

It's not really that nice a story - sexist man who thinks he owns his wife's body changes his mind about breastfeeding because of he advantages to him

The time to disabuse a man of his sexist notions is when they become apparent.

Why wait until there is a baby in the mix to stand up for the fact that you are a person, and not his fuckee doll?

OP here!

Gosh this thread got long in my absence. I haven't read the whole thing, but thank you very much for your input. Having no actual experience when it comes to rbeastfeeding (although I am well researched) I really wanted reassurance that I wasn't being ridiculous for feeling as outraged as I did.

Honestly, this was one conversation we had, and I think his view is entirely due to ignorance. He never saw breastfeeding when he grew up (I did) and we don't know anyone that does it now. He is a total prude (something I generally don't mind at all) and I think all he could think of was the 'horror' of public boob as oppose to the reality of feeding a baby and what's more important.

I will have this conversation with him WELL before we even convceive. This is pretty fundamental to me, and I surely do not want to stress about it once I already have a child to care for. I do not believe him to be sexist, I just think he has no clue how breastfeeding works (or pumping for that matter). I cannot take offense that people would say he is sexist, because if you judge him from this one conversation alone, that's how it comes off. I just think, like so many people, he isn't perfect and he allowed his gut to override his brain. But the test will be how he responds to it once I've explained the facts. I feel pretty good about that, now I know a lot more than I used to.

Thanks for your help MN!

Lol InTheNightKitchen This is confuses me too. My boobs are pretty nice but I should think if I have a baby latched on to them, that would put any potential predator off as it would certainly act as a distraction. Thanks for cheering me up.