Breastfeeding on Cross Country trains - a horrid experiance

[Paulala]

Hello ladies, I'm a first time poster & a first time mum so apologies if I introduce myself by way of a horrid experience but I'd like to know if you think I'm being unreasonable.

I've just taken my first train journey with my 7 month old boy, we were travelling alone to Derby with everything we needed for a week on a Cross Country train. Everything was going ok until we returned to our seat from a nappy change. The nappy change itself was quite upsetting for him, being strapped to a table in a moving urine soaked metal cubical isn't very pleasant, but I hadn't expected a lot from the facilities.

I intended to give him a breastfeed at our seat but when we got there the seat beside us was occupied (we were in a set on 2 seats not a table of 4). I asked the man sitting in the seat if it would be possible for him to move to one of the single vacant seats 3 rows up just while I breastfed so I could have a little bit of privacy. He said No & stated that was the seat he was allocated why should he move.

I asked him again saying my baby needed to be fed, he was hungry & distressed & there were empty seats in view he could use. He said I should move there instead, this really wouldn't have helped as they were single aisle seats & would have meant I'd have to feed even more publicly. I was so upset I asked him if he expected me to breastfeed in the seat beside him with him watching & he just shrugged his shoulders.

At this point everyone close by was aware of the situation & I'm still standing in the aisle with an upset baby, this man hasn't even got up to allow us to sit down. The ticket inspector then arrives & I explain to him that the man in the seat beside us is causing a lot of distress with his insistence on sitting there while I breastfed. Anyone who's traveled by train will know neighbouring seats offer no prospect of personal space.

I fully understand his right to the seat he booked but both he & I could see other seats he could have taken until I stopped feeding then he could have returned to the seat he booked when we finished. I'm sure many men would have been totally ok with doing that. Instead he was nasty & snarly & the thought of him watching me feed my baby in such a tight space was horrible. I had no option but to ask the ticket inspector to help me find another seat & to help me move all my things, we would also need the assistant at Derby station to be made aware we'd be on another carriage. All because this man would not move 3 rows up.

Still seating stubbornly in his seat the man recognised how upset he'd made me & stated loudly to everyone, right I'll move & asked the guard what he was going to do about it. The guard then said we'll sit you in first class sir don't worry about it you will be ok there. I couldn't believe it he'd made me suffer through a very public request to breastfeed privately (or as private as I could be) he'd initially insisted he would not move while I did so & left me feeling like I shouldn't be breastfeeding on a train, all while I stood with a distressed baby in a moving carriage while everyone watched. When the man eventually moved I sat & fed my baby & cried it was the worst breastfeeding experience I've ever had.

I have to travel back next week with the same train company & I'm dreading it, I can't express milk & I'm really worried something similar will happen again. I think trains should have a breastfeeding policy which recognises a womans need for privacy and a bit of respect. Not a system where men are rewarded for making women feel bad about the need to feed their babies. Do you think I'm being unreasonable?

Cheers ladies,
Paula

Hi. First time posting on AIBU for me too!
I don't think you were being unreasonable. I think you were incredibly unlucky to sit next to some one who would refuse a reasonable request. My dh would have undoubtedly moved at such a request having supported me through bf our two. It's not easy to bf in public the first few times but I was fortunate not to have any negative experiences. If it had been me I would have asked once politely and then warned him of the consequences - exposed flesh and possible milk spray - he'd have moved smarties!!

Also if I had been sitting any where near you I would have offered to swap seats with you. So it's a real shame no other passengers offered to support you.

On the return trip speak to a guard at the beginning of the journey and they may offer to move you to a seat with two unreserved seat or at least with women. Failing that just bf as soon as you get on the train and hope it puts rude people off sitting near you!!

Never had any special clothes, except for a breast feeding bra. Just wore loose fitting tops. Never had to expose my boobs at all - although I perhaps didn't take as much time as usual making sure ds had a good latch .

I could never see the point in the special tops with button up "holes" for breast feeding through. They seemed to be more of faff than lifting a loose top and then let it drape over the baby's head.

And a cape, to me, was just screaming "I'm breast feeding, look at me" as opposed to "My baby is having a nice cuddle and might be sleeping, or possibly feeding, who cares?"

i don't boubt they are helpful to the individual women who is bashful, but they do reinforce the idea that breastfeeding is something shameful and to be hidden away.

Not everyone wants to be a warrior though- I do get that.

I just went back and re the OP's first post again she sounds utterly ridiculous and that man had every right to be annoyed. The OP stood in the aisle of the train carriage with a loudly refused to sit next to this man whilst she breast feed like he was some kind of slobbering pervert. If I was him my piss would have been boiling.

cake- my OH would not have moved. And he would have felt insulted at being asked.

Honestly, the cape makes little difference to what other people see. It us obvious that a baby is booby feeding whether you wear a cape or not. Breastfeeding is perfectly normal so the op really didn't need to kick up a fuss and ask someone to move from their designated seat. If she was that bothered about privacy she should have moved somewhere private. It is very entitled to assume everyone else should work around you, breastfeeding or not.

cake- my OH would not have moved. And he would have felt insulted at being asked

you must be so proud of him!

If it had been me I would have asked once politely and then warned him of the consequences - exposed flesh and possible milk spray - he'd have moved smarties!!

Failing that just bf as soon as you get on the train and hope it puts rude people off sitting near you!!

So cakeforme you're advocating using a perfectly normal activity as some kind of threat?

What about those rude people who've booked an allocated seat?

"It us obvious that a baby is booby feeding whether you wear a cape or not.

I disagree. I have breastfed for a total of 8 years in my life, much of it in public. I would have thought that I could easily spot a breastfeeding woman across a room- but you know what- I can't

I can think of many occasions that I have sat near a woman with an apparently sleeping baby in her arms and not until i have finished my coffee or stood up that I then realised she was breastfeeding.
Ther must have been hundreds of breastfeeding women that I have passed and i have been completely unware.

EXCEPT-- the onles who wear capes and struggle to breastfeed under tents- not they wre the ones who really call attention to themselves.

I would say if you are shy about breastfeeding in public then master the art of minimising exposure rather that the huge advertising banner that says "Look at me I'm breastfeeding under here"

Of course every woman has the right to breastfeed under covers if she feels the need.

move you to a seat with two unreserved seat or at least with women.

Why only women!?

The only person I can see being rude is the OP. Making assumptions that the man would be 'watching her' and calling him the most vile names. There is no excuse for that.

it's a real shame no other passengers offered to support you.

Maybe the rest of the carriage saw how she was behaving and wanted to stay out if it.

My DP may or may not have moved however he is a father of four all of which were breast fed so it wouldn't bother him and he certainly wouldn't 'watch'

If you're that self conscious wear a cover. Do you seriously expect privacy on a train? You have no clue what that man has been through in the last 12 hours. Maybe he's just watched his wife die and just wants to sit in his seat and not be bothered, maybe he's just been told horrible news, maybe he gets travel sick on aisle seats. You just don't know. He's not saying he's against you bfing he just didn't want to move as he was settled in his seat.

Each to their own. Breastfeeding is normal and natural, however you do it. Still, you can't expect other people to move out of their allotted seat so that you can avoid bring seen because you want privacy in a public place.

I've actually used a hand-express pump at a table in a crowded mountain restaurant on the ski slopes when the weather was too bad for me to find a quiet spot to the side of the slopes. People never knew what I was doing.

People are not normally that interested in what random strangers are doing, despite the fact that we think we're the centre of the universe!

Hi Paula, I do get how upsetting these things can be - especially when you're feeling frazzled with a screaming baby and changing in a gross bathroom. Unfortunately, I think that if the person isn't willing to move (on first polite asking), you just have to make the best of it. I think there have been some good suggestions already - especially just turning your back entirely towards the other person so you face the window.

The other thing is that you can't assume in advance that people will behave inappropriately while you're breastfeeding. If it did happen that you sat there trying to breastfeed and found that the man was staring at you, then of course you'd be entirely justified in saying very very loudly to stop staring at your breasts and show some respect - but in my experience, that is very unlikely.

I have ended up breastfeeding a lot these days during the evening rush hour on London buses while seated in the priority seats at the front, with every single person entering the bus or coming down the stairs walking past. I didn't like it at first and it's not ideal (and I'll be really pleased when my toddler no longer demands this), but you know, it's actually fine. I've also had a number of women say really nice things to me and have never had a man stare (and trust me, there are lots of weirdos of all sorts on these buses - but not one has stared). Really, most people don't notice at all. And yes, my nipple has popped out on the bus. It happens, but you know what? After trying to avoid breastfeeding on the bus home from nursery for a while, I have just come to accept that breastfeeding on the bus whenever he wants just keeps him quiet and happy and I (and everyone else on the bus) can have a much more pleasant time.

Try not to stress too much about the trip back and just go with the flow. Really, it just go ahead and feed and it will be fine.

This is the sort of behaviour that gives breast feeding mums a bad name. I would have just sat down and got on with feeding my baby. No fuss, no attention needed. You created a scene instead of moving to one of the seats that you expected a stranger to move to. I'm sure if you'd offered a table seat to someone sitting in a standard row you could have had two seats to yourself! FWIW I bf my daughter for 15 months in public without drawing attention to myself, demanding any special provision or inconveniencing others. Never had anyone comment on it and we spent a lot of time out and about.

It seems like the man could have just moved. No, he didn't HAVE to, but why not just do it if there were seats nearby?

I fed on trains but was never comfortable doing it, and a lot of you are being really smug with your 'I just got on with it.' We all struggle with something or other, and someone else telling you how easy they found it is just annoying.

But why should he?

Just because a woman is breastfeeding. What if I was about to bring out a magazine and asked him to move as I like privacy when I read, or when I bring out my sandwiches or want to speak privately on the phone.

The man could move for you then- there are other seat available after all.
Why the bloody hell should he?

The world doesn't revolve around us- sometimes we just have to fit in with other people, and breastfeeding women are no different.

The capes are for the congenitally nervous, probably 1 in a thousand bf women use them. You have probably been surrounded by bf women all your life and not noticed because basically what most people do is push up their tops and effectively plug the flesh gap with the baby.

Drop a wet breast pad on the bugger next time. He'll move sharpish.

Yabu, you had a seat, you should have fed anyway, you caused more attention to be drawn to you than if you had just fed... And if you had fed and he pulled his face he would have looked like an arse

Get over the private feeding thing, it's a train, it's not a private place

Drop a wet breast pad on the bugger next time. He'll move sharpish.

That makes me so cross. It's not funny or amusing and I'd be livid if you did that to me. I'd back up anybody else you did it to as well if they wanted to report you. I know it's only breast milk but I don't like this underlying 'threatening' that some women think is ok... spray people with breast milk, drop breast pads on them...

Does anybody really think this is ok?

I agree with you lying

Gosh its not really a horrid experience OP. You had a small argument with a man on the train, who wouldn't do what you wanted him to. If that's the worst thing that happens to you, then good for you.

Some people are possessive about their seats on trains. Perhaps he was very tired and thought if he moved, he would have to move again out of someone else's reserved seat. The whole point of booking a seat is so you don't have to do that. Perhaps he was very anal. Perhaps you were very irritating and caused him to have such a caustic reaction to you. The fact the guard let him sit in First Class implies to me that he may not have been Unreasonable.

Much as I said previously Lying
It reminds me of the people who threaten others with the likelihood of their children being sick etc to "persuade" other passengers to give up their allocated seats on planes.

So you did and that's exactly it, ilovesooty. I don't understand the mentality of women like that, not at all and have zero empathy with them. I think that kind of antagonistic attitude generally makes people unsympathetic.

The body fluids thing is freakish. Forcing them on somebody is common assault, I think. Vile anyway, yuck.

I breast fed on the wings of a jumbo jet once with everyone watching.

Mumsnet, Yabu. I think I shall now flounce because you are a load of mind boggling hypocritical swear words.

Actually, I'm really quite saddened by the lack of sympathy for a first time mum trying to breastfeed in public. It's really fucking shitty.