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

I would say that you were lucky there were spare seats- my general experience is that you couldn't move someone because many people were having to stand. You ought to assume this when travelling by train.

Total drama about a very normal ever day activity.

Our wrapping bf into some sort of mystical experience or worse a dirty little secret is the reason bf rates are do
Low in the UK.

Babies can be fed anywhere and everywhere discreetly.

My 4 were. To be comfy you need a seat and a Muslim scarf or such like and get on.

What is it that makes some people as entitled as OP ? Fine she wants privacy it's not ok for her to harass some poor man that's paid for his seat just so as she can get her own way. Jesus.

Provoked by another thread, and the mis spelling of muslin scarf by the The Body......into Muslim scarf....

Do we know what culture op hails from? Perhaps she feels more need to be covered up due to other factors?

Has anyone met a man and felt them to be leery?

FFS, for all we know the chap could be gay and not remotely interested in boobs. I'll word this carefully (so I don't get deleted again), but I find it astounding that the OP only chose to tell us about the ogling once a lot of people disagreed with her.

I didn't realise she said he had actually oggled her, only that he was leery.

Has anyone else ever experienced leery men? I have quite a lot of them.

Ha ha typing on iPhone.

Do you think I meant to say Muslim? How funny

Leery men yes but never when bf to be honest but then I was usually far too busy latching the baby and then reading or dozing to care.

I leered at a fire engine today though to see if I could glimpse a fit fireman

bornfree I have twice or thrice had a leerer, and once even had a lad pull his phone on me. Honestly though, I just turned my back on it and carried on bf. The world is mostly full of decent people, and the ones that are idiots are not worth getting your knickers in a twist over. Sometimes people stare without meaning to as well. Babies have hypnotic hands and fingers and lips. :)

I do the muslin/muslim thing all the time - nothing freudian/nothing to do with religion...think maybe muslim is easier to pronounce than muslin or something and it just gets in your head?
Anyway my sister lived in the west bank for a while and saw women there in full burkas etc openly and comfortably bf in cafes - without modesty blankets etc...so I think bf and privacy issues maybe more of a problem in 'western' cultures - not a religious/islamic cultural issue at all.

I can't believe this is still going on mostly with posters droning on about how they fed on a train/plane/back of camel in front of a bazillion people and didn't care.
Some people care, whether they should or not is by the by because it matters to them.

Do you think I meant to say Muslim? How funny

No I think you meant to say Muslin, and said Muslim.

As I said.

I have had men leering at me without a baby BF and I have had a few men leering, whilst BF but more at a distance.

Had this man been leery and oggling its not something I would have wanted at such close quarters and trapped on the inside of a seat on a train.

so I think bf and privacy issues maybe more of a problem in 'western' cultures - not a religious/islamic cultural issue at all.

Do we know ops religion? Maybe she wouldn't have had an issue if she had not felt the man to be leery.

She didn't accuse the man of being leery until he didn't want to move.

When he wouldn't play ball then he was all of a sudden a big old perve.

The man did not ogle or leer at her. She accused him of "grunting" at her (presumably fully covered )breasts during the ridiculous conversation she had with him.

However as she never even attempted to feed in front of him there isn't any evidence he ogled or leered. The OP made a hysterical assumption about him and proceeded to insult him on the train and here based on her assumption.

notso well it kind of does matter if you demand privacy in a public place really doesn't it.

As for posters sharing their own experiences how on earth is that wrong? Unless you have experienced something it's hard to comment isn't it.

The bloke neither ogled or leered in her first post he was just bloody sat there.

He changed to a pervert when posters told her she was out of order.

And she's not a Muslim as if that mattered anyway.

She asked him if he was going to sit there watching. There's no evidence that he was going to do anything of the kind. She told us that he was a pervert once the response from here was in general that she was BU. Again there is absolutely no proof that he was a pervert and that was a disgraceful allegation that MNHQ saw fit to condone.

It's not wrong to share experiences, I never said it was.
I'm not sure it is helpful to repeatedly say how you didn't feel uncomfortable. How does that help anyone to feel different?
As I posted before I didn't feed my first child in public once unless you count the post natal ward. I planned every trip out either around feeds, fed in feeding rooms, went back to the car etc.
People telling me I was being daft, nobody cared or they did it with no problems only served to make me feel worse about myself not better about feeding in public.

If I go to visit someone with a new baby and they go out the room or upstairs when it needs feeding, I don't tell them to get a grip and stay put, I fed DC2,3 and 4 in front of anyone so so should they. I offer to put the kettle on or see that as my cue to leave depending on who it is.

I still think that the initial request to move was not unreasonable. Repeated requests and trying to make him feel odd for not wanting to move were. I like to think in the same situation though most people if asked to move would maybe point her in the direction of the guard for help rather than just saying no.

Ok well to me asking another person to shift because you choose to do something is rude.

To expect complete privacy in a confined public place is ridiculous.

Of course neither would anyone normal tell a bg mother to get a grip if she chooses to feed privately but that's not the case here.

The cake and eating it comes to mind with an unpleasant dose of tantrum and vile accusations

Exactly ilovesooty

So if a pregnant woman asks someone for a seat on the bus she is rude too then?

To expect complete privacy in a confined public place is ridiculous.
I agree, to ask for more privacy though is not, in my opinion.

There are loads of posts I have read about post natal wards where women complain about Midwives and other HCPs demanding the curtains around the beds are left open on the ward even when the Mothers are breastfeeding and it is visiting time.
I've never read anyone saying they were being ridiculous not to want to feed in front of others.

exactly notso

Asking for more privacy is pointless when there is none to give.

Booting somebody out of the seat they have paid for is simply not an option.

Op should have considered this before travelling and planned accordingly.

Pulling a curtain on a ward is far easier to organise than giving yourself a complete privacy zone on a packed train.

So if a pregnant woman asks someone for a seat on the bus she is rude too then?

The OP wasn't asking for a seat she was asking for two.

I don't see how you can compare starting to bf on a post natal ward wanting to breast feed privately on a public train.

The vile remarks that the OP also made about the man were unfounded and completely uncalled for as was asking him originally if he was going to watch.

Asking for more privacy is pointless when there is none to give But there was some to give.

He could have popped into the other seats and within a few minuets been safely installed back in his original seat, baby fed, mum happy, leering oggling man happy.