Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Flip

1 2 ··· 35 36 37 38 39 40

Original poster

Breastfeeding on Cross Country trains - a horrid experiance

999 replies

Paulala · 07/08/2014 23:11

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

OP posts:

ilovesooty · 12/08/2014 22:05

In fact she herself describes it as a very public request

Because she made it so.

Notso · 12/08/2014 22:05

So embarrassed he managed to loudly ask the guard what he was going to do about it. It's a small train, asking him at one side of him sitting down or asking him at the other side of him standing up isn't vastly different. Perhaps she didn't want him to get up once to let her sit down then again to move so she could feed.

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:09

What's wrong with him asking that? She asked him to move snd he didn't want to, why keep on at him? She got the ticket inspector involved and he asked him, what are you going to do about it?

revealall · 12/08/2014 22:10

I think it might have been the Op's melodramatic tone that has decided this one as a YABU.

The "hungry and distressed" baby that obviously could wait for the Op to have a discussion with the man and then the guard.

The " suffering" of having all the nearby passengers overhear that she might be breast feeding.

It's putting my back up just reading it let alone actually have someone standing over me telling me to move from my allocated seat in case I saw her feeding her baby and then getting upset when I said no.

ilovesooty · 12/08/2014 22:13

Yes perhaps she assumed he was going to move at her request. Perhaps she's really considerate. And perhaps he didn't speak loudly either. In any case she'd already ensured she'd alerted surrounding passengers and had publicly told the guard he'd caused her distress by that point.

KnittedJimmyChoos · 12/08/2014 22:16

So why didn't she get into her seat and ask him quietly? Was it necessary to stand in the aisle and make a scene?

She gives the impression he had made no movement to let her into her seat.

By which time, after the altercation, she probably did not want to be squashed next to him in a confined space let alone to feed.

Delphiniumsblue · 12/08/2014 22:19

The lesson to learn before she does the return is that she handled it badly.
From the man's point of view he had got onto a busy train- quite stressful. He finds his seat and then a woman appears and before even getting in her seat is expecting him to move- without any preamble.
Had she sat down, talked to him quietly, said how stressful it was changing a baby in a small space and asked him if he would mind just taking another seat for a short while - she would have got a different response.
I would certainly be more inclined to be cooperative with a friendly person that had chatted to me, rather than one who straight away launched into getting me to move, as if she had a right to my seat.

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:19

Oh the drama. Come on, she was perfectly fine sitting next to him until he wouldn't do as she asked.

Delphiniumsblue · 12/08/2014 22:20

The poor man probably didn't know she wanted to get in if she didn't ask!

Delphiniumsblue · 12/08/2014 22:21

She hadn't been sitting next to him- he got in the train while she was out of her seat.

ilovesooty · 12/08/2014 22:24

She made a scene and stood there while he continued to sit. She mentions him notgetting up but tthere is no indication that she made any attempt to take her allocated seat. It appears she made (in her own words) a very public request and stood there hoping he'd be pressured intomoving. She then told the tticket collector he had caused her distress and asked to move. The guard sized up the situation and seemingly decided that the man was being embarrassed and moved him - with the added effect of giving the OP the space she'd asked for.

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:25

Ah I gettit.

Delphiniumsblue · 12/08/2014 22:28

I think that sums it up, Ilovesooty. The way NOT to do it. Avoid it in the way home and all should be well!

PhaedraIsMyName · 12/08/2014 22:31

From reading the OP, the man.... didn't let OP sit in her booked seat despite her and her baby being upset

No he did not. Not even the OP said that. He did not stop her sitting in her seat. She wanted him to give up his booked seat. We don't know if the OP had even booked one seat let alone the 2 she wanted.

Notso · 12/08/2014 22:31

Or from OP's point of view, she is travelling alone with her baby and a load of stuff for the first time. Stressed by nappy change and at prospect of feeding on the train.
She panics when she sees a man at her seat who wasn't there before and without thinking asks him to move into the empty seats she has just passed.
She is taken aback when he refuses and her baby is distressed, she is stressed. The Man is not being helpful for whatever reason, he isn't even moving to let her sit in her seat. She asks the inspector to help her move all her stuff. The man speaks up and the inspector thinks it easier to move the man than the stressed woman with a hungry baby, a load of stuff and a need to phone her station to tell them he has moved.

PhaedraIsMyName · 12/08/2014 22:33

But it wasn't "her"seat. It was his booked seat.

cruikshank · 12/08/2014 22:33

OP, I haven't read the whole thread, so don't know the ins and outs of all the arguments so sorry if I'm saying what someone else has, but if you're likely to be travelling by train even three or four times in the next year, it might be worth your while getting a family and friends travelcard. That way you can book two tickets - one for you and one for the baby. So you don't need to have anyone sitting next to you. I know it seems a bit mad given that babies travel for free, but I go by train with my ds quite a lot and for as many journeys as I can remember, it has been cheaper, with the f&f card, to book us two seats than to pay the full adult fare - it's just one of those quirks of pricing.

Anyway, I'm sorry you were so upset with your experience.

KnittedJimmyChoos · 12/08/2014 22:34

yes I would think that's a pretty accurate idea of what's gone on Notso. I can just imagine her in that foul loo thinking, thank goodness that's over, now little man lets get you back to our seat and calmed down, then heart sinks and panics, as someone sat there, baby crying - the rest is history.

And this wonderful man just sat there and refused to move.

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:35

I'm really bored if this now can we talk about something else

Softlysoftlycatchymonkey · 12/08/2014 22:38

The bit where he didn't move to let her get to her seat resonated with me and I think it's one of the reasons I sympathise with her.

I've been in the position a many times when I worked in a bar when men would do this, so I would have to squeeze past. It's unpleasant.

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:38

Knitted, come on, they are imaginings.

Since when is going to be bloody toilet such an ordeal. Jesus.

KnittedJimmyChoos · 12/08/2014 22:38

I see a struggling Mum, trying to keep it together on her first big trip, worried about all her stuff, juggling balls in the air and so on, and is then met by Mr Unhelpful.

I would not have used the cubicle to have changed baby and simpy done it on the seat, and your Wonderful sweet kind salt of the earth Man would have come to his seat and been faced with .....a dirty nappy or bottom, Yes I am That Entitled I would not have gone to the cubile

HaroldLloyd · 12/08/2014 22:39

I see a woman, imagining, imagining all sorts of things.

Delphiniumsblue · 12/08/2014 22:39

Good idea HaroldLloyd.
Now she knows where she went wrong she can avoid in future.

Softlysoftlycatchymonkey · 12/08/2014 22:40

harold if you click on active convo there should be lots of things that might interest you?

Flip

1 2 ··· 35 36 37 38 39 40

Swipe left for the next trending thread