My DP said he wouldn’t have another baby with me if I was to formula feed.

[Missy450]

We were talking about having a second child last night and I casually said I think I would formula feed (I have ebf my first).
He replied he wouldn’t want another one if I was going to formula feed. This then turned into a big argument which when we got to the bottom of it, what he really meant was he wouldn’t want another baby if even before I’ve got pregnant, I had decided to formula feed I.e. not wanting the best for our baby without even trying.

I would like to bf again and I would try to, but I can see it being so much harder when you’ve got a toddler as well.

He would be supportive if I gave it a go but had a good reason to stop. He’s a nutritionist and has studied in detail how good breastmilk is so I guess it’s important to him.

But, he’s basically saying, the babies life isn’t worth as much if he/she is formula fed, right?? AIBU?

Why would you decide even pre-conception that you don't want to give your second child as good of a start as you did your first?

Sounds like you don't really want a second child so don't go with it.

And he hasn't said No BF No baby.
He's said he won't like to try if OP will say a hard No to not even trying to BF.

He wants his baby to have the best start.
So he's saying that's cool. You don't want to BF but I don't feel comfortable having another baby then.

He gets a definite say on the conditions of him brining a child into this world.

Because maybe like a lot of things to do with parenting he didn't realise that it mattered before it happened!
Who knows?!

Reality is it's his sperm. And he can put whatever conditions he wants on it.

No one is forcing the OP to do anything with her body that she doesn't want to. If she doesn't want to BF she doesn't have to. Never in a million years is it OK to force someone to do something with their bodies they don't have to.

But if BF is a hard no for her then she's not having his baby.

Taylor22

Reality is it's his sperm. And he can put whatever conditions he wants on it.

No, he's a twat and being controlling for not doing exactly what the woman in this relationship wants!

I wonder if half the replies on this thread are MRAs who will use this as an example of stupid feminists.

Your body, your choice. I wouldn't want a child with someone like that anyway. Is he controlling in other ways?

@BertrandRussell

"I don't think"

FTFY"

No idea what this means, but I assume it's rude. I believe the correct response is "Right back atcha"

I can see his point, he obviously feels very strongly about it. I don’t think giving you that ultimatum and effectively holding you to ransom
Was fair though.

Fixed That For You.

Wow, you're cynical!

HTH

He has a point.

I breast fed my first son until he was 2.5 years old and when I was pregnant with our second I couldn't envisage how I would manage the demands of BF'ing and the cluster feeds etc when I had a toddler to look after too. Pre-conception though it was always my plan to breast feed and I can't imagine why you would make a decision now that you aren't going to breast feed because hypothetically it may be difficult with another child on the scene.

My second baby is now 3 months old and breast feeding has been a totally nightmare. He had a horrendous tongue tie which was snipped at 9 days old and we have continued problems with his positioning and latching and he sees an Osteopath for this. He's also on ranitidine for reflux and I'm currently
on a dairy free diet as my son may have a dairy allergy. It's exhausting and the last 13 weeks have been so troublesome and stressful and all related to breast feeeing. However, the actual act of breast feeding whilst looking after a toddler too really isn't problematic at all - it's pretty easier and much easier I imagine than faffing around with bottles and sterilisers etc.

Over the course of DS2's life I have felt so stressed and worried about his feeding at times and it has led me to almost crack and say "let's just formula feed" but I haven't done it yet and I know I wont.

It sounds bizarre, but is kind of on your DH's wave length, but I would feel incredibly guilty if I put DS on formula, especially at this age, when I had given breast milk to my other son for so long.

Battered, since you addressed Morphene in a reply to a post from me, it's reasonable to think you had confused me with her.

I don't understand your focus on mothers having time for babies and toddlers when the father is available to help. Surely the father's attention is just as valuable?

Absolutely your body your choice. I just don't understand how that can be so obvious to people re abortion (which is that baby's life), but not re feeding. He of course is allowed to choose whether he wants another child and is entitled to make that decision based on his own criteria. That's the sad truth. But he is a twat.

If you had said you would like a c-section and he'd said "I'd like another baby, but only if you at least try to have a vaginal birth with no pain relief", would people think that's OK?

It's a long time ago but I found it way easier to bf with a toddler than bottle feed. I breast fed for 4 months and then changed to bottle (health problem which led to my milk drying up) and trying to cope with a hungry baby, the toddler AND sterilising/making bottles was a nightmare especially when out and about. It was so so much easier to give the toddler something to occupy themselves, and talk to me about, whilst sticking the baby under my jumper. I usually had the baby held in one arm whilst the toddler was tucked in the other which I couldn't do when bottle feeding!

Why are people discussing the benefits of bf here when the issue is clearly that her husband is a controlling arsehole?!

Why is anything else relevant??

All sorts of things that should be ironed out before you have children together could be perceived as controlling if you come to a fork in the road.

Athletic person marries couch potato, tries to prod couch potato into exercise.

Teetotal marries drinker and tries to convince drinker to cut back.

And so on.

Ideally people figure this shit out in advance and wind up with people having similar views on things that really matter to them. BFing was important to both me and my husband, when we met in our 30s we were going Noam Chomsky lectures doing Nestle boycotts and all this other earnest stuff so he'd have felt quite rightly I'd sold him an illusion if I turned around and said I wasn't BFing our second.

"Fixed That For You.

Wow, you're cynical!

HTH"

Nope-none the wiser. And I know what HTH means. I can only assume you're a nutritionist

*Why are people discussing the benefits of bf here when the issue is clearly that her husband is a controlling arsehole?!

Why is anything else relevant??*

This.

ordinarily i'd tell him to fuck off out of your body but i do get my judgey pants on a bit when people pick and choose between bf and formula. surely you turn to formula if you can't bf not select it as an equal option.