AIBU - TTC and single-use plastic?

[PretendNothing]

Long-time lurker here and this is my first post. For the last couple of years, my husband and I have been trying to reduce the amount of single-use plastic in our lives. We've stopped buying bottled water, buy fruit from the local greengrocers to cut down on packaging, take a ceramic coffee cup to the café, you know how it goes.

Now that we're thinking about having a family, AIBU to be horrified by the amount of single-use plastic floating around? Why do pregnancy and ovulation tests have to come in plastic casings? Just how much packaging is really necessary for a few vitamin pills?

Wow.

If you’re shocked by the amount of plastic involved in TTC then god help you once you actually have children.

@ToffeeSauce - this is a common observation among my friends and family. But does it have to be like this? Should we all just accept that we're going to use tons of plastic in our lifetime and say there's nothing we can do about it?

For those of you who have said similar things and have children already, what single-use plastic do you think is unavoidable when children are involved?

That's not a challenge or trying to get a rise out of anyone, it's a genuine question. I am no eco-warrior. My DH gets MAD at me because sometimes, sometimes, I still buy bananas wrapped in plastic instead of loose ones because I don't have time to wait in the queue at the scales. I'm not perfect or preaching. I know there's a balance of convenience and concern for the environment that sometimes falls in favour of convenience. But I'm trying.

Plastic toys are everywhere, I see, but that's not single-use. My four-year-old niece is happily playing with my own 30-odd-year-old Lego and PlayMobil as we speak, so I've seen that some plastic can bring a lot of long-lasting joy.

And hygiene/sterility issues aside, of course - I'm not advocating doctors using syringes repeatedly or washing out your pee sample pots...

Really appreciate everyone taking time out of their weekends to share their thoughts.

The plastic that is destined for landfill off the top of my head:

Car seats
Mattresses
Certain toy gifts (e.g. plastic food. Children chew on that, squash it and generally destroy it. You get called pretentious for insisting on wooden toys)
Packaging from clothes
Calpol syringes
Medicine packaging - vitamins/antihistamines/syringes for vaccinations/etc
Beakers - they get chewed on, not hygienic to pass to others
Spoons - also get chewed on
Bottles if bottle feeding - advised not to pass on bottles or teats between children
Dummies - same as bottles but also chewed on
Party bag toys/balloons/bubbles
Snot suckers

Not all single use, but they can't be recycled or passed to others. We use reusable nappies/wipes and pass clothes back and forth between friends all the time, but the above cannot be avoided really. It can be minimised if you're dedicated but that takes a lot of time that you may not have.

Great post, @GummyGoddess. Thank you. Daunting and I hadn't thought about a lot of it but fore-warned is fore-armed, I suppose.

@pretendnothing

It’s an interesting question. I ended up using OPKs/tests for many years. Buying off eBay was definitely preferable both from cost and the fact they come in a big bag, so less of the single use plastic. Mine were only the basic strips though.

I think the more expensive tests are covered in plastic so that you can hold them easily and direct them into the stream of urine, and also the window is clearly identified which helps with easy reading. With the small test strips, you need to wee into a clean container and then dip them. Interestingly doctors' offices often seem to use disposable plastic cups for this purpose, but of course you can use anything you like at home.

I think a snot sucker can defo be avoided - they weren't even a thing when I had DS apart from on American forums, they weren't heard of over here and babies all managed without them.

I used teaspoons and did baby led weaning, so no plastic baby spoons. We did have little sets of toddler cutlery which had plastic handles.

I did use beakers, but you don't have to - you can use metal cups for non-breaking (expensive though) or just normal mugs and thick glasses with supervision. Or if you've got a few baby bottles already you can often get sets which turn into beakers later with just a different top, that would reduce use of plastics.

Baby bottles can be purchased in glass very readily these days. I had plastic ones - but if you get wide neck ones, these are actually quite useful after their life has been completed, as 8 fluid ounces is the same as a cup measurement, and hence 4 = half, 2 = quarter - so I used them for years as measuring cups in the kitchen, until they eventually all went missing or got broken.

You can definitely kit a child out entirely in second hand clothes if you're organised, and avoid plastic toys which aren't long lasting. Of course, you can't do much about gifts or party bags received from others. You can talk to your own children about the wastefulness of magazine freebie toys or McDonald's toys etc, and do non-plastic options for party bags for your own children's parties such as giving away small books from a multipack, packets of crayons, those little "magic towel" things, etc, even a craft project the children have made themselves.

There's a definite divide over the snot suckers, dc couldn't breathe well enough to feed from me when he had a cold so it was invaluable during the first few months. Others have never had baby get a cold so never needed them, or they were bottle feeding so noses didn't get squashed during a feed.

He also won't use metal cutlery, we have metal toddler cutlery but he doesn't like it, I think it hurts his gums when teething so he likes the plastic or silicone spoons. We're almost done with teething at the front though so hoping to move to metal shortly. On the plus side he is excellent at using China bowls, plates and pots with his food and doesn't throw them, so don't need a suction bowl or anything.

He would only drink out of my glass for months but he didn't like help and kept getting dehydrated so we had a massive push with nursery to get him to use a beaker so that he could drink whenever he was thirsty instead of relying on me or them offering from an open cup.

We did try glass bottles but needed Dr Brown ones in the end as he would get reflux otherwise whenever he needed to use a bottle instead of me.

If you can get baby to use non disposable or recyclable versions that's fantastic but some children are more than a bit stubborn and won't tolerate it.

I have kids, but I hope us all being vegan goes some way to offset the terrible eco-horror. Are you vegan op?

Ah, I used to squirt breastmilk up DS's nose when that happened :) You can also buy saline drops which do the same thing supposedly, though that would presumably involve plastic packaging.

TBH we very rarely used any cutlery what with the baby led weaning stuff.

I did think that a beaker was far more practical than anything open, most of the time. I liked the most basic tommee tippee ones.

ConciseandNice impressive.
No formula for your kids?

Yes, the basic ones are the only ones he accepts! Tried loads of others with nursery, including metal with the silicone lid you can stretch over the top.

He's only recently decided to start using cutlery, from about 15 months maybe. Before that we just cut his food into hand sized pieces and put it in front of him.

No formula for your kids

That’s not that unusual I think? I’m not vegan but DD never had formula.

@speakout, no, no formula. Ever. Why would
I give my kids formula?

I didn't use formula either - it's not a given but it does help if you suss out the sources of BF support available to you beforehand.

These responses are great, thank you all. Really thought-provoking.

No, @ConciseandNice, I'm not even a vegetarian. Which, considering my efforts with plastic, I can see that many might think is hypocritical/counter-productive. At the moment, we're making small changes to our lifestyle in the view that any effort is better than no effort at all.

That said, we are definitely cutting down on our meat consumption and trying to make more ethical choices when it comes to eating meat - buying local, for example. I also don't drink cows' milk any more, so would be interested to hear what alternatives MNers give their children?

Do you and your oh get invited out much? You sound utterly, crashingly boring.
Probably a good idea to look for something to fill that void. Jeez

Once they are over a year they do not need milk, so they can have whatever you have if you want it for cereal, baking etc, or just avoid. Soy containing products can be an issue, and so can rice milk. I breastfed until DS self weaned which was about four - that might sound weird at this stage, IME it's a slow burner of an idea. Anyway it's fine to mentally commit to 12 months and then see how you feel.

BertieBotts is spot on. Milk is unnecessary beyond infancy and I natural term breastfed my kids too. My older kids (my youngest is 3 and still nurses as and when he wants) have soya milk with cereal if they want it.

How is it a waste of an appointment going to the GP because your pregnant do you just go through your whole pregnancy with no medical intervention ? Nutter.

It depends on your area but actually many GPs won't see you to confirm pregnancy, they just book you in with the midwife at 10 weeks. Sometimes they won't even do that as it's self referral so they'll just give you the number!

Generally there's no need for a GP appointment to confirm pregnancy given that home tests are very reliable. Then don't even always confirm the pregnancy at booking in! Sometimes they'll listen with a doppler or do a urine test. I do think it is a bit nuts you don't get any advice early on because things like food and drink and drug guidelines and vitamin supplements are most important in the first trimester, and if you don't see anyone until 10 weeks then that's almost over, but I suppose most people just google it these days and anecdotally you tend to know what is and isn't allowed.

The only reason you might need to see a doctor in early pregnancy would be if you have a history of miscarriage and need intervention to prevent this or if ectopic pregnancy is suspected. Or, of course, if you aren't happy about the pregnancy and want to terminate it.

BTW, how do you think the doctor tells if you're pregnant? They use a urine dip strip pregnancy test... exactly the same as you can buy in poundland or online. In fact, they'll probably use a sterile container for your urine, which will be... plastic! And a pair of plastic disposable gloves. Which means that all in all they may use more plastic than you'd consume at home by doing the test yourself.

Mine did a dye test and if you haven't had a period in 2 weeks you'd need to see a GP regardless so my point stands you see a GP after waiting 2 weeks no tests needed

@MrsElla You cannot live near me then, GP will absolutely not see you for pregnancy here. They will just tell you to call EPU or make an appointment with the midwife. If you're calling to inform that you're pregnant they tell you to come in and complete a referral form which is passed to the midwife on the day that they are in the surgery. You then get a letter in the post for your booking in appointment.

They won't confirm any pregnancy until your 12 week scan. They don't do blood/urine tests to see if you're pregnant, just take your word for it and assume you've used a HPT.

GPs don't see you to confirm pregnancy here.

Women book the initial midwife appointment online and continue under midwifery care unless there's a need to refer them to a Dr. There's no need for many women to see a Dr at all in pregnancy. They're not sick. Midwives are the experts in normal pregnancy.

OP: we actually do rinse-and-reuse urine pots, but only with the same woman. I give a pot out at the booking appt (I'm a midwife) and the woman uses the same one for her whole pregnancy, washing it in between uses.

My gp told me that I didn't need to see them for a missed period until I had missed 3 in a row. They also don't see you for pregnancy, you book in with the midwife. Seems like a waste of a Drs time and resources to just do a pregnancy test.