To be annoyed at boots for this

[pleurotus]

I have a 4 month old who is 95% breastfed. She has had the odd bottle of formula here and there to see if she would take it and so that I can leave her with her Dad should I want a night off or whatever and without having to stash our freezer full of breast milk.

I went in to boots today and tried to buy two bottles of ready made formula with my boots points only for the woman to say I wasn't allowed to use my points to pay for them. When I asked why she said 'because we encourage women to breastfeed'

AIBU to find this ridiculous? I felt a little shamed by her and judged. I almost said 'well I do breastfeed actually' but stopped myself because it's a frigen choice! And so what if I didn't breastfeed at all, it would still be my choice and nobody should be made to feel bad about that. I can't imagine not being able to use your points to pay for formula is hardly discouraging anyone from bottle feeding anyway!

However should I have wanted to spend all of my advantage points on dairy milk and coke that's absolutely fine apparently and boots encourage that

I'll correct my prior post - boots lady should have said "by law we can't accept points" so op is not bu by thinking boots lady meant boots policy.

However to all the posters saying it shaming and what about babies who can't bf. I think we need to take a step back and look holistically at society not anecdotally.

I don't think the law shames woman at all.

As a whole it protects society from companies who want to make money from new mothers and actively seek to undermine them.

Facts are and not limited to

Formula companies aggressivly market formula and it has detrimental effects on BF. Numerous cases of this through the years. U.S hospitals with separate baby sections. formula in countries with no clean water. It's law like the one we have that protects us from both aggressive and deliberately subversive methods used.

Government want to promote / encourage socierty as a whole is better off when BF rates are higher. Woman need guided by either their own instincts or medical professionals and not by companies seeking profits

There is not enough £ put into supporting woman to bf.

Woman should have a choice how to feed however there are many different groups of woman such as

Woman who want and can easily bf

Woman who want to bf find it hard and need support so they can carry on

By helping the above you help bf % increase as the % who try at day 0 plummet over the course of a few weeks. So you target issues as to why they stopped.

Then there is the group of
Woman who might not see bf as the "norm" who could be educated and supported through the early days

You are then left with

Woman who want the choice and choose not to - at which point it is their choice to buy formula

And finally those who can't for many different reasons who should again be supported and could argue be helped with prescription milk.

So in short it comes down to money on all sides. the law is free to implement and curb companies who still got around it by inventing follow on milk. So I agree with the law.

I know that wasn't the question but unless that £350m a week is ploughed into bf then not sure how woman are protected at a vulnerable time in life.

I actually think you should write to Boots OP and ask them to make their staff aware of the rules around formula, she maybe genuinely didn't know! And they need to word their reasons more accurately because TBH 'we encourage breastfeeding' isn't just wrong but a bit weird to say to someone who presumably isn't breastfeeding and can't just suddenly take it up

“guilt comes from within” is really quite a vile thing to say in this context. Victim blaming at its finest. Shame on you.

Wow, such a harsh knee jerk reaction there.

It is correct that people can’t make you feel guilty about something unless there is already self doubt. They can play on that and work it up and bring it out but they can’t place a guilt when someone is confident in their choices.

The real question, as @YourFinestPantaloons further explained is what brings women to question their choices. The answer is often other women which is hideous, and in this case it is also the massive marketing machine behind the misguided “breast is best” messaging. It started with a decent intention but has resulted in those who don’t breastfeed for whatever reason, feeling they have to explain themselves.

Woman need guided by either their own instincts or medical professionals and not by companies seeking profits

I agree with this to an extent, but my experience back in 2009 was the medical professionals were more interested in filling the forms and ticking the boxes so they could gain their gold badge in breastfeeding from whatever organisation thought this was a great idea. “Can you just sign this form to say I’ve encouraged and helped you succeed in breastfeeding” is just as bad for a struggling new mum as “buy this formula, it’s grrrrrreat”

It's got nothing to do with Boots, it's just the law. No promotions on formula, end of.

Nobody cares whether you FF or BF and I doubt the boots shop assistant would have been interested in you breastfeeding 95%. It matters more to you than anyone else.

I'm a huge advocate of breastfeeding but I think your insistence that you only use formula occasionally is actually pretty snooty to mums who've made it the perfectly valid choice to formula feed.

@vickyc90

What happened to fed is best! We all know times are tough for many maybe it's time we relaxed this law seen as we are out of the EU

Breastfeeding rates are shocking in this country, I don't think relaxing rules on marketing is a good idea at all.

If it's an issue of affordability we need to address the much bigger problem of shit wages in this country!

Breastfeeding rates are shit because there is fuck all support in a lot of cases and too much of pedalling of how natural and easy it’s ‘supposed’ to be. When the reality is anything but for many, many women.

@Stuckhere2021

All this shit actually makes me angry. What if the mother died in childbirth/ was too poorly to feed? What if the baby was given up for adoption? What if the mother had a condition that could be passed on through breast milk? What if the mother was on chemo or medication which meant she couldn’t breast feed? What if the mother was ill / unconscious/ depressed and couldn’t breast feed? This is in addition to the mastectomy situation allied to in my earlier post. Note also - points can’t be used for stamps - what’s that about!!

But formula isn't forbidden it's just not incentivised. You can still buy it, so there's no point wondering about the mother who hypothetically died in childbirth.

Formula is still stocked

maybe it's time we relaxed this law seen as we are out of the EU

Was a law in the U.K. long before it was a law in the EU.

I’m a huge advocate of breastfeeding but I think your insistence that you only use formula occasionally is actually pretty snooty to mums who've made it the perfectly valid choice to formula feed.

Or, the OP has been affected by all the messaging that a good parent breastfeeds and formula is sub-standard and finds it necessary to make sure people know she is a good parent.

Anytime anyone saw me breastfeeding, they would launch into a story of why they didn’t do it, even women who’s kids were then adults at the time. All I had done was feed my child but they felt it necessary to explain why they hadn’t. I couldn’t have cared less, but when parents 20 and 30 years on were still finding it important to explain themselves there is something going wrong with how we treat FF parents.

I knew about the boots points thing (tried to pay myself with points a short while ago) however the comment about breast feeding isn’t fair even midwives can’t push the subject now never mind anyone else. It’s personal choice, and sometimes we don’t even get a choice.