to be annoyed when people describe making up bottles as "faffing around"

[shuffle]

It takes 5 mins! You have to follow similar process when expressing (never referred to as faffing around).

Expressing (which I utterly failed at) is much more hassle than making up bottles, I agree. But breastfeeding is totally easier. No shopping, preparation, washing up, serilizing, measuring, getting to the right temperature, worrying about carrying it around and then warming it up etc. I was happy to stop breastfeeding for personal reasons, but no doubt moving to bottles increased the "faff" factor.

Oh I hated making bottles with a vengance. I would rather change 100 smelly nappies.

Don't know why. It just irritated the hell out me. It is most definately faffing around.

Sorry to me it's faffing. It may only take 5 minutes, but if you add all those 5 minutes together it's a lot over the course of a baby.

Mostly I use in the context of saying "well that's lovely that your dh, MIL wants to have a go at feeding the baby - let's hope he or she is faffing about with all the sterilising etc."

But it is a faff, I hated making bottles more than anything else when dd was a baby. It was a complete faff.
As was expressing, which I had no luck with at all when I was bf'ing. Would definitely refer to that as faffing aswell!

But which bit about raising a child isn't 'faffing'? I used to do all mine when DD was in bed for the next day (the water with formula measured out in pots).

What else do you do with all your time? I think it's just used as one more way to beat women over the head with one more reason why BF is better.

If we're thinking about time doing one task then BF for me was much more time consuming than making up bottles (I hasten to add I didn't steralise anything). BF had me tied to the sofa/bed for hours and hours so which part of this was better?

I only BF for about 7 months and was gutted when I stopped but I did express anyway and I always quite enjoyed the process of making the bottles up. Washing, sterilizing etc. But then I am odd like that lol.

Although.....

Towards the end of 'making them up' (DD only has one bottle a day now) I hated it with a vengeance, I hated the washing up and all it concerned. I would have wholeheartedly gone back to bf'ing if I could.

Never made up a bottle, and never expressed. I don't faff around.

I hated doing bottles it was always dp's job!

Washing up and sterilising bottles is the biggest faff ever! Making them up is only slightly better.

I went back to work FT when DD was 13 weeks, and breast fed till she was 1 yr - I don't think I referred to having to express twice a day as "faffing" so much as a "right f*cking nuisance" - Does that make you feel better?

My DS was FF so bottles were made up for a year. I never once thought of it as 'faffing around'.

What's so difficult about washing an extra bottle when yu probably have other dishes in the sink, then shoving it in the steriliser until you've filled it that night switch it on, boil the kettle, measure formula into little pots (well I did) when steriliser done, fill to right amount put little pots in and shove in fridge?

It only takes like 5/10 minutes.

I can think of worse 'faffings' like not being able to go out the door without a suitcase full of 'what if' stuff LOL That was the bit I hated. Everything had to be packed with military precision incase DS soiled himself/nappy leaked/puked up/got hungry/got bored. The list is endless

OP you are defo not being unreasonable LOL

It is a faff imo.

It was a downright chore.

with twins and 16 bottles a day

its just got to be easier to whap yer baps out - no contest.

although, if breastfeeding were a piece of piss thee would be no need for a forum on mn would there.

so where on the one hand you have faffing with bottles on the other you can have cracked nipples etc.

no doubt breast is best

no doubt bottles are an extra chore

but its not always as easy as whapping yer baps out

always been a faffing around job.

LOL Brenda

The joys, I lied with my mum when DS was born and she had 8 month old twins so on the odd occassion someone would get stuck doing 14 every night because it was just easier

I used to love doing the bottles at night when I was pg and couldn't sleep haha.

Well, I hated BF-ing and I find making up bottles a faff (especially at night. I have it down to a fine art, though. Bottle warmer, readymade formula cartons and stack of sterilised bottles in steriliser on my bedside table!)

Must be the world's laziest mum

Oh, I found it faffing (compared to grunting in my sleep and flopping out a ginormous boob! ) but I didn't have enough milk so started mixed feeding which became fully bottle fed over time. - WHY do I feel the need to justify myself, nobody even SAID anything! ....anyway, every 2 hours in the night ds1 wanted a bottle. And he wouldn't have them cold. So we had to warm them. (we made several in the evening, ready) we had to go downstairs (2 flights of stairs, we lived in a town house) warm a bottle, take it up...and this is where you REALLY wanted to scream! He'd either have ONE BLOODY SWALLOW, or he'd clear the lot, scream for more, we'd go and do another one and then he'd have ONE BLOODY SWALLOW!!

Recently we were talking about it, and I said

"Why didn't we get a mini fridge and a kettle in the bedroom, then we wouldn't have had to keep going up and down all those stairs."

But unless you are organised, it is a faff. Because baby starts screaming that it is hungry, you realise that you haven't made up a bottle, boil kettle, mix up and then have to chill the thing asap because small, screaming baby doesn't understand why hasn't been fed yet. And that's to say nothing of sterilising and washing every evening to ensure you have bottles to pour said boiling water into.
Far easier to pick up screaming, hungry baby and pop on the boob. Job done.

"I think it's just used as one more way to beat women over the head with one more reason why BF is better. "

Calling it faffing around is a matter of opinion not a fact.

YABU, It is easier to whip out you boob and feed as there is no making it up and cleaning after. To me and many others making up a bottle was a faff but to those who are used to it think of it as just part of their routine.

Some people think making your own bread is a faff but I love doing it, doesn't mean I think pre-made bread buyers are beating me over the head with their plastic wrapped loaves.

Looking after a small baby - no, make that looking after a child - is faffing around. Makes no difference what particular form your faffing takes. I have faffed trying to latch an unwilling baby on, expressing, making up bottles- and doing a hundred other jobs that can also be described as faffing.

I refer to making up bottles as faffing around, but then it was/is my choice to ff and am sure it's easier to bf.
But complaining about it doesn't stop anyone doing it. I also think it's a faff getting ds bathed and dressed for bed but I do it, I just like to moan about it.
YABU

Sounds like my experience Hecate- I blame the lack of sleep interfering with the brain. I would be like a ninja if i had to do it now

It is a faff, but so is getting your nipples munched when you are trying to sleep. I love cuddling little babies, but I wouldn't go back there. All of it is faffing.

Feels like faffing when you make up the bottle in the way people actually seem to do it, let alone the faff if we actually followed the correct guidelines! Has anyone actually done that?

For the record, it was never easier for me to 'just a whip out a boob'. I found bf-ing exhausting and difficult.