To remove the toy baby feeding bottle from my dd's new doll bath and feeding set?

[Springfleurs]

I was brought up to think that breast feeding was a strange and rather disgusting thing to do.

Luckily managed to overcome this myself and b/f both dc for 5 months and 14 months respectively.

Took dd to a toy shop today and she chose a doll bath and feeding set. Unpacked it for her when we got in and there is a feeding bottle in there. I know it might seem a bit precious but it irritated me slightly, as though it was a mandatory piece of equipment for all babies/dolls.

Or

I am taking it all rather too seriously?

FabulousBakerGirl It doesn't make something disgusting or wrong to simply not have it! But just does not give the impression of it being a first choice.

bubblagirl Whatever your opinions are on bf/ff, dolls with bottles normales something that should not be normalised, because IT IS NOT NORMAL! Or shouldn't be anyway, the human race evolved fine without bottles!

normalises, not normales!!!

To those who think that what we play with as children doesn't matter, would you let your child have toy cigarettes?

so as i was unable to breast feed due to too many meds and what about people that dont produce milk how do you suppose they should feed there child?

fgs its a child having fun and it gets turned into huge debate on bf and ff both are normal as to the person its normal even if not for others we are given choices and some are not such as i , we still love our children bottles for dolls are not saying bf is wrong thats taking the bf , ff fight too far its another excuse to make others feel they are wrong well my ds didnt starve thank goodness as meds made my milk dry up what should i have done

let kids be kids and put your views out when there old enough to understand it god forbid they dont have a choice or choose not too bf they would feel like the rest of us to be made to feel we have failed

every day i look at my healthy ds and know i haven't

What about the poor little boys playing with the dolls? Many fathers feed the occasional or regular bottle to babies, EBM or formula.

Why would it be a good idea to give the impression to little boys that the feeding side of caring for a baby is exclusively womens work?

I find this thread rather sexist.

i ahd joke cigs from a joke shop i dont smoke stop making a childs play into another debate

dolls bottles were around many yrs ago my nan had one for her doll

as were dummies for dolls

Wastingmyeducation - Lots of people had those sweet ciqs as kids and dont smoke. It never tempted me. I played with guns, swords etc and have never been tempted to use one as an adult.

My ds used to 'breastfeed' dolls. at sexist! Ff can be viewed as sexist from certain feminist perspectives (note the emphasis on SOME, as not wanting to get into an 'essence of feminism' debate), it can be percieved as part of the 'scientific' control of women's bodies and the perpetuation of a discourse that suggests our bodies are unable to cope without intervention, oh and obviously that is for a (mostly male) profit

YANBU, I did this too. (My family now think I am weird)

LaurieFairyCake DD1 feeds her dolly the same way I feed DD2, I don't know if you've noticed but milk doesn't come out of most he play bottles either

DD2 never has a bottle & will go straight to a cup like her older sibling. I want BF to be the default position in my dds' lives.

Yes I do think children playing with toy bottles normalises ff at the expense of bf which like it or not is the natural way to feed a baby.

Whilst ff is invaluable for those who can't bf it should not be the default position

I agree MANATEEequineOHARA - I distinctly remember my brother Breastfeeding his action man. We teach children this is the way you feed a baby - distinctions between gender roles come much later.
Double at this being a sexist thread

oh ffs talk about over precious - get over yourselves.

ff is normal too.

its all hyper sensative over preciousness one up man ship

join a club or something - clearly too little to think about

I always removed the bottles and dummies from baby dolls when my dds were younger.

But men can't BF babies. And when feeding them they use a bottle.

You can't have it both ways. Chuck the bottle and you chuck the option for men to feed their children and for women to use EBM or formula.

I still think that the fact everyone is banging on about little girls and dollies is sexist. Only mentioning boys after I brought it up twice. Showing the underlying default position of many posters is that girls are the ones who play nicely with dollies, in a nurturing form of roleplay, while the boys are presumably off doing something else. That's a far more worrying thing to "normalise" IMO.

Do they still make those sweet cigs?

DS has never had a bottle LTOS. It's certainly not sexist to assume that women don't need to go to all the hassle of purchasing expensive equipment and expressing in addition to feeding so that the dad doesn't feel left out of that one aspect of childcare.

imaginewittynamehere [grin} at double

Custardo It is not 'one-up-manship', sorry you feel that way from reading this, I certainly did not intend to give that view, I do hate 'othering' but I think the 'othering' of bf, as a means to make ff appear normal to increase profit, is wrong.

yanbu - I would prob do the same altho ds1 hasn't shown much interest in dolls and ds2 is only 11 weeks... I don't think I would make a big fuss out of removing it or say that bottlefeeding was wrong or anything like that (because I know in some cases there isn't an alternative) but I would prefer bf to be the default. It is not necessary for a baby to have a bottle - for milk water or juice. BF babies do not need water - surprised that so many people think that's the case.

I would throw it away. What I wouldn't do is ask for opinions in AIBU.

Neither of mine had water either.

DS used to breast feed a small plastic giraffe, am concerned that he may grow up and try the same with a real one.

If you feel strongly about it YANBU. Personally, I would probably not bother to remove it myself. I guess that your DH could choose to pretend to bf her doll and if you didn't remove the bottle then she could pretend to use that too. You could argue that this would present a more balanced representation of 'real life', as some people bottle feed and some breastfeed.

I do however have to disagree with some posters who have stated that bf use bottles for water. A large number of bf babies don't use bottles at all and it's not necessary for an exclusively bf baby to be given water. I only started giving DS water from a cup when we started weaning him (he wouldn't take a bottle anyway and had always refused one when I offered expressed milk). This is a small point of course, but one I felt necessary to make.

littlebrownmouse - I would only worry when he starts saving pocket money for a ladder.

Wastingmyeducation - those toy cigs are called candy sticks now.