Do you ever feel like the odd mum out in RL?

[ChubbyStuckForAFestiveNameBurd]

Put this here cos though it's a weaning thing it's more general.

My DS is 5months. I am EBFing him and will continue this until 6m when hopefully if I can persuade DP we will do BLW.

All of the other mums I have met have started weaning onto baby rice or purees at 4 months (17 weeks to the day, some of them!). This isn't helped by our local HV service doing weaning visits pre-4 months and not being very strong on the 6m thing at all.

I am the only one who has never tried to give formula. Everyone else is either mixed feeding and have been for ages or moaning because they want to but their DC won't take a bottle!

DS wears babygros all day. He's comfy that way, he doesn't care what he looks like, so all the nice stiff fiddly denim outfits we were given are at the back of the wardrobe. Everyone else dresses their kids up like dolls.

Obviously I'm mad cos we cosleep and use a sling ...! And as for the CIO conversations ...

I never say anything (often I don't share my own choices, esp in cases where younger babies are weaning I just smile and don't mention that we're not) but I wonder why people don't follow the guidelines, why everyone seems obsessed with their kids growing up so fast, rushing them into food, beds, clothing ... I also think were it not for the reassurance I get from MN I'd feel pressure to go along with these folk. Thankfully I know that loads of other mums take the same approach and I feel less like a weirdo but it just sits uneasily with me that these kids are DS's peers and I wonder what sort of issues we'll have to deal with as they grow up.

rah sorry, didn't mean to let your earlier post go unanswered - you didn't sound like a cow, it's just my wording in the OP (and probably subsequently!) was, er, crap.

Dinner/baby/phonecall/MN juggling!

P.S. We're not having organic seaweed or anything ... a T*o chicken pie no less

I don't think it will be an issue for others unless it is an issue for you.
If you are happy with your choices and do not feel the need to preach to others or disapprove of their choices it will be fine with most people.

I really was the odd one out with my kids after DS2 developed profound asd and i became very focussed on excluding additives and his diet ( because it helped). I did tend to bang on about it for a while and that ( combined with Ds2's behaviours ) meant i did get a bit isolated. But now i am quite happy withthe parenting choices i make at home ( including weirdish things like no vaccinations for DD) but I don't talk about it all the time and other people tend not to really care.
So be happy and be comfortable as you can with your choices and the choices of others and the things that really count will define your friendships and your childrens peer groups.

Oh god don't get me started about the crying thing! Again, my mother is really wonderful but is convinced that at the grand old age of 8 weeks DS can manipulate - she wouldn't leave him to cry it out herself, thankfully, but still, she thinks he has power!

I went shopping with DS in a sling when he was 4 weeks old and people asked me what it was and what was in it!

I think I felt a little like this during my maternity leave. I met up with the same people a couple of times a week and as our babies are the same age, we did discuss (too much in hindsight) things like breastfeeding (or not) weaning (when,how etc) and everything else.

Now that we are mostly back in work we tend not to discuss baby related things so much as we meet up far less frequently so things tend to happen without much discussion. For example, it turned out that a couple of us had stopped breastfeeding but we found out just by chance. Months and months ago we would have spent hours talking about the decision (or not) to go beyond 6 months.

There isn't a right or a wrong way to parent and you do sound a little bit judgemental about other methods. You may find as your child gets older the differences won't be as marked.

ChubbyBurd

I have found it hard too. I am finding it gradually easier.

I was SO delighted the week I saw another mum babywearing. I haven't yet met anyone else that does BLW (I live in the middle of a city) and I have really really sturggled with feeling judged over the attachment parenting kind of stuff I do. My closest friend from baby groups has never ever allowed anyone to rock her baby in any way. She is a lovely lady, a good friend, and a good mum. But I really make myself feel judged.

For me there is a touch of PND, and a big heap of my self-esteem and personality. It does get easier - what has helped me is getting to know people better, talking about some other stuff we have in common, and managing to be a bit honest.

I've whittered. I hope some of it has made sense to you.

llaregrub, I am sorry that my post sounded judgemental. I think what I was trying to say was that sometimes I feel judged. It's as if (round my way) there's a perceived 'normal' way to bring up your child and by trying to follow guidelines/my own instincts I am deviating from what others dictate is right.

I was just feeling like this a bit too.
I left a M &B group early on monday feeling lonely and a bit of a weirdo.
I was chatting in with a group of mums and we were talking about BF. I breastfeed exclusively (mainly from bloody mindedness, it was a real struggle to get started, he got more formula than breast milk at first, and I see the 6 month thing as a finish line that I never expected to get to - when I will go and post a big thank you on the breast feeding thread )
As the only one still BF I was asked about when I planned to wean, and in the general chat about BF and babies sleeping through or not, I mentioned that I co slept. Prehaps not helped by a general dip in the hubub of cafe noise around us, all the mums stopped talking and looked at me aghast. It was like a siberian wind had suddenly blown through!

The thing is that I know before I had DS I too used to think 'Why on earth don't they put the blinking baby in a cot?" In RL I am a bit shy and a bit crap at explaining that I am not doing these things because I think anyone doing anything else is inferior, I just started doing them in desperation and they have made my life with DS bearable! So I slunk away home early . I berated myself as I walked home, for not trying to explain - the thing is sometimes trying to explain makes things worse.
I am hoping 'least said soonest mended' and they forget, while I quietly carry on co sleeping and ignoring well meaning advice to wean.

hey chubby - sounds like your doing things all the right way

FOR YOU

We all bring up our babies the way we see fit - i totally breastfed never gave a bottle in 2 years - i weaned at 6 months - i refused to do controlled crying - i co-slept with both my kids - but i just did what i wanted and what worked for my family

I think Pagwatch has a good point. I met lots of different mums at the various NCT groups/First Mums/toddlergroups I frequented and saw lots of different methods and takes on childrearing- but the only one that I remember as weird was the one who spent all the time preaching to the rest of us and trying to make us feel our choices were inferior. I can't remember any details now, but I do remember feeling as if I was not interested in my children's wellbeing because I sent my older child to infants at the council school across the road instead of taking her out of town to a special Montessori school (I don't even drive).

Not suggesting you are anything like this lady, but if you see people suddenly closing ranks, it may be because you have unintentionally made them feel criticised. If you are tolerant and supportive of the other mums, they are likely to be tolerant of you.

I speak as somebody who has needed to remember this, coming from a different country with different childrearing traditions. On the whole, I have found other people very accepting as long as I don't ram my ideas down their throats. As for finding people with the same ideas, I don't think there is anyone from my country locally, so I've had to make friends with people with different ideas- and ended up enjoying it.

Thought I'd sleep on this (sleep? ha! DS laughs wickedly at such notions!) and come back to it because I didn't put my OP across well.

I realise I sound preachy [wilts shamefully] but I really don't mean to be. Obviously I feel my choices are right for us, every parent feels the same about their own way, but I'm not saying everyone else is weird for doing things differently. It's not really a guidelines thing - if it was I'd still be battling to get DS onto his back in a cot, muttering "feet to foot" and cursing!

In fact, a lot of the things I do have been forced on me - co-sleeping, for example, using a sling ... these things were for survival. Other mums sometimes treat me with suspicion for these choices - maybe just because they faced different problems from me and so can't identify with me. But I'm definitely looked on as a bit odd in this respect (my HV in particular I think finds us completely loopy, despite knowing I've had difficulties as I've asked for her help before now).

I don't understand the desperate rush to give solids. I do understand that older generations will always trot out 'didn't do me/you/him any harm' - that's partly defensive, right? And that'll be us in 2 or 3 decades! Maybe that's something I am judgemental about - because it's usually an attempt to get more rest for the parents. Often these so-called sleep deprived parents are not doing too badly in the rest stakes by comparison to us, so I don't have much sympathy and I don't think that it's OK to contravene good evidence by choice when it comes to your child's health. So shoot me. I certainly wouldn't voice that view to any of these mums though, because what purpose would it serve once they've already gone down that path?

My post was just a reflection on how locally people aren't open to me doing things 'differently'. There's a definite accepted path (I suspect this comes from the HV service) and I am seen as deviating from it. I have lost count of the number of times someone has discovered in conversation that I cosleep/still BF exclusively/whatever, and paused in stunned silence before hurriedly saying "Well, whatever works for you, I suppose" in a loaded tone or "That must be terrible" (!) or just gawped at me like I've sprouted an extra head. I certainly don't bring up my parenting methods as conversation topics by choice, but in a group of people with young babies these issues are unavoidable really. I'm not going to lie just to appear acceptable to others (or is this where I'm going wrong?).

I totally respect the choices other mums make. It's not for me (or anyone for that matter) to tell people how to raise their children. But I suspect we aren't getting as much information as we ought to be from our HCPs here, and I know there's "well the latest guidance is x but in reality most people do y" bandied about a lot. No encouragement to make it to 6 months on milk, no information on the implications of mixed feeding. I don't know how else to explain the culture amongst mums here.

Manchita I agree that the AP/BF vibe is what makes me feel more at home here than at the local parent & child group for example, where I may as well be in an enclosure with a "Do Not Feed The Animals" sign on it. But MN is way more diverse than that, because there are loads of routiney people too, FFers, everything from the Verity followers (although I suspect they go about it quite quietly ) through to continuum types and more.

I hope it's right that these things fade in significance, because although I'm maybe viewed as a bit lentilly by other mums in RL we're all in the same boat and we'll presumably all go through various troubles as our kids grow up and I'd like to think that we'll be able to share our woes without criticism or blame. Maybe I just need to give less of a shit about what people think!

As a total aside, Clara, how are things at home?

Just a tiny point - maybe some of those who weaned at four months did it because they felt their DCs needed more nourishment than milk alone was providing - I only say this cos I weaned DD at four months as she became very miserable and waking every two hours from hunger(only woke once or twice a night for feed before then). Was exclusively bf and carried on till 6 months and more feeds didn't solve the prob.

Personally I feel a bit the odd one out where I live cos I'm the only SAHM I know and other mums tend to be a bit surprised that a) I would walk away from a good career to look after DD b) that I can bear to spend all my time looking after her without a break. I do find that in my head (and occasionally out loud if I'm not careful!) I do tend to be quite judgemental about working mums (specifically mums I know who don't need to work at all financially but choose to work full time) but realise that everyone makes their own choices and mainly get judgemental cos I feel such an odd one out with my decision so get defensive. I know there are lots of SAHMs, I just don't ever meet any! But saying all this all my mum friends are working mums and we still get on fine!

You make an interesting point about the baby dictating the parenting style you adopt, Chubby - I would like to have been more lentilly in my parenting of my DD2 - feed on demand, co-sleep, feed to sleep etc... but the bugger won't let me! When younger, if I fed her more than 3 hours apart (even if she appeared hungry), she'd throw it up; she always slept terribly when we shared a bed, but slept like a dream when we moved her into a cot in her own room, she has hardly ever fallen asleep feeding (too windy/puky) and won't be rocked, so we've had to put her down awake and she's learnt to settle herself. Thank god she's finally taken to a sling and is in washable nappies

So this is the kind of parenting that works for us. Most parents are muddling along doing the best they can.

I only have to say one tiny thing in a room full of mums and I have this uncanny ability to silence the whole room. Not quite sure how I manage that, but it's enough to let me know that I not considered "one of them".

Thank God!

Sorry, just read that back - should have said if I fed her less than 3 hours apart.... durr

I could have written this post!

My DS is 19 weeks, and the oldest baby in my group (met at antenatal classes). They're all going onto the baby rice, one by one, but I want to do BLW - mentioned this and was told "ooohhhh he won't sleep through without going onto solids!" Have also had to listen to the old "Oh they need more than just milk" chestnut many, many times.

I'm also the only one doing reusable nappies/cosleeping/not giving formula at night. Beginning to feel more and more like the square peg, but glad I've got the strength to stand by my beliefs!

Like you, I wouldn't get into any discussions re weaning etc - no point. I have enough to do just looking after my own DS ;)

I know what you were getting at Chubby - being the weirdy hippy one myself. In fact a (childless) friend recently described me as a bit 'earth mothery' .

At the local baby group, postnatal group, even my NCT antenatal lot, I just didn't seem to fit in - especially noticable at the 4 month mark when all the conversation turns to pureed carrot. But what a difference a year makes.... DS is now 16 months and I'm back at work 2 days a week. When I go to toddler groups or speak to other mums, there's a lot less talk about the banalities details of childrearing, and more about well.... pretty much everything else that women talk about

I don't often get into a discussion about why I'm 'still' breastfeeding tho, or why DS often ends up in our bed at night...