Joe Wicks and his breastfeeding journey

[IHaveAGreyLamp]

Joe Wicks has written in his ‘Wean to 15’ weaning and cookery book about how his wife breastfed their first child. He refers to it as ‘his’ journey- ‘This is just me sharing my experience and journey’. Sorry Joe but what exactly was your breastfeeding journey?

He goes to on preach about how you should just do what’s right for you and your baby, and ignore the opinions of anyone else. Sage advice but I think I would have felt better if it had actually come from his wife (you know, the person of actual experience of breastfeeding and what it’s really like?)

There’s also a lot of ‘we did this’ and ‘we did that’, for example his wife both pumped and breastfed but ‘we found this quite challenging’. Yes Joe I’m sure you did find it quite challenging considering you were neither breastfeeding nor pumping.

I have to say I’ve found myself filled with an irrational rage reading this section of the book. Why couldn’t he have let his wife write this section, to talk about it from a breastfeeding mother’s point of view, rather than a man trying to claim something so inherently biologically female as his? Argh!

Luckily I had only been lent the book to have a look through- I would have been even more annoyed if I’d actually paid £8 to line the pockets of this smug and annoying individual!

YANBU

Maybe she did write it but didn’t want to put her name to it so as to avoid the scrutinisation and character assassinations?

I hate when all these celebrities write these groundbreaking books on parenthood and their breastfeeding journeys. As if it's something new. People have been having kids and weaning them since the dawn of time.
What makes them so clever and special?
The fact the Joe Wicks talks about his journey when he doesn't, and will never know what it takes to breast feed is very irritating and patronising.
And from a quick google search, he has a degree in sorts science ( commendable) but no actually qualifications in nutrition.

WTAF 😡. I hate this bullshit. "We" are not pregnant. "We" are not breastfeeding. "We" did not give birth.

The way he talks about parenting in general is totally cringe, as if hes the first person to ever have a kid.

I don’t know, for any decent partner of something is tough for the woman there’s a knock on effect for the partner. I mean it should be tough for him if she’s breastfeeding and pumping, because then he’s looking after the baby when she’s pumping.

He seems nice enough, I don’t think using twee language is a reason to vilify him, if the overall message is good.

@andfurtively

I hate when all these celebrities write these groundbreaking books on parenthood and their breastfeeding journeys. As if it's something new. People have been having kids and weaning them since the dawn of time. What makes them so clever and special? The fact the Joe Wicks talks about his journey when he doesn't, and will never know what it takes to breast feed is very irritating and patronising. And from a quick google search, he has a degree in sorts science ( commendable) but no actually qualifications in nutrition.

That is correct, he does not have any qualifications in nutrition, he co-wrote the book with a qualified child nutritionist (but you don’t find that out until the very last page of the book where she gets a very small mention)

*If something is tough

LOL

‘ I mean it should be tough for him if she’s breastfeeding and pumping, because then he’s looking after the baby when she’s pumping’

@GreyishDays What sorry, it’s tough for him because he might have to look after his own child for a bit whilst she pumps? How awful for him!

Why couldn’t he have let his wife write this section, to talk about it from a breastfeeding mother’s point of view, rather than a man trying to claim something so inherently biologically female as his?

She's probably too tired from all the giving birth, breastfeeding, pumping and generally looking after a newborn.
He needs to make money.

DH says he felt a valuable part of the conveyor belt system, passing babies and winding etc, and that he hardly felt the mastitis at all

mean it should be tough for him if she’s breastfeeding and pumping, because then he’s looking after the baby when she’s pumping

Say what?

I'm the first to get ragey about stuff like this usually BUT DH did have his own breastfeeding journey to be fair. DC1 was an absolute nightmare feeder and DH was right alongside me all the way. Yes I pumped and produced the milk, but he would be sat up all night making sure she was spoon/syringe fed breastmilk every two hours in the night whilst I slept. He was my cheerleader, did all the sterilising, kept me fed and rested.

He absolutely had his own breastfeeding journey, despite not producing any milk himself.

@SittingAround1

Why couldn’t he have let his wife write this section, to talk about it from a breastfeeding mother’s point of view, rather than a man trying to claim something so inherently biologically female as his?

She's probably too tired from all the giving birth, breastfeeding, pumping and generally looking after a newborn.
He needs to make money.

I imagine they’re not too short of money

@SittingAround1

Why couldn’t he have let his wife write this section, to talk about it from a breastfeeding mother’s point of view, rather than a man trying to claim something so inherently biologically female as his?

She's probably too tired from all the giving birth, breastfeeding, pumping and generally looking after a newborn.
He needs to make money.

Maybe she didn't want to?

Hhmmmm.

Yes.

I'm not sold on Joe Wicks. Just like I'm not sold on Justin Trudeau.

(Although JT is 1000x worse for International reasons)

@melroses haha brilliant.

Ugh my manager used to say when his girlfriend was pregnant "we're pregnant" 🤦🏼‍♀️ I didn't say anything... 🙄

@pinkyredrose

mean it should be tough for him if she’s breastfeeding and pumping, because then he’s looking after the baby when she’s pumping

Say what?

I thought the point was that it’s nothing to do with him. I’m just saying that it should affect him too.

Just to add, he missed the birth so thankfully I didn't have to hear all about how he pushed the baby out.

I have mixed feelings about this. I agree it would have been nice to have her voice in the book, but then maybe she didn't want to write for it.

On the other hand though I think it's good they view this time as something they did together. My partner was a huge support when I was breastfeeding, getting up with me in the night in the early days when I was finding it hard and in tears, letting me sleep whenever I needed while he had baby even though he was tired too, doing the bulk of cooking and housework. Plus all the logistics around pumping and leaving baby with dad. It was completely a team effort. Of course it's not like that for everyone but maybe it was for them.

Having said all that though, totally agree celebrities writing parenting books is cringe and I'd never buy one!

@IHaveAGreyLamp

‘ I mean it should be tough for him if she’s breastfeeding and pumping, because then he’s looking after the baby when she’s pumping’

@GreyishDays What sorry, it’s tough for him because he might have to look after his own child for a bit whilst she pumps? How awful for him!

You said it was rubbish for him to say “we found it challenging”, but I’m just trying to say it would have been challenging for him too. Unless he’s a dick and just let her do it all. If he’d said he found it no problem, that would be wrong too.

YANBU

This is in the same vein as the men who attend breastfeeding support groups. I wanted to tell them to fuck off. To have my (Large) tit hanging out with men present on day 5 when I was in pain and very awkward around position etc, was just awful.

I went to two events and didn’t return because of those men supporting their partners. My husband waited in the car park. Why couldn’t they??

My DH's breastfeeding journey mostly involved getting his hand slapped when he tried to touch them.

I think engaged dads find breastfeeding hard - there's a degree of guilt that they can't properly help, feeling useless (especially with first child as toddler wrangling is obviously useful)!