Banned from breastfeeding group for objecting to males breastfeeding

[snickerdoodle1990]

Hi everyone,

I gave birth a few months ago and had some breastfeeding difficulties, so joined a local breastfeeding support group in my city. It’s basically a place to go for support with feeding, plus meet other mums/have a cuppa and biscuit etc. They also have a FB group. It’s become a nice, friendly place to go once every couple of weeks.

Recently, a trans-woman (male) has joined the group asking for support because their wife has not long had a baby and the trans-woman is wishing to breastfeed too, apparently through use of hormones and domperidone (?) to stimulate supply (I did not realise this was possible at all)

I really really object to this person being present in a group of women who are seeking breastfeeding support, trying to come together in their breastfeeding experience and also revealing themselves intimately

I told the group leader my concerns and she basically told me to shove it - said that the group is a safe space for everyone and they support all who wish to breastfeed and that I shouldn’t come back because I am a bigot

I am horrified as are the other women, where do we all stand and what would you do?

No no no. this surely can't be happening! Is this real?
This is all shades of wrong😮🤑

I try to give a balanced view on trans threads but dear god this is bonkers.

If this had been my experience I'd be shouting from the roof tops.
There is no way his partner needs him at the breast feeding group. That is controlling behaviour or fettish. Bloody disgusting. They can go to their GP together if they need help.
If he turns up elsewhere I'd be reporting him to the police for voyerism.

I really don’t think men should be breastfeeding at all. What is the benefit to the baby?

But if the majority of members left the old group to support the new group, it would send a very strong message.

This. It genuinely makes me feel ill to think of these fetishistic men getting their rocks off while ‘feed in’ drug induced moob juice. I’d have to give them a piece of my mind before leaving.

I think if you haven't experienced issues breastfeeding, it's hard to understand the absolute desperation to try everything to make it work. Especially when all the hormones are going wild, sleep deprivation is at its highest and logical thinking is very far down the list of priorities. For me, I'd needed fertility treatment to get pregnant, then DC had a NICU stay and then I couldn't bf like everyone else in my NCT group. The feeling of just absolute failure at basic tenants of womanhood, plus the desire to give DC to very best start to compensate for everything that had happened meant that my logical pre birth thinking of "well of course if bf doesn't work, I'll just give formula" went totally out of the window and you get sucked into months of triple feeding, and 10x per day pumping schedules and then domperidone. For context, that's actually where I drew the line and decided not to take it, but just to move to combi feeding - but I still feel a lot of guilt for doing so then when on other threads, you get slated for giving baby UPFs from newborn when you give formula.

@AnotherNC22 do not feel guilt. If anyone on another thread does that to you they are a nasty piece of work. You did your best.

I am so sorry OP. I would hate this.

Breasts while having a hugely practical purpose, are sexualised - and I would not feel comfortable breastfeeding around a random man (cis or biologically).

S/he is being incredibly selfish and entitled attending.

It is madness that formula (unless it is follow on) can’t be advertised in the UK, because of the gov push to breast feed - but at the same time the gov are happy for vulnerable women to be put off seeking support. This could end their BF journeys or result in painful complications. SMH.

I am going to write to my MP. There should at the very minimum be two groups available, one that is a safe space group for women only and another that welcomes everyone.

We used to understand the red flags around a man who would like to have a baby suck his nipples.

The games with language enable him to hide in absolutely plain sight while his cheerleaders can only congratulate themselves smugly on how “progressive” they are. I hope you grow up one day, or learn a bit of rational thinking and looking at the psychiatric literature around men and paraphilias. Stop preening about being kind and open your eyes.

He is disrupting the milk producing feedback that the baby’s mother needs to establish lactation. He is skin walking his wife. He is selfishly placing himself in a place where women need to centre their own and their baby’s needs. He is a narcissist and pervert and is not doing this for the baby’s well-being but for his own gratification.

His behaviour screams MALE. A baby is a human being, not a fucking prop in his fucking immersive role playing game.

Agreed - please don’t take any comments about the drugs as relevant to females. I think most people here are thinking of the huge philosophical difference between stimulation of an adult human female’s milk supply with a modest dose, and artificial induction of male chest pus via high dose. Theyre two completely different things

A few people have asked if other men have been present at the group and the answer to that is no, no other men have attended. Just had a browse of the group’s description on the FB group which states that the group is intended to ‘provide a safe space to support new mothers with all things breastfeeding’, so make of that what you wish.

Indeed.

It's a whole other level of selfishness and arrogance.

I'm so sorry, that sounds very tough.

It sounds like you did an amazing job. Feeding is a paired activity (like a dance partner both have to learn the steps) and after 16 years my DC still has eating issues. Like you I played my best game and didn’t get the result I hoped for - but my child wasn’t ever going to be able to go with it. Much heartbreak but like you I did my best. In the division of responsibility you did your part really well and you should be really proud of that xx

No, I’m saying she’s been banned for an unfair reason and she’s every right to be there. The organiser shouldn’t be allowed to be the gatekeeper, especially if she’s going to ban women for unfair reasons. OP can go along and get support if she wants & interact with the other attendees & let them know why she’s been banned by organiser. See what they think. I think organiser will get overruled. How is it straw manning? It’s an analogy. Rosa had a right to a seat and wasn’t going to give it up - neither should OP give up her seat because of some unfair organiser.

The group organisers didn’t have an issue with a trans woman attending

Hopefully the OPs situation will be picked up by social media and one of the groups fighting fighting misogyny and discrimination against women.

Absolutely appalled for those poor women.

So they want to be the baby’s biological father but also ‘breastfeed them’. Sorry but no, you can’t have it both ways?

I also don’t agree with a male breastfeeding supplemented with hormones. Breast is best for a baby due to it being the most natural thing on earth however this isn’t the case. Very frustrating. I would definitely set up your own group OP.

That may be so and if it’s a voluntary group theyre entitled to offer access to anyone who wants it.

However if there’s any public money involved then theyre not. Theyre obliged to provide a single sex service - which this male could have already accessed but chose not to. The OP can complain and the group will have to be made lawful

My friend trained as a breastfeeding support volunteer and quit due to being forced to erase the female experience - 'chestfeeding' etc. It is disgusting and the majority of women stand against it but are then banned.

I think we will find that a new network staffed by all the existing/banned counsellors offering single sex groups will spring up. I’d be surprised if they hadn’t been running underground - bf women are pretty militant!?

The other groups can continue to offer the female exclusionary inclusive service.

I wouldn’t have attended a group with any male in attendance for the simple reason I only breastfed in female only company. While I understand that was my choice I don’t honestly think it’s that unusual. One of the strengths of these types of groups is it’s somewhere women can share not just breastfeeding challenges but stories of births and recoveries, of dealing with husbands and parents and their new bodies. None of that would happen with a man present. And all of that pales into insignificance next to being put in a position of condoning and supporting a man making a baby suck his nipples so he can feel good.

What about the women in the group?

How about asking them (anonymously) away from the pious thought-police how they REALLY feel about it.

You are an apologist for a load of narcissistic behaviour from a man who is centring himself and his own needs over those of the women and babies in the group, and over those of his own wife and the baby he fathered.

Every mother in that group has the same motivation, to give their baby the best start they can, to ensure their baby is feeding well and getting adequate nutrition to be healthy. The motivation of this transwoman is totally different. Their motivation is to fulfil a personal desire, with no care of the potential consequences to the baby (the miriad of drugs exposed to the baby) or the negative impact on the wife who is actually trying (through a true motjers motivation) to feed her baby. It is so fucking selfish!!!!!!!! If the baby and mother's health and well-being was thw true priority for this transwoman they would back the fuck off and focus on supporting their wife.

@Willyoujustbequiet i don't think I've ever read anything on mumsnet that has made me so angry.
The mother in this will be assigned a midwife and health worker so there's no need to access a club for women. It's totally unacceptable.
I don't turn up at a 'ball checking' group because my husbands gone to one.
I'd literally be there for a gawp at the todgers.
It's about time a group of like minded women bearded up and infiltrated a rugby club changing room. See how these men like it. But of course we wouldn't because we know our bounderies. At nearly 6ft I'm sorely tempted.