October 2012 Moms
badkitty2012
member
Article - MIL Breastfeeds baby WTF?!?!?!
badkitty2012
member
I know I don't post much, but had to share this doozy of an article. There are a lot of nutty MILs out there, some pretty good ones too, I happen to be lucky with a pretty good one, but this is some serious boundary issues!!!
Sorry the Insert/edit link is not working on my mac. grrrr
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Re: Article - MIL Breastfeeds baby WTF?!?!?!
Married my best friend 09.18.11
TTC since 12.10.11, BFP #1 02.10.12
Baby E born 10/18/12. 8.5lbs and 21in of pure perfection!
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I agree!!!! Based on this I wouldn't be surprised if this poor woman said her MIL had tried to jump in bed with them on their wedding night!!!
Now I know in some cultures community breast feeding is the norm and there are wet nurses and community milk banks available in many of our communities which are wonderful resources for the moms who want and/or need them, but I think the thing that skeezed me out most about the article was that she had no permission (based on how the article read), explicit or implied, to breastfeed the baby. Who in their right mind provides food, healthcare or physical discipline to a child that is not their own without asking?
This article ranks up there with the other one I read about a 24 yo woman breaking into a house and nursing a baby. Their are some real BSC people out there!
Wow if my MIL would do that I don't know what would happen. I'd definitely flip out, H would never hear the end of it and honestly I would never want her to touch my child again. Not because I consider it abuse, I think it's overstepping boundaries to an extreme. You had your kids, let me have mine. It's just plain disgusting.
For some reason I have a hard time believing that actually happened, but if it did, it was obviously totally uncalled for. The parents of the child should be making feeding and comforting decisions for such a young child, and a grandparent making their own judgment call on this is inappropriate.
People don't think things through. I remember people on my son's BMB posting things about relatives sticking their fingers in the baby's mouth to pacify him/her, etc., which is just as out of line, in my opinion, but probably a lot more common. No wonder the mama instinct to stay near and protect your baby is strong!
This! I am floored by the fact that this woman thought it would be ok to do something like that! Unbelievable!
I read this today on babble. The first thing they asked was, "what would you do in her shoes?" Thinking of my MIL who when she hugs my son triggers my gag reflex my answer was, "I'd drop kick her ass so hard and fast she'd make it across the pacific and land somewhere in China." But then I stopped to think about it. And I can have some understanding for the MIL.
#1) I loved nursing my son. Like loved it and cried when he weaned. It's one of my fondest memories of motherhood. When I got my BFP with this cycle I went to sleep that night blissful and dreamt about nursing another baby.
#2) I was nursed by another woman and my mother has nursed a baby that wasn't hers. So have I. My sister and I have sons who are 7 months apart and I nursed her newborn and she has nursed my son. All with explicit permission of course.
My issues with this were the same as Prudie's. This is not about nursing. That grandma is not a pervert. Or sick. It's not about bonding. Or anything like that. This is absolutely about what is considered culturally appropriate for Americans and the boundaries that exist for the relationships of the involved parties. Nothing about this was okay for those reasons. I'd bet money that Grandma thought she could do it, satisfy her desire to tangibly remember what it was like to nurse a baby, not get caught and no one would be the wiser. And I have a bigger issue with that than the thought of someone else's boob in my kid's mouth.
I'm in the small percentage of people who would allow someone else to nurse my kid. I think it's sad that mom and grandma couldn't bond over reminiscing about nursing. I think it would have been nice for grandma to be able to say, "I miss nursing so much. It's been so long but I just loved it and instinctually, when your baby cries I want to nurse her myself because it was just what I did to comfort my own babies." I don't know if she would have. But I worry that she might have felt like a freak saying that. And I think that's sad. Any woman who nursed a baby could have said something like that to me with no judgement from me. I would have completely understood.