NIP (nursing in public)? (breastfeeding, milk, baby, support)

[deerislesmile]

What are your thoughts, feelings and experiences with nursing in public, either as a nursing mom, or as a public ?

[gardener34]

No problems with it. I did it all the time mostly with my son because he was an extremely colick-y, stressful, nervous, hard-to-deal with baby that had digestive problems to boot.

And the only way I could quiet him most times was with my breastfeeding. Many places just did not have very good facilities (like a chair in the women's room) and I had to find a quiet place wherever I could.

And he was not the type of baby who would quietly feed either, he like to roll around and play while he feeding. I am sure some people had a problem with it, but too bad. They never had to deal with my baby!

Needless to say I have NO problems with it, and cannot figure out why anyone would. It is a completely natural thing to do.

[irishmom]

I think it's fine as long as the child isn't old enough to walk up to mommy and say, "Milk please."

[BrianH]

Its all good. A child needs to eat, and i think its great that mothers are actually still breast feeding, cause all teh campaings are telling them different.
If anybody has any problems with it they should stay behind locked doors because there is allot worse out there.

[beth ann]

I exclusively breastfed all three of my kids. With my first, I was intimidated with NIP. However one instance changed my perspective forever. One time I was in church when I needed to nurse. Not knowing where to go, I went to the restroom and sat on a bench outside the stalls. All of sudden it occured to me (I think it was the Hoy Spirit), "hey, I'm feeding my baby where people are eliminating...this is pretty undignified."

From that day forth, I bf in any and all public situations. I must stress that I always (I mean always) bf discreetly, so discreetyl, that sometimes people would be talking w/ me and initially not notice. It was obvious when they finally did becasue they would say something like "oh....sorry, I had no idea."

I think that if people have a problem w/ discreet (stress discreet) bf, that's really something they have to deal with. However, I will say that I have been respectful with my Father-in-law who we all knew was uncomfortable even w/ discreet bf, that I usually went into another room. He was supportive in the sense that he thought bf was how God designed us, as part of God's plan. My mother-in-law didn't bf any of her 6 kids because a doctor told her w/ her first that she couldn't, so sadly she never even tried w/ the others.....she just resorted to the notion that she couldnt' do it.....but, that was a completely different age and time, since she's 76.

[SmerkyGrl]

Not only do I not have a problem with it, I fully support it and have problems with people who have problems with it! Its a very natural thing and not to mention the most intimate moment between mother and child after the child is born. Its a shame that people would scorn breastfeeding in public just because they *gasp oh noes!* cannot handle the fact that YES, WOMEN DO HAVE BREASTS and they are used for something other than foreplay!

[BrianH]

Originally Posted by SmerkyGrl

YES, WOMEN DO HAVE BREASTS and they are used for something other than foreplay!

You know it took me 24 years to figure that out :S

[weatherologist]

I breastfed all of my children in public. Like beth ann I was very discreet (always had a blanket over my shoulder covering the feeding baby). Of course the actual latch on was sometimes not so discreet. I would occasionally get some odd looks and once I thought that an employee in a restaurant was dusting in the same place a little too long (which we just got a laugh out of), but for the most part, noone seemed to take offense. Personally I do believe that a little discretion is key to breastfeeding in public, I can remember being in a restaurant once and seeing a woman walking to her table with her baby latched on and NO covering at all. Got to admit, not only did I think she was amazing for being able to carry out such a task, I did think that it was a little improper. But, I guess you gotta do what you gotta do.

[ADVentive]

I completely support a mother breastfeeding her child anywhere that another mother can bottle feed her child. And I don't mind if they can ask for it either.

I was shy about BF in front of others in the beginning, but I got over it pretty quickly. After a week I didn't mind doing it in front of family. After another week I didn't mind doing it in front of friends. After a month, I BF in public, but went out of my way to be covered and all. I mean, I realized that I spent about 50% of my time with my baby attached to me, so if I didn't BF in public, it meant I wasn't going to get out of the house! And I didn't want to spend half of my dinner or shopping time sitting in a back room while my companions were having a jolly time either.

But what really pretty much turned me into what you might call an activist on the issue was when someone actually told me not to feed my baby in the store. I was at the mall with my husband and some friends, and my 5 week old baby. She wanted to nurse, and they were looking at stuff in the store. I found a chair, I sat down and nursed her. I was wearing a nursing shirt - a shirt specially designed so that you can nurse and not show any skin. I had a blanket up over the top part of my breast, and the baby was covering the rest. I wasn't going to cover her whole head with the blanket though because 1) she was still so small that I needed to keep an eye on her latch, and 2) it was summer and quite hot. So, I can guarantee that you could not see any part of my boob, but you could probably tell that I was nursing the baby if you were really paying attention.

Anyway, the store manager came over to me and told me that I couldn't do "that" in the store. I was pretty flustered, but I managed to blurt out that I was pretty sure that in fact it was the law in our state that I could breastfeed my child in any location where I was otherwise authorized to be. He said he'd never heard of any such law, and still wanted me to stop. I said I would not. He said, would I at least cover her up with the blanket. I told him why I would not. He didn't really know what to say, but insisted that I had to go. At this point I was so upset that we left (without buying anything of course). Well, I went home and researched the subject. I called corporate to complain. I printed out the law and brought it back to the store to show the manager. I just was so upset that this had happened. But in researching the issue, I came to be much more confident at nursing in public and now believe that it's actually something that the public needs to see in order to normalize breastfeeding in our society. And to me, that also includes normalizing nursing an older baby.

Now when I nurse in public, I don't worry so much about who can see me. I'm not putting on a show or anything, people can't see much. But I don't make any special effort to hide either. Breastfeeding is a normal and natural parenting activity, and needs to be seen more in public, not less. I nurse my baby when she needs to eat, wherever we are. If it makes someone else uncomfortable, they can look away.

I am amazed at how often I hear stories (now that I have a special interest) of women who are harassed and asked to leave places for nursing their children. And I am amazed at the number of people whose response to those stories is that the mother should go feed her child in the bathroom. Eww!

[SmerkyGrl]

Adventive, I'm really curious now...what did that jackbutt manager say?! :O I would definitely have become "activist" after that too and I'd be tempted to rub the fact that he's a prude jerk right in his face every time I visit the store!