My JNFMIL is pushing formula on me. I’m 35 weeks pregnant. Due pretty soon.. She has said things like:
“The baby will need to be on formula when you’re waiting for your milk to come in.”
“I’ll buy the formula and I can feed her when you need to rest.”
“You can’t breast feed for more than 2 weeks.”
“If you’re going to breast feed you’re only going to breast feed for 6 months and you can supplement with formula.”
“You don’t want your baby grabbing your chest in public you need to use formula when we’re out.”
“You need to cover up when we’re in public if you’re gonna breast feed or go somewhere else so you might as well just use formula.”
“You’ll need your medicine after you have the baby you can’t breast feed. I’ll buy the formula.”
“You need to put the baby on cereal at 3 months and use formula.”
“You can tell WIC you’re breast feeding but I can still buy the formula.” (WIC is a supplemental assistance program in my state.)
Side note: she’s broke and running out of a money a majority of the time and she can’t even afford formula with the way she manages her money.
I do understand she’s pushing the formula because she wants to solely be able to feed the baby whenever she wants and be the primary bottle giver. Which is not going to happen but not because of spite but because she doesn’t manage her blood sugars and is usually under the influence of a variety of controlled substances that are prescribed but I’m very concerned she would drop my baby. I also prefer breast feeding but a fed baby is really all that matters. If my boobs didn’t work out. I’d use formula. No biggie.
I even mentioned providing breast milk in bags for storage that she can put in bottles to still feed the baby and she is still pushing formula to be mixed in when I say that and I know it’s because she wants to feed the baby all the time.
I had an experience over Memorial Day weekend with my bf’s cousin’s baby boy. He needed a bottle and I was getting ready to feed him and she said “IM going to feed him!”
And I said, but I’ve never got to feed him before and she cocked the biggest attitude and said FINE. YOU can do it THIS time. But IM doing it NEXT TIME. And I’m like…what’s the big deal? She’s even mentioned taking my baby places without me as another reason I shouldn’t breast feed and I’m like..you can’t even unbuckle a car seat or drive yourself??? Like no.
I’m not mad or annoyed I’m like really confused why feeding babies is such a big thing for JNMIL’s and I’ve heard issues like this before. Anyone know why?
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they see it as a power / control issue. Hard no
If your MIL breastfed, you must too. If your MIL formula fed, you must too. These women want to control everything.
Because if she can’t feed the baby, she can’t be alone with the baby. This is really about her making sure she gets her alone time with baby, which from what you’ve said SHOULD. NOT. HAPPEN. Ever. You should start putting out that messaging now so she can prepare, because otherwise she is going to show up the day you get home, looking to take baby out for the day/back to her house/etc. It’s about control and being able to take your baby away from you.
Omg tell her to stop with the comments! Tell her your breasts and how you and the father choose to feed the baby is not a 3 party decision! She’s pushing it so that she can play do over mommy and she can’t do that if you’re nursing. She’s also probably a part of the generation that was pushed to use formula and were made to believe breast milk was not enough so she probably believes if you breast feed your baby will not get enough if what it needs
She’s grasping for control. I’d put up some pretty hard boundaries – if she starts badgering, she doesn’t get to hold the baby at that event.
Your milk is already in. It’s called colostrum and you have been making it since 14 weeks of pregnancy. True milk comes in after the baby has the colostrum. Disregard your mil and just change the subject. Whether or not you do breastfeed, pump, or use formula is your choice. She sounds like she has feeding fantasies and “misses having a baby”. Get her a discounted baby doll that takes a bottle if she won’t stop ….once my mil found out I’d be nursing and sticking with it she avoided me like the plague. I haven’t had to see her in 3 years and counting….it’s the breast thing that has ever happened to me.
Do you live together? Why does she think she’s going to be doing all this feeding of the baby?
Do not under any circumstances allow her to babysit or have unsupervised time with your child. She will 100% feed your baby formula, even if you provide breast milk.
Do not give unsupervise access to this woman or else she will sneak in a formula, take it from MY experience.
She doesn’t care about baby’s welfare, all she cares about is being needed and playing mom to your child.
Shut down every comment and if she doesn’t stop, stop seeing her, you don’t need the stress right now. Your priority is you and your baby’s feeling.
She can mope all she wants but you are not responsible for her emotions.
These conversations need to stop. Your partner needs to do their job with their parent.
Probably a power and control thing but I believe some older generations were told that breastmilk was not nutritionally complete and that formula was better. The way she’s going about it, it definitely sounds more like a power trip
She’s a weirdo, wants to play mommy, controlling woma. This obsession gives me the ick, it’s so creepy. Thank goodness I breastfed my first for 2 years and going strong with my second for 5 months! No bottles, no formula, feeding in public and she can suck it up lol my mil came with this cover it up 💩, thank god my husband shut her up. I would avoid and ignore her as much as you can, this stress and pressure can affect your milk supply, stay away from this weirdo.
welcome to the world of the MILFH. MIL has been bad now; just wait until your baby is born, oops, or should I say MIL’s baby is born.
You and husband need to establish boundaries and consequences now. your MIL is going to be an absolute nightmare when baby arrives. If you don’t, MIL is going to suck all the joy out of your experience with a newborn. don’t let her do it. also, no unsupervised visits with your child; MIL is going to do whatever she wants without regard as to what, you the mother, actually wants.
This woman feels delusionally entitled to your baby. You need to shut her shit down. Every time. You will feed YOUR baby however YOU deem fit. If she doesn’t like it, well, that’s just too damned bad for her, then.
“How I choose to feed my baby is none of your concern”
I hope your husband/partner is aware that his mother is acting like this and is fully prepared to put boundaries and consequences in place. If he’s a “she’s just excited” “that’s just how she is” “I don’t want to be in the middle” kind of person he WILL be your #1 problem.
Don’t let her have unsupervised access to the baby. Especially if she’s abusing substances – even prescribed, she’s unsafe for the baby to be left with. I wouldn’t let her around at all, to be honest, not unless she gets her medication sorted out.
My baby is EFF and I enjoy the flexibility of who is able to feed him. But that being said, you should get to decide whether to BF or not – no one else! It does not mean anyone who wants to get to feed my baby either. He’s only fed by people that we and – now that’s going through the social anxiety phase – he trusts. That’s been the people he lives with (my husband, his auntie because of living with us temporarily, and I).
Edit: If she is similar to my mom, it’s because they want to “guarantee” alone time with the baby. A lot want to treat the grandchild as a “do over” or relive having a baby. For my mom, that means ignoring safe sleep, using the baby as a cute accessory, and letting my emotionally and socially unstable older sister play mommy. She also insists that modern safety standards are “silly” and makes fun of us for following them, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she wanted to “prove” that. This is the reason she has never been allowed to babysit my son (9 months).
Ew what a weirdo. I’d breastfeed for a long time, if you can just out of spite. I’d never pump so she could feed the baby too.
She needs put on an info diet immediately! She does not need to know every detail of your pregnancy or life. Do you live with her? It sounds like you spend a lot of time with her.
Because she wants to steal your baby. She’s a grandchild-stealer, whether she’s a narc or not (most of them are narcs but not all).
Usually suggestions are don’t EVER let her keep the baby alone (no matter how expensive babysitting is), not overnight nor even an hour; avoid letting her be alone in a room with the baby; don’t let her feed the baby (she’ll really want this one because she figures she can replace the baby’s parents in the child’s mind and emotions very easily if SHE is the main giver-of-food, especially if she can get the baby to refuse food from anyone else), and don’t let her call the baby by “her own little pet name”.
And above all, be present for all interaction with the baby–preferably the son- or daughter-in-law, because they are much less likely to be moved by the whining, anger, or crocodile tears of an in-law than the actual son or daughter of the grandchild-stealer. (That’d be you, obviously, in this case.)
My MIL tried: “Maybe the baby doesn’t like to be breastfed?!”
Well, said baby nibbled tiddy even after 2.5 years, and it was a hard fight to get him to stop. She didn’t breastfeed at all (her body, her choice), and yet she was utterly shocked that I could be planning with it. My older daughter was breastfed for a little over a year.
Don’t know what she expected. Anyhow, we’re NC anyways.
This is weirdly controlling.
She envisions a future where she raises your baby.
I’m not saying she actively wants something to happen to you, just that in her mind you are the incubator fir her baby, so once you’ve delivered, you can disappear.
Can you imagine harping on an expectant mother to end breastfeeding early for your own selfish reasons!?! Never mind your feelings or your babies actual health. That’s embarrassing to be around honestly.
Youngest never took a bottle. Arm yourself with info about what to expect on your breastfeeding journey and tell pushy MIL to stay in the granny lane – the mothering lane is solely yours.
Its a control thing. She doesnt want to be told the baby is exclusively breast fed becUse that means Mom is more important. Shes trying to level the playing field.
She’s weird and tbh you should be mad with her trying to push you to do something you don’t want and because she’s clearly trying to create a fantasy where this is her baby.
Where is the father in all this? Unless he is telling his mother to back to fuck off you have a partner problem and it’s better to be a single parent than have to deal with this crap.
It’s not a doll, this is your child that you have nurtured for almost 9 months. Tell her to jog on and walk a long way off a short cliff
Yeah, no. It’s a control thing, so she can push for unsupervised time/overnights with the baby. Your instincts are on point and you should trust them. Especially if she’s that much of a lush.
I don’t understand it, but it certainly reinforced my choice to directly breastfeed all the time! My JNMIL tried to take over the couple of times I was away and my husband gave a bottle. He didn’t let her. Lol. My kids had very few bottles and that was my husband’s opportunity to experience it – not anyone else’s time to play mommy!
I was born in 1961 and my mother breastfed at a time when hardly anyone even considered it.
I had my baby in 1984 and things were not much better.
My neighbors had babies that were fat, lethargic and wheezing. Their mothers used formula and put baby cereal in it as soon as possible.
My baby fed A LOT. They do this to stimulate future milk supply. She was also perfectly slim, active, no wheezing, little spit up.
Yes, a couple of times I got caught out where I couldn’t feed her in public, like in the subway. She wasn’t happy about it and neither were my fellow passengers. But in those days, a breast pump was a cone with a big rubber bulb on it. Not exactly stimulating lactation. Nowadays, they have great pumps that work really well.
Many women shamed me for having a skinny baby (the doctor told me she was perfect!), for having a baby that fed too much, etc., etc., etc.
At the end of the day, it’s YOUR baby. It’s between you, your doctor, your lactation consultant, and your baby. Make this clear to your MIL. She doesn’t have to agree. She just had to accept your decision. While it is the family’s baby, and it’s grandma’s baby, it’s mom’s baby first and foremost. certain decisions belong to mom. No questions asked and nobody gets to override that. Believe me, I didn’t even care what my baby’s father thought or wanted in these matters.
I also want to add, that my baby’s father was severely lactose intolerant, and I was advised not to expose her to fairly milk if any kind till she was two. I didn’t, and she is not lactose intolerant. I’m not a health fanatic but there is something to be said for cow’s milk being for baby cows. When I got to the point where I had to use formula, I used soy based.
Control and getting you to “admit” that she’d be a better mother to your baby would be my guess. She sounds absolutely obsessed.
Why does she even THINK she will have so much involvement in feeding your baby?
“I will buy the formula” you don’t want the baby grabbing your breast when WE are out in public”
Does she live with you? Is your plan to have her take care of the baby??
Tell her that you will be feeding the baby and any other parenting task and if you need help you’ll ask her.
She is not entitled to anything. Do not let her make your parenting journey about her and all of her wishes now that she is grandma.
Wow. This would drive me crazy. She truly is obsessed. It’s really none of her business if you want to breastfeed your baby or not. I would try to EBF out of spite so that she never gets to feed the baby just based on the sheer annoyance. Once baby is here, she will likely get worse.
OP,
If this were me, I would shut that shit down right now. Your spouse should be dealing with her and her bs. Not you.
This is your sweet baby, not hers. She got her chance to be Mom and feed her babies how she chose to.
Remind her sternly that YOU are the Mama, and you’re feeding baby how you see fit.
I hope you have an easy and stress free delivery and recovery.
Enjoy that baby. It goes way too fast.
She is pushing formula so she can feed baby, and keep baby overnight.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again.. these crazy JNs need to get jobs in a daycare center. They can feed all the babies.. JFC!!
Honestly tell her to keep her opinions to herself, it’s your decision and no one else’s. It also sounds like you spend far too much time with her.
Yooooo RED FLAG
Let’s make a deal— I’ll worry about everything concerned with feeding my baby and you worry about managing your own life and money.
You’re the primary caregiver? Wonderful! Leverage this ruthlessly.
Tell her that unless she stays in her grandma-lane, there will be no more care. She can hire a carer, take taxis, etc.
When she starts yammering on about breast feeding, shut her down *every single time.*
Be direct, be abrupt, don’t be afraid of her becoming upset.
“I will be breast-feeding, shut up forever about this!”
“NO, I will not be using a damn cover in public, deal with it.”
Be as rude as you need to be, until she knows her place.
First – you have a great outlook on breastfeeding. I think accepting that you may need formula only helps destress the situation. I always kept a can of formula on hand in case it was needed but never had to use it.
As far as JN; she’s clearly got baby rabies. I would invest in a carrier and baby wear when she is around. If you deny her bottle feeding watch as she may slip the baby solids too young to satisfy her need to feed. Be watchful for other lines that she’ll inevitably overstep. You should to head them off by stating clear boundaries. She won’t listen, but you will have stated your expectations and reference them. Then every time she oversteps “We discussed you not doing ____.” And take the baby.
Do you live with her? The expectation of being the primary bottle giver is just unrealistic and ridiculous! There are plenty of other ways to bond, and if you pump she can still give a bottle every now and then. As far as being covered in public…baby chooses that. My daughter drew way more attention if I wore a cover. Double shirt method works great for easy breastfeeding with minimal exposure.
Good luck. Realize now that you are your baby’s advocate and you call the shots on how they are fed. Embrace your inner mama bear. You can do this!
I’d flat out ask her why she’s so obsessed with your boobs. 🙂 she sounds like a gem.
I agree that her concern is fake and gross.
That being said, if for any reason you do need to supplement with formula, do not let her be involved. You deserve to feed your child however you wish. It’s your child. As long as they’re fed and healthy, that’s all that matters.