Mothers (Grrr)

I hope that I will never punch my daughter's buttons the way my mother punches mine.  I think it's accidental--which is the only way I can deal with it--but, man, it's infuriating.

Tonight while I was nursing The Girl and reading The Boy his bedtime story (and my mom was sipping a glass of chardonnay--not her first of the evening), she opined, "Maybe your breast milk is missing something because [The Girl] really loves bottles."

I am not a breastfeeding zealot, but still.  How is this comment useful?

Comments

[K&M]

Babies like bottles because they don't have to work as hard to get the goods out of them. Your boob food is lacking nothing at all. Momma needs to stick to her wine...maybe she'd like it better in a bottle too! ;o)

[May]

Ugh. Why do they do this to us? I, too, hope that I manage to remember these moments when I'm old and my daughter is a grown-up herself.

[cat, galloping]

I guarantee you my mom would have been the same way. Actually, she said similarly unhelpful stuff in the limited time I did breastfeed.

[Jill]

Yep, my mom was the same way. Anytime I had to sit and breastfeed, it was "What, again?"

[missymey]

my mom isn't really like that--but my mother in law and sister in law both make up for it. :)

they were NOT pleased that i was still nursing my son at 11 months. they both thought that he should be taking a bottle to feel more independent from me.

[Erin]

My MIL was the same way the first time she visited after P was born (he was 3 weeks old). It was mostly that he was clearly not getting enough milk and that's why he was always so hungry. And that we should give him a bottle, and she'd be happy to give it to him. Um, he was hungry because he was gaining weight. He gained 3 lbs in the first month of life. Of course he was nursing all the time.

My mom, who breastfed all three of us, didn't start getting antsy until I was still nursing P at nearly a year. It drove her crazy that I continued until he was 18 months. Since then, she's made repeated comments about how he was nursed for too long.

Your milk is fine, but you already know that.

[AmyinMotown]

I have been fuming about this very thing this week, and I don't know why. The subtle little digs. Why can't they, at some point just realize "I'm done, if I haven't turned this child of mine into an effective human being by now it's not going to happen."

Of course, I wil probably understand that more in 20-some years.

My mom's most recent one is always making comments about how my sister-in-law (who is her version of Perfect and the daughter she never had) must be appalled at my daughter's strong-willed behavior (subtle message there is "because you are so permissive and their child is Perfect as well""). A) We are not super-permissive, but we have a kid where picking your battles is the best strategy b) my SIL has never given me any indication she has anything but love for my dauughter and thinks she's precious and c) their kid can be just as much of a little shit as any other four-year-old. Grrrrr.

So, um, yeah, right there wth you.

[Mary]

I think it's guilt and denial. They didn't nurse or nurse enough or whatever and you turned out JUST FINE so why aren't you doing the same? It's not really about nursing, it's that you might be doing a higher degree of mothering than she did (in her POV) and she can't deal with it.

I don't know why my own mother hasn't been doing this to me, but I'm still fuming about my sister giving me a hard time about continuing to nurse my 27-month-old. I don't give her a hard time about her plans for parenting that I disagree with, but she doesn't know that because I keep my big mouth shut.

[Robin]

I think there is some jealousy going on. We were raised in the generation that breastfeeding was looked down on. And we came out just fine. And she probably wants to interact more with her - and feeding a bottle is a way.

Although it is sad when a mother is jealous of her own daughter's mothering.....

[marion]

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that your mother either didn't breastfeed you or was not happy with her breastfeeding experience where you were concerned. I'm sorry you have to deal with this.

Mary: Sounds to me as though you may want to start speaking your mind, even if it's just in the, "I think we all have differing styles of parenting, and sometimes we will disagree. You may think me continuing to nurse my toddler is gross, and I may think you allowing your child to do X, Y and Z is pure insanity, but the important thing is to show respect for each other's choices." Say it enough times and she might get the picture. As it is, I bet she thinks you're jealous of her "superior" parenting skills, or something. :)

[Elizabeth]

When I was crying 4 days postpartum because my baby would not latch and everything about breastfeeding was 100 times more difficult than I had planned, my mother said, "I don't know why your generation needs all these fancy things to breastfeed, and Boppy pillows and all that. WE just put you to our breasts and nursed."

Ooh, 2 1/2 years later and I am still mad at her for that one. I nearly expelled her from my house at the time, what with the hormones!

[S]

Well, you can't call your own Mom an asshole...so I will. Asshole.

My mom is wicked cool and is pretty good about keeping her opinions to herself...the flip side is I have a MIL who isn't. She has let me know a couple of times that I should have stopped nursing the tot since I am pregnant again. Um, my boobs, my biz.

[Rebekah]

Umm, that is totally NOT useful. At all! Sorry that she said something like that. I think I would have to hope that it was the wine speaking. =P

[Heather]

My mom always pushes my buttons too. I always hope I'll be better than that with my DD. My MIL is cool though. She has a lot of opinions, but she keeps them to herself.

[isabel]

Moms and buttons, I second that. And you're right, so not useful.

Turn it around on her, it's easy to rememer as a strategy and very innocent: "Is that what happened to you, your milk was missing something?"

[Sarah]

Yeah, that was mean. Mean.

[Mardougrrl]

Oy. I don't understand why either. Everyone is my family is giving me crap about nursing my two year old. I am even TRYING to wean, but it DOES take time, and no, asking me, "she's STILL nursing?" in THAT TONE every time you call does NOT make it happen faster. Grrr.

Oh, I am sorry...was this post about you? I think the other posters might be right about this one...I think its a combination of "well, WE didn't do it that way" defensiveness and general forgetfulness about the realities of parenting a small child.

Hang in.