Why have a baby and then not breastfeed?

Question

I saw this woman the other day, and she was giving her baby a bottle, and I asked her why she couldn't breastfeed, like if anything was wrong with her. She got real mad and rude, but anyway, she said she didn't want to breastfeed. So why even have a baby?

Answer 1

It wasn't really any of your business why she was or wasn't breastfeeding.

Answer 2

That was probably the fifth person in half an hour to ask her the same question. You can want to have a baby and not want to breastfeed. Why......are you the breastfeeding police and only you can decide as to who can use formula and who has to breastfeed??? I bottle fed my daughter after 10 days of struggling and feeling awful about it, I also had a comment from a lady probably just like you, it tipped me over the edge, I was already feeling bad about the choice I made.....I ended up with postnatal depression, due to my mental state and others and their opinions. I have had a son since then and I got the breastfeeding (Thank god, lol) and you know what even though it has been 3.5 years since my daughter was born I still feel very badly about not breastfeeding her to 12 months like I am doing for my son. Please please hop off your soap box, it is NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS what people do with their boobs. I will say again, you do not need to Want to breastfeed to want to have a baby!!! Maybe you will have trouble and wont be able to breastfeed and someone will ask you a nosy question, then you will see how it feels!

Answer 3

why not? I don't see your point. Are you saying that you can't understand why there's any reason to have a child unless you're going to breast feed? Why don't you try thinking a little deeper than just what your breasts can offer. Do you think of yourself as nothing but a boob? I am absolutely in favor of breast feeding and think it's a great thing to do but, it is not the be all and end all of being alive and wanting a child! I could say the same about so many, many other thiings. Why have achild if you are just going to send them to school instead of spending every waking moment with them by home schooling? How dare you consider letting your baby sleep in their own crib -- why did you bother to have a baby if you're not even willing to share your bed with them? I am very glad that we live in a place and during a time when we all have choices and the ability to make them on our own. Why don't you keep your snooty opinions to yourself. It is absolutely none of your business why anyone chooses to breast feed or not and I would have given you a dirty look if you'd dared to ask me if there was "sometiing wrong with me" for not breast feeding. You acted incredibly rudely and your question doesn't deserve the thoughtfulness of a legitimate answer. No mater what the reason this woman had, the most obvious thing is that it is none of your business and that you had a lot of nerve thinking it is.

Answer 4

You are the exact reason so many women feel so bad for not breastfeeding, It is no ones business why a woman doesn't or does breastfeed! Get off the high horse it's not like our kids are suffering from it! I tried to breastfeed my son, it didn't work he was getting nothing! When I switched to formula all of a sudden i'm a damn monster what is it better to starve your children?

Answer 5

Everybody is different and it's an individual choice whether to breastfeed or use bottles, or express the breast milk and feed it from bottles. If this woman was a stranger, who are you to tell her what to do? Here's a question for you: why the superior attitude if you're breastfeeding? Do you think this makes you superior as far as parenting is concerned? That doesn't give you any right to berate a stranger for her choice in life. Get real and mind your own business. If you can't refrain from accosting strangers and criticizing their life choices and those made for their children, why go out in public?

Answer 6

I never breastfed and if anyone ever came up to me and asked why I would have been rude to. And just because she was feeding a bottle in public maybe she does breastfeed at home and doesn't want to in public. But really its not any of your business. I am a mother of 16.

Answer 7

Number one it wasn't any of your business i have an 18 month old an i chose not to breastfeed, It just wasn't something i was comfortable with. For other people perhaps its the work they do i know a person who is a nurse an breastfeeding didn't work with that schedule. Maybe something that is right for you isn't right for someone else, Its perfectly fine for those to choose not to breastfeed it doesn't mean were any different than those who do.

Answer 8

There is no rule to say you MUST breastfeed and it is up to each mother what she feels is best and no one should be bitchy to someone who chooses not to. For all you know she may have adopted her baby but did not want to have to tell a stranger who has no business asking anyway.
I breastfed my 1st 2 children i had to stop with my 2nd after 3 weeks as she had no suck reflex (due to the shape of her mouth)also as she was such a poor feeder sometimes I'd sit for hours trying to get her to feed only for her to throw it back up again........I had no time to eat and my milk quality was poor. It was actually my GP and health visitor who told me to stop.. Partly cos my baby needed supplements in her feeds and also so the amount and calories could be monitored properly.........
Had a stranger came and asked me at the time why i was not breast feeding my baby I'd not have bothered going into my reasons just told her it was none of her business.

Answer 9

"So why even have a baby?"

So does that imply that if you cannot breastfeed when you have a child of your own, you no longer want that child?? A woman's decision to breastfeed is very personal and can be centered on health reasons, biological/genetic reasons, religious reasons, pain tolerance for the woman (breast feeding hurts), the baby's ability to take to the nipple, health reasons in the baby, advise from a doctor or other trusted person in the mother's life, the woman's own personal upbringing (whether her mother breastfed), the father's preference or influence, an iron deficiency that can only be corrected through special formulas, a bought of breast cancer that left the woman unable to breastfeed, a family history of cancer, etc. etc. etc. As you can see, there are THOUSANDS of very very personal factors contributing to this woman's reasoning, and, as it was stated before, it was none of your business to ask her, or to judge her. How she chooses to raise and nurish her child is completely her choice and decision.

And, to answer your question, women have babies because they're beautiful and it's our biological right to have children and raise them however we want.

Answer 10

First of all you were quite rude to even approach her on subject. There are many women who don’t breastfeed perhaps she was on some medication that would be bad for the baby; she could have bad milk, low milk or something else. Either way it was none of your business. Breastfeeding does not make one a mother.

Answer 11

Well, my cousins baby wouldn't breastfeed. But some people choose not to breastfeed. They may not feel comfortable with it. Formula isn't as good as breastmilk but it's better than regular milk. But everybody has their own choice.