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[–] Hippie_Housewife 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

This and so many other reasons are why I stepped away from mommy forums when my kids were very small. It just got to be too much. Everyone was always so offended about everything - and dare I say it,but the working moms who fed their babies formula were the worst for that. They felt under attack from every single opinion and statement. Once I mentioned that I loved breastfeeding because it was so sweet to hold my baby and look into her eyes and run my free hand over her fluffy hair, and just enjoy the closeness, and some insecure mombie asked me if that means that formula-feeding moms don't know what that kind of closeness is like and how very insensitive it was for me to say such a horrible thing. LOL I don't know what I said in reply but I do know it was sarcastic.Another time I got chewed out because they were talking about what parenting methods people used - Dr. Sears? the Pearls? etc. - and I said I use the "_______ and ________ method" (my kids' first names). Apparently that made me a stuck-up bitch who thinks I and my snowflake children are entirely to special for everyone else. What the actual heck. It's just ridiculous out there. The Mommy Wars are a real thing. All that female sexual jealousy that propels pubescent and teenage girls, and single women, to be competitive and snotty needs somewhere to go once women have been locked down and have babies, and so it finds a vent in trashing another mother's choices. There are, of course, some things that are good ideas and others that are bad ideas where parenting is concerned: breastfeeding is healthier than formula, circumcision is not medically needed for almost any male ever, and childhood obesity is a sign that your kids eats like crap. But honestly, people freak out over everything; they're worried that they aren't being good enough mothers, and I think that's what makes them lash out at other moms. They're putting someone else down to try and make themselves feel like they're not a failure because they are sure that they are. It's sad. But you can't fix it so it's always best to just stay away.

And yes, pro-vaccine posts are of course the norm in all those places. Someone - I wonder who? - has really ratcheted up the vax fear to an 11 these days. 15 years ago when I was a brand-new mom, it was common for people not to vaccinate fully or at all, and most people didn't get so heated about it, not like they do now. Now everyone is utterly terrified that their child will die, or your child will kill him, and it's just bizarre. They think they know all about it because their doctor told them to vaccinate, and now they're experts too because they listened; but most people don't know anything about what these diseases are actually like, what the mortality and morbidity rates are, what their odds of infection vs. complication are as compared to the odds of an adverse reaction to the vaccine, etc. Nobody does any reading or asks any questions, and like crabs in a bucket, if you do they will tear you down. Don't let them get to you. You still have the right to make that choice for your child. I like to ask them how they feel about abortion since they are apparently okay with forcing others to do things with their bodies even though they don't want to. Bodily autonomy, unless we're talking about the 50-some odd vaxes we pump into children here in Canada before they go to kindergarten.

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[–] OneOfTheBoys [S] ago 

So much yes to everything you said! Yeah I've stopped commenting for the most part, but I still read. I stopped after I got into a thing where a few piled on me because I spoke out as the lone voice of objection when everyone was all "fed is best" - like WTAF, who is saying "breastmilk or starve!" also if I give a newborn a chocolate milkshake is that "best" too? I put it more poiletly than that but my main issue was them saying people shouldn't give tips on breastfeeding when they say they are having trouble as it might just be impossible and they should use formula guilt free, and one of the tips (eating oats for supply) was something that was the difference between doctors saying I had to use formula and fully breastfeeding.

Mummy wars are real. I try not judge, give people the benefit of the doubt and be helpful. Nobody is the perfect mum, I really believe "good enough" is enough, strive for prefection but settle with realistic expectations so you don't end up a different kind of crap mum.

I just get annoyed with the crabs. I want to know when there is a better way. I'm happy to listen to alternative strategies and can entertain ideas without accepting them and changing when I learn new information. I don't understand the doubling down stuff.

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[–] Hippie_Housewife 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

I stopped after I got into a thing where a few piled on me because I spoke out as the lone voice of objection when everyone was all "fed is best" - like WTAF, who is saying "breastmilk or starve!"

Yeah. It's frustrating how hard it can be to have a conversation with a group of moms - or really, even just a group of women in general - about anything even remotely controversial or sensitive. People take everything as if you personally insulted them and everything is about feelings. Why can't we just have an honest discussion about why breastmilk is the ideal food for babies? Why do we have to pad that with a hundred soothing reassurances that formula moms are just as good at mothering? It's ridiculous. I've noticed that this is far more pronounced with liberal-minded women - they are far harder to talk to than conservative ones, almost always. They claim to be more open-minded but often they're far more fragile and emotional and sensitive than their allegedly close-minded conservative counterparts.