Seewalds 42: Trying to Stay Relevant

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

7 hours ago, Fundie Bunny said:

Seripusly, what the actual fuck. It's a picture of two babies. With diapers on, you can't see genitals. Are you actually so fucked up that you can't see a shirtless baby?

And again, really, fat shaming a baby, real classy and not weird at all

I took what @SassyPants said as Ivy is a cute little butterball, She's grown and filled out, like babies are SUPPOSED to do. What happens when we see skinny babies? We assume the child is either malnourished, neglected or sick. 

I called my daughter "my adorable little chunky monkey", My sister called her daughter chunky monkey, I have a friend who called her son tank.  Another friend of mine has a 3 month old right now and her and her husband say she's a little chubbs, they aren't making fun of her, I wasn't making fun of my kids, they are descriptors of how we think they are perfectly adorable. 

Now if Sassypants had said "Ivy is fat" THAT would be fat shaming.    

[nausicaa]

11 hours ago, LacyMay said:

But it doesn't work like that. I'm pretty confident that Jessa doesn't think about what happened to her as a child on a day to day basis, I'm pretty sure it never crossed her mind to parallel that photo to Josh's actions. I was molested as a child and sexually assaulted in university. They were devestating experiences but I don't think about them every day, I don't put all of my actions through that lens. We have no reason to believe that Jessa or any of the other sisters do either. 

Yeah, there was a lot of this going on directly after the Josh revelations and it still really bothers me. "Did Jessa wear a blush wedding dress because she thought she didn't deserve a white dress?" "Does she not smile a lot because of being molested?" Maybe she just wanted to wear a pink freaking dress and doesn't like to smile a lot. 

Jessa Duggar Seewald, for all her faults, is still a person with interests and opinions. She is not an object to reduce to a vector for the disgusting things her older brother did to her when she was a child. To do so gives Josh so much power over her and her life. 

I don't think people always have malicious intent with their comments and speculation in this area, but had I been sexually assaulted and it were publicly known, I can't imagine how horrible it would feel to continually have my agency taken away by people thinking everything I do, say, or wear is or should be seen through the lens of that assault even decades later. 

[theotherelise]

Yeah, there is a general conversation about whether and how the second generation are exploiting their children. People are going to have different views on that. Personally, I think using your children to become an instagram influencer or to monetize a youtube emprie or to land a reality TV show is problematic. I don't think it's fair to children. But even with my views, there is gray area. 

The picture Jessa posted is similar to ones I see on my instagram feed all the time. I think many of my friends with kids tend to have private instagrams, so the access is somewhat restricted. But I have some friends who have open accounts who post lots of potentially embarrassing kid pictures. And I have some friends who don't post a single photo of their child's face on the internet. 

I think Jessa's personal history as a child who was exploited on television by her parents is far more relevant to her decisions in this area than anything else in her personal history. Jacob Roloff responded to having his childhood scripted and broadcast by taking control as an adult and refusing to be on the show. But he still has a public instagram with what seems like carefully curated content. Jessa has chosen to continue the path by putting her children on TV and also sharing a lot of information and photos of them online as part of her brand.

As for Ivy, she is an adorably chunky baby, as she should be. I didn't see any fat-shaming and I *also* find it interesting how some babies get really chunky and then get their height while others do the opposite and they all (mostly) end up as soft little toddlers at about the same age. 

[Screamapillar]

I don't think anyone was fat shaming Ivy? Unless it was in an edited comment that I missed? I think there's a big difference between actively calling out a baby for being overweight ("Yo baby so FAT that..") and making general observations that some babies are chubby at birth, some babies get chubby after birth, some chubby babies become skinny toddlers, etc.

Didn't Jessa once post a snarky response to someone who asked if she was feeding chunky baby Henry steak?

In this instance I suppose Jessa is lucky that Ivy and Henry are so chunky because more people on her IG post are commenting on that rather than, you know, insanely projecting her childhood trauma on to an innocent picture she chose to share of her small children.

 

[Curious]

On 7/24/2019 at 4:57 PM, EmmieJ said:

Jessa's relaxed parenting style (at least, what she shares with John Q Public) remind me of the way I was with my own son.  My son still wanted to have a bottle of milk as a pre-bedtime ritual long after he turned one.  I remember the pediatrician saying I should put a stop to that, but I ignored his advice because I could see that it was something comforting and calming for my son.  He would sit next to me on the living room couch, have his bottle and his favorite blanket and he'd also rub  my upper arm for some reason.  I guess my chubby arm felt good lol!  I always brushed his teeth before putting him to bed, and either through good genes, good luck, or a combination of both - he only had one tiny cavity (still has only one filled cavity and he's 21 now).  So I'm glad I didn't take away  his nighttime comfort bottle just because he turned one year old. 

It does seem to me that Jessa and Ben really enjoy their children for themselves, not just as arrows in a quiver.  Too back that I strongly disagree with their particular religious beliefs.  I hope they will at least end up fundie-lite.

 

I was a relaxed (or if you prefer lazy) parent.  My son was OBSESSED with straws.  He wanted to be able to use a straw SO badly, starting at about 9 months.  So he weaned himself as soon as he learned how to use a straw.  He had a binky for a lot longer though.   He was in NICU when he was born and had become very dependant on it by the time he came home.  I didn't see a reason to wean him off it before he was ready.  Then when he was maybe 2.5-3 he started chewing on them, which make them a choking hazard.  So I told him any time he chewed one it would be thrown away and when he chewed the last one that meant no more binky.

Every time we had to throw one away I would remind him that chewing on them meant they had to go in the trash and when the last one was thrown away there would be no more binky.   He had a metric shitton of them by that point so it took a while for him to chew his way through all of them.   When we got down to the last one I was a little nervous that there was going to be a time when I was listening to him scream for binky and I would have to have the will power not to run to the store to buy a new one to shut him up and give me the ability to think again.

Then one day he toddled into the kitchen where I was doing something, pulled out the trash can, made sure I was watching and tossed the last binky which was obviously chewed into the trash and said Bye-bye binky.  Then he looked at me and said "No more binky" and toddled back off into the other room to play.

He would occasionally find a binky hidden in some obscure place and he was allowed to keep it until he destroyed it, but there was no fight to the death weaning process.

I have heard of keifer, but never tried it.   I like buttermilk so if it's that texture and taste I could manage it, but I have texture issues and "thick" drinks, for the most part, are a no go for me.   I'm looking for something to help with inflammation though. Is that one of it's uses?

I was on some powered probiotic thing for a while after I had sepsis since I had been on a massive amount of antibiotics.  I didn't really notice a difference, but I only was on them for a month so maybe that isn't long enough to make any kind of difference.

[Melissa1977]

Finally, I saw the picture. 2 beautiful, happy babies. Big baby loving little baby sister.

For those who see something weird in that picture. Please. When parents have little kids, those kids are bathed together, see siblings using the toilet, kiss each other, hit each other, etc. It's normal and has no connection with any kind of eventual abuse.

Jessa does not keep her kids sweating under several layers or clothes. Lets them play. She isn't creating mini robots. She seems to try a gentle parenting. She's still fundie, but her children's childhood is a paradise comparing to Duggar's one.

I hate defending a fundie, but critizising her for that picture is too much. Maybe I'm seeing the picture as a mother, and my hormones are active, but I would love to have that couple chubbies right now at home (my kids are former chubby babies haha).

[Bazinga]

7 hours ago, Melissa1977 said:

Finally, I saw the picture. 2 beautiful, happy babies. Big baby loving little baby sister.

For those who see something weird in that picture. Please. When parents have little kids, those kids are bathed together, see siblings using the toilet, kiss each other, hit each other, etc. It's normal and has no connection with any kind of eventual abuse.

Jessa does not keep her kids sweating under several layers or clothes. Lets them play. She isn't creating mini robots. She seems to try a gentle parenting. She's still fundie, but her children's childhood is a paradise comparing to Duggar's one.

I hate defending a fundie, but critizising her for that picture is too much. Maybe I'm seeing the picture as a mother, and my hormones are active, but I would love to have that couple chubbies right now at home (my kids are former chubby babies haha).

Was it Jessa that posted something about Charlotte Mason too? I've read her books and she was a big advocate for letting kids just play, gentle learning, and loads of outdoor time. This is great considering the alternative. 

[kmachete14]

I don't disagree that the picture is 100% normal, and that cute naked babies are nothing to sexualize and that siblings see each other in a state of undress at that age, but I do think some people are kidding themselves when they say toddlers aren't sexual. 

Many toddlers learn to "touch" themselves and know that the genital area can be a source of pleasure and comfort. They can be curious about male and female genitalia.

Around the age of Spurgeon, my cousins and I engaged in sexual curiosity ("I'll show you mine. . .") that later developed into sexual play, and from my perspective, abuse. I have clear memories of this even though I was around 3 years old (I'm 26 now). 

I have long suspected one of my cousins must have been sexually abused or exposed to sexual content somehow that led him to carry that "play" out so far at such a young age. 

I don't think you can write off toddlers as 100% asexual. I don't have a source, but I also think this is supported in studies. 

In no way do I think Jessa's photo is indicative of any abuse or anything I just said above.

[Bobology]

15 hours ago, Curious said:

I have heard of keifer, but never tried it.   I like buttermilk so if it's that texture and taste I could manage it, but I have texture issues and "thick" drinks, for the most part, are a no go for me.   I'm looking for something to help with inflammation though. Is that one of it's uses?

While I can't speak specifically to inflammation benefits, I will say that overall, consuming kefir over the past 2 years has been beneficial to me. The two most notable differences in my life have been significantly reduced viruses and a significant reduction in allergies. The reduction in allergy symptoms includes hay fever-type allergies and my atopic dermatitis (eczema) which is a product of inflammation.

My quite elderly mom has always loved buttermilk (I've never tried it) and she says the kefir I make is akin to it in taste and texture.

After dozens or perhaps hundreds of hours of reading before I started the kefir, I decided to forego the bottled grocery store kind and the powdered kind of starter. I purchased some real 'grains' from a goat milk lady in Wisconsin or somewhere in that area of the US. It takes a while to get it going, and a while to get the hang of it, but other than my initial purchase of the grains, the only on-going cost is the whole milk I use. I have just recently started experimenting with over-fermentation and separating the curds from the whey and consuming them that way. There are benefits to all of it.

Thank you, Jessa, for using the word 'kefir' in one of your posts back then.

[Glasgowghirl]

I personally wouldn't post it online but I wouldn't slam those who do either. Jessa probably took a picture thought it was a cute pic and posted it without thinking too much about it. I definitely didn't see anything alarming or link it to abuse and I certainly didn't think I better unfollow her for it.

[patsymae]

Sorry, I can't believe a pic of two babies in diapers is an issue. Yikes.

[adidas]

I ferment my own kefir and was only thinking this morning that I need to give some grains away. It’s a pity I can’t send them to the US otherwise I’d share them.

I do a second ferment to make chai kefir, it’s delicious.

[Curious]

On 7/29/2019 at 1:55 PM, Jinder Roles said:

Hearing about bottle feeding makes me feel better. I really want a breast reduction/lift and would not be able to breastfeed afterwards. 

I’ve mentioned it to a few people and some have made it seem like I’m putting my future hypothetical baby in danger. 

But there’s no way I could live with these boobs for 8-10 more years. And if they’re this big now, I can’t imagine the size after pregnancy. 

I had zero desire to breastfeed for whatever reason.  My kids were both bottle fed from day one and they have managed to become productive members of society, despite the horrible parenting fail of mine.   I felt/feel zero guilt for my decision.

My DiL really wanted to breastfeed and it has not been an easy road for her, but things are better now.  At the beginning, I was afraid people were giving her a lot of flack for continuing to try when it was going pretty poorly so at one point I told her that if she felt like it was getting to be too much not to feel guilty about going to the bottle and not to listen to anyone trying to guilt her into continuing (she was a real trooper and was going to lactation consults a couple of times a week after having a c-section).

She told me actually it was the opposite and people were telling her to just give up and go with a bottle.  I was surprised by that.  She said, "you know its kind of given me more incentive to stick with it and make it work."

ok then!

[Curious]

On 7/31/2019 at 6:42 AM, raspberrymint said:

I'll find out if I'm pregnant within a week.  I don't want to breastfeed because my goddaughter breastfed and she was mean about it.  ? 

She punched her mother's boobs all the time.  Meanwhile her mother is scared that because she isn't breastfeeding anymore, they won't be bonded.  Baby's about nine months old.

I really can't breastfeed much anyway even if I did want to because of the nature of my work (long hours).

Overworrying about bonding seems futile to me.  I can't be the parent that's home the most anyway, and from what I've seen, the parent that's home the least is the one that the kids prefer.

I don't know that this is always true.  I had just started college when I got pregnant with my son.  He was in NICU shortly after birth due to having pneumonia and we were told it would be better to keep him out of daycare as long as possible because he may end up having lung problems and being around a bunch of other little germ machines would likely make him ill a lot more than if he was home.

So his father and I arranged our schedules such that one of us was always home with him.  I had school, work-study and a job where his father had a job (fast food) that allowed for some variance in scheduling so we were able to make it work.   His dad was definitely home more with him, but he was still very bonded to me (probably because I wasn't there all the time.  I can be high strung   )

I loved the time I was with him and sometimes he'd just sit on my lap and we'd watch Blue's Clues ad Infinitum (I hate that show now).  

He had a whole bunch of really strange notions of what parenthood was going to be like.  I tried to gently suggest that those things were probably not going to work out the way he had them planned and he said: "that's what everyone says."   Now that the baby is here, he's found out he can handle stuff he thought he wouldn't be able to and he's super hands on.   I don't think we've talked on the phone once since she's arrived where he hasn't said, "I have to go, need to change a diaper!"  

[Kak]

On 10/4/2019 at 8:33 AM, Melissa1977 said:

Finally, I saw the picture. 2 beautiful, happy babies. Big baby loving little baby sister.

For those who see something weird in that picture. Please. When parents have little kids, those kids are bathed together, see siblings using the toilet, kiss each other, hit each other, etc. It's normal and has no connection with any kind of eventual abuse.

Jessa does not keep her kids sweating under several layers or clothes. Lets them play. She isn't creating mini robots. She seems to try a gentle parenting. She's still fundie, but her children's childhood is a paradise comparing to Duggar's one.

I hate defending a fundie, but critizising her for that picture is too much. Maybe I'm seeing the picture as a mother, and my hormones are active, but I would love to have that couple chubbies right now at home (my kids are former chubby babies haha).

What you say is definitely true of "normal" or non-fundie people. It's surprising to me at least to see Jessa being so "normal" in this way. 

I'd love a couple of wee chubby babies too, just for the afternoon. My babies are teens now, and although I love them to bits, I miss the baby stage.

[Curious]

On 8/14/2019 at 10:32 AM, Bobology said:

I also read something about this 28-29 years ago when my oldest was 5-6 years old. I took it too strictly, or did it incorrectly/didn't follow my instincts and when she was in middle school she asked me once why I didn't tell her how proud of her I was more often. I agree that kids need to be proud of themselves instead of or in addition to it coming from parents, and they definitely need to learn that they do things and help people because that's just what we do. Apparently I took it too far. I explained myself to her and all was OK.

With her son (I'm the nanny) I've kept this lesson in mind and have tried more balancing with the praise and my words. One thing in particular I have encouraged is his coming up with ideas to answer his own questions and wonderings. He can come up with some doozies along with quite plausible explanations for things, and he is proud of himself for it. I choose to believe it is helping him to think creatively about situations. 

I had an ok childhood relatively speaking.  I wasn't beaten.  I had food and shelter.  Only child so I suppose you could say I was spoiled, but I honestly tried not to take advantage of that privilege.  I babysat to make my own spending money and had a job at 15, etc.   I knew if I *really* wanted something within reason and didn't have the money for it, I could ask for it and most likely get it, but again tried to be responsible.

I got a fuckton of emotional abuse though and that didn't do me any favors.  I ended up cutting my parents out of my life after my second kid was about 18 months old because I saw them starting to talk to him like they had to me and I wasn't having it.

My goal was basically not to do what my parents did, some of which was just carelessness, not actual intent to be mean to me.

My son is way more responsible than I was at his age so he turned out ok despite my being very human.

On reading:  I love books and always had several books laying around in various states of being read.  My son also is an avid reader.  I was really pleased when they had their baby shower and asked each person to bring a book in lieu of a card.  They encouraged people to write in the book as though it was the card so the baby would have nice keepsakes.   They are going to need a new house because we both buy ALL. THE. BOOKS. for her.    We are to the point now we need to start making a list or we are likely going to start duplicating.

Since I am not local and can't travel (and don't expect them to travel with a baby) we are going to start doing video chats when she is a few months older and one of the things I plan to do is read to her.  I'm ridiculously excited about being able to do that.

[Curious]

On 8/14/2019 at 4:51 PM, allthegoodnamesrgone said:

I'm still not ready to be grandma. 1 year 2 weeks & 2 days until I turn 50 then I will start bugging my kids.  Or not, they are too young have have kids, they will be 3 months shy of 23 and the little one will be 20 1/2.   I'll just play with my step nephew  and niece. 

When I hit 50 I was SO ready to be a grandma.  My son got "lucky" and inherited a bit of the zebra from me so he's had some various health issues, including a bad spine (his dad had a bad spine as well, but we didn't know that before we had him or I might have reconsidered kids period) and he wasn't sure he even wanted bio kids.    I promised them I wouldn't be one of those crazy mothers/mothers-in-law that nagged about kids, but I did ask if I made crocheted or handmade things would they use them.  They both enthusiastically said yes and thus the "hypothetical grandchild" was born. 

I spent a year making stuff and putting it in the "hypothetical grandchild" storage box.  I never talked to them about it.  If I saw neutral yarn I liked I'd get it and make something and toss it in the box.     So when they told me last Christmas they were expecting, I already had a bunch of stuff ready to send them.  I did wait until my DIL was past the first trimester just because I know it would have been hard on me to have a box of baby stuff and then have something happen and no baby.

I was going through a bag of yarn to see what I had in it and found several outfits that just needed buttons or some other little finishing that I never got around to and now are too small for the baby so a hypothetical grandchild #2 box has been started

[Curious]

On 8/15/2019 at 6:09 AM, Someone Out There said:

Yup, my understanding is that reading to little kids when their young is more about increasing their vocabulary  than anything else (when their a little older they may prefer them with more pictures I  don't know).  So you could potentially just read out loud whatever you're reading for yourself.  Podcasts also could expand the childs vocabulary.  That being said, apparently young kids don't filter the different noises very well so it's best not to have too many competing noises (particularly when talking to them).

I read somewhere when I was pregnant it didn't matter what you read as long as you read.  I was in college when I got pregnant (thank you universe with a sense of humor) so I would read textbooks, newspapers, etc out loud until my son was old enough to appreciate picture books and really understand the stories.

[Curious]

On 8/15/2019 at 8:48 AM, VelociRapture said:

gives us a break from Disney or Toddler songs

My son will be 26 next month.   I am currently singing a Timmy the Tooth song in my head. 

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

2 hours ago, Curious said:

My son will be 26 next month.   I am currently singing a Timmy the Tooth song in my head. 

My son will be 22 next month, and DH & I will still watch Bugs Life (DS's favorite), or Lilo & Stitch, Monsters Inc etc...

I was looking at baby pics last night and found a photo of my kids at almost the exact same age as Henry and Ivy. Henry & Ivy are 28 moths apart and my kids are 27 months apart. DS is sitting on our couch in a diaper and holding DD who is also just in a diaper, she's is about 4 months old so he is 2 1/2.  It's an adorable photo, of her kids & mine. 

 

On 10/5/2019 at 4:44 AM, Curious said:

I had zero desire to breastfeed for whatever reason.  My kids were both bottle fed from day one and they have managed to become productive members of society, despite the horrible parenting fail of mine.   I felt/feel zero guilt for my decision.

My DiL really wanted to breastfeed and it has not been an easy road for her, but things are better now.  At the beginning, I was afraid people were giving her a lot of flack for continuing to try when it was going pretty poorly so at one point I told her that if she felt like it was getting to be too much not to feel guilty about going to the bottle and not to listen to anyone trying to guilt her into continuing (she was a real trooper and was going to lactation consults a couple of times a week after having a c-section).

She told me actually it was the opposite and people were telling her to just give up and go with a bottle.  I was surprised by that.  She said, "you know its kind of given me more incentive to stick with it and make it work."

ok then

I wanted to breastfeed, badly, but I'm  one of the small percentage of women who do not lactate, so no milk, I had to bottle feed. After dealing with the eminence guilt of not breastfeeding, feeling bad that I wasn't doing the best thing for my child, and I was in some way harming him by taking "the easy way out" as I'd been told by mommy shaming breastfeeding nazi's who looked down on me. Never mind that I COULDN'T breastfeed, as they said "everyone can you just didn't try hard enough". The same with having a c/section.  Once I flipped my shit on one particularly uppity woman who figured she was perfect, when I told her that I could have delivered my son vaginally if I'd waited another 2 or 3 days for him to die and shrivel up in utero, but I opted for the easy way and had a c/section, I and I guess I could have breastfed until he died of starvation because after 3 weeks of nursing and pumping and nursing and pumping and nursing and pumping and my milk STILL hadn't come I should have just let him die of starvation, as that would have been best for him.  That pretty much shut her up and kind of humiliated her as I did it in a group of women, and I told them all that I wanted a natural child birth and I wanted to breastfeed but I couldn't and really didn't need nasty bitches judging me and making me feel worse about having to bottle feed, and knowing that I was never going to have a vaginal birth due to messed up internal body structure. I told them that I was lucky that my son was born when he was, because had he been born 100 years earlier we both would have died in childbirth, so if my c/section was "the easy way out" then I'm glad I took it, it beat the hell out of dying at 27. 

Long winded as usual, but my bottle feeding didn't hinder my bonding with my babies. I only worked full time for about 6 months after DS was born and was a SAHM from the time DS was 18 months old until DD was 7.  I was home the most with my kids and DH worked fulltime, now DS loved it when daddy came home, DD did as well but both of them were total mamas kids, they still are. 

[EmmieJ]

I say this every time the topic of breast v. bottle comes up:  I have 7 siblings.  We were all bottle fed.  We all bonded very strongly with our mother.  I breast fed my son exclusively his first 3months, then when I went back to work, combo of breast/bottle, then exclusively bottle by age 6 months.  We bonded strongly as well.  Most important:  love and feed your baby however works best for you.

[Thorns]

After reading the stories of kids being labeled as delayed in reading comprehension because they were bored, I finally figured out that that was me also! I was a voracious reader in school, and I've always remembered the early reading as being really boring. My Mother though says the opposite, that I was a bit slow. I find the "too advanced" being a plausible (and ego-stroking) alternative

[JesSky03]

On 10/5/2019 at 4:44 AM, Curious said:

I had zero desire to breastfeed for whatever reason.  My kids were both bottle fed from day one and they have managed to become productive members of society, despite the horrible parenting fail of mine.   I felt/feel zero guilt for my decision.

My DiL really wanted to breastfeed and it has not been an easy road for her, but things are better now.  At the beginning, I was afraid people were giving her a lot of flack for continuing to try when it was going pretty poorly so at one point I told her that if she felt like it was getting to be too much not to feel guilty about going to the bottle and not to listen to anyone trying to guilt her into continuing (she was a real trooper and was going to lactation consults a couple of times a week after having a c-section).

She told me actually it was the opposite and people were telling her to just give up and go with a bottle.  I was surprised by that.  She said, "you know its kind of given me more incentive to stick with it and make it work."

ok then!

I do think the pendulum can swing too far towards bottle feeding sometimes. I think most reasonable people are coming around to fed is best, but if a woman is saying she wants to breastfeed then she deserves support to continue that journey as long as she wants. I see it all the time on mom forums where a breastfeeding mom hits a road bump and is asking for advice and there's always several people chiming in that she should just quit and switch to formula and her life will be so much easier. There is absolutely nothing wrong with formula/bottle feeding, but if someone is saying they want to continue breastfeeding and are looking for advice or just support on how to make it happen then don't just tell them they should quit.  I mean nobody is going to tell a bottle/formula feeding mom that they should give up and find a wetnurse if they can't find the right formula for their baby's digestive tract or if baby is being picky about bottles. 

*Not singling you out @Curious, what you said to your DIL was fine and it sounds like you were being supportive. Just hits a nerve sometimes to see people telling a breastfeeding mom she should just quit. I'm so glad nobody was in my ear telling me to give up when I started out with my son. The first 6 weeks were incredibly painful and I was in tears at some points but we stuck it out and I ended up loving breastfeeding until my son weaned at close to 16 months. 

[Curious]

5 hours ago, JesSky03 said:

*Not singling you out @Curious, what you said to your DIL was fine and it sounds like you were being supportive. Just hits a nerve sometimes to see people telling a breastfeeding mom she should just quit. I'm so glad nobody was in my ear telling me to give up when I started out with my son. The first 6 weeks were incredibly painful and I was in tears at some points but we stuck it out and I ended up loving breastfeeding until my son weaned at close to 16 months. 

I'm not going to go back and see what I said, but if I gave the impression I was not supportive of my DIL breastfeeding, I'm sorry.  I was very supportive of her doing what she felt was right.  My concern was her mother and sister are very strong personalities and tend to kind of run over my DIL sometimes.   Since she was pregnant she has actually gotten a lot more opinionated which is good for her when it comes to her family.

My concern was her having them in her ear constantly, making her feel guilty because breastfeeding wasn't going very well and they were doing a lot of bottle feeding.  I just wanted her to know that IF it got to be too much not to feel guilty about it not working out.

She worked really hard and saw the lactation consultant for a few weeks and now she is breastfeeding during the day.  The baby is a very slow nurser so she pumps and they use bottles at night so she can actually get some sleep.  They can't co-sleep because my son has sleep issues that make it dangerous to have her in bed.  So they take turns getting up at night to bottle feed her.   Apparently, she will just suck a bottle right down, but she lazes around on the breast.

I'm happy she has been able to work it out because the birth did not turn out at all as they would have liked, unfortunately.  She was induced on a Monday at 7:30am (for health reasons) and ended up with a c-section at 2:45am on Thursday

[potato]

Well this sure is something: