How do you handle the non-AP advice you get??

[nktigger99]

I get a ton of non-AP advice from other MoMs....Schedules,Sleep training, propping bottles you name it.  It gets on my nerves...it is mainly online...but also from people IRL.   I joined our local MoMs support group and lordy be that is all the advice that I have ever gotten...even when I haven't even asked for it.  Also any message board I have tried to join about multiples it is plastered with non-AP advice...how do you handle that?  

I am just trying to find people I can relate to and who knows somewhat what I am going through...but it is hard...I feel like I can't win for losing...I am too AP for some places but then I am not AP enough for others(like here)...because of choices I have made...mainly FFing.  I feel like if you FF on MDC then most people see you as a non-AP parent no matter how you go about it and any other thing you do as a parent. 

I feel like me FFing sets me apart from other AP parents(in their eyes not mine) even though we Bottle feed with love and always on demand...we let the boys chose their own schedule ever day just like when I was BFing my other children.  We do not prop bottles and I do not see myself as a lazy parent just because I FF my kids...I don't know how in the world you can be a mom of mulitples and be lazy...lordy be it is a lot of hard work 24/7 no matter how you feed them.   

[annettemarie]

This happens a lot in my MoMs group, too. I think part of it is just the area-- there isn't a whole lot of AP going on around here-- and then of course, there are just the realities of life with twins. There are some AP/NFL practices I have had to give up due to my circumstances, but I would prefer those be my choices that come from my life and not because other people feel the need to foist them on me.

So, I guess I handle it like I would handle any unsolicited advice-- I smile and nod and pass the bean dip,

I've also learned not to bring up things I don't want people to comment on, and I never ever complain about stuff I don't want to change. So I wouldn't complain about the babies waking up a lot at my moms' night out, because advice to let them CIO is only going to make me stabby, and I know it's the advice I'm going to get. If you don't want people to comment on you using formula, don't bring it up. If someone comments on it or gives unsolicited advice, that makes them the rude ones, not you. AP isn't a checklist, it's about relationships. If you don't make it a list of things you do and don't do and just focus instead on how fabulous your little ones are and how much you love them, that's what shines through, AP or mainstream.

Another strategy I adopted several children ago when people ask rude questions about stuff that's none of their business is to answer with "Why do you ask?" Usually people realize how rude and intrusive the question is when you throw that back at them.

[pitter_patter]

Don't worry, I FF my twins and they turned out fine.  The judgment about FF is so irritating!  I just smile and nod when I get advice that I would never in a million years even consider.  Depending on the person I might counter with more AP related suggestions, but for the random looky-loo at Costco who tells me I simply MUST do xyz I don't even bother with a rebuttal.

[Strong Mama]

How is FF lazy?its actually harder than breasfeeding! all those bottles to sterilise, etc. UGH. I FF and could care less what people say. I prop bottles sometimes when I have to, i am the only person here. My babies are HUGE and love to eat. Gotta do what I gotta do.

[lynsage]

If it's online, I don't respond. If it's in person, I say "Thanks, I'll think about it" unless it's something really egregious like spanking or circ in which case I'll just say "Thanks, but that doesn't work for us".

ETA: Sorry for thread crashing, I'm just a mom, not a MoM, but I think the advice is universal :)

[macandcheese]

Originally Posted by lynsage 

If it's online, I don't respond. If it's in person, I say "Thanks, I'll think about it" unless it's something really egregious like spanking or circ in which case I'll just say "Thanks, but that doesn't work for us".

Yeah, that.

I just have a single kid, but I saw this in the Recent Discussions list and it caught my eye. Relatively harmless stuff (like my neighbor's advice to give popsicles to my teething baby) gets met with "Oh, that's an interesting idea," or "That would be interesting to try." Advice that I consider harmful (like spanking and cio) get a more forceful, "We aren't comfortable with that," or, "We don't ____."

[Smurfette2]

What does AP mean? It wasn't until the twins were born that I got into these forums. My other kid is in her teens, back in the 90s the internet was still a baby and I learned most of the Mom-stuff on the job.

[annettemarie]

AP = attachment parenting.It and NFL (natural family living) is what this entire website is based on.

[ShanaV]

When it comes to multiples, we have to sacrifice some of our AP ideals. Fact. Compromise has to come somewhere because two babies at the same time =/= one baby at a time.

Just approach everything with complete confidence! You don't have to make any excuses. You've got twins to take care of, dammit!

[Jane93]

I think that for multiples, as with special needs kids, that a philosophy that seems to have many requirements for membership can be challenging to adhere to.   Sounds like you and I are in a similar spot -- there were a number of things that I couldn't do with twins that I otherwise would have liked to. 

Because of that, I have also learned to be a bit more flexible and experiment with some of the ideas that others suggest.  For example, we did on demand feeding for the first six months of the girls' lives, until the nanny started with us before I went back to work.   She really wanted to move them onto a schedule, so we did a two week trial and it worked wonderfully.  It actually felt more AP than on demand in the sense that we really worked the schedule around the girls' needs (and continue to fine-tune it on almost a monthly basis) so that we were actually anticipating their needs very effectively.  With on demand, I always felt reactive, that I was behind the 8 ball and if I somehow missed early signs of hunger the situation would get very bad, very quickly. 

[newmommy7-08]

 My usual response to unsolicited advise is - that's not something I'm comfortable with, or that doesn't work for us. I've found it's important to always present a like minded front in regards to my DH and I otherwise his mainstream family will lecture him and then give me attitude when they follow up w/ me to see how their idea panned out. DH is good at just letting it go in one ear and out the other thankfully. As a PP said I try hard NOT to complain to mainstream moms about the things that are driving me crazy. Reality w/ twins... especially w/ twins and an older toddler is that some of my AP ideals have been tossed out the window. We didn't bedshare w/ the twins because DS was still in our room and because I wasn't comfortable w/ 2 babies in bed with us, tho we did room share until they were 6 months old. If they wake up they do come to bed w/ us... but if i can get them sleeping solidly I take them right back to their crib. (Sleeping w/ them is destroying my hips and back from the way I lay.) We FF'd and I wouldn't have kept my sanity otherwise. The first few weeks they nursed for 1 - 1/2 hours a piece every 2-3 hours. Which meant nursing practically round the clock. I couldn't do for my toddler or for myself. We started ffing at night early on so that I could at least get sleep and when DH went back to work it was next to impossible because I couldn't make tandem work on my own and I would wind up letting one of them scream so I could nurse the other... We did nurse one bottle the other for a while, but by 4 months I completely gave it up because it was that or my sanity.

[Red Pajama]

I found that I could find more in common with moms in general, than looking for a moms of multiples club. We just didn't fit.

[LittleOsMom]

Originally Posted by ShanaV 

When it comes to multiples, we have to sacrifice some of our AP ideals. Fact. Compromise has to come somewhere because two babies at the same time =/= one baby at a time.

Just approach everything with complete confidence! You don't have to make any excuses. You've got twins to take care of, dammit!

Yup.  I think you just have to do what works best for you and your kids and the rest of them be damned.  I've found I'm really beating myself up a lot about not being able to do for two what I did for one, and it's mostly because I'm not able to do a lot of the AP stuff I'd like to do.  Give up the idea that I have to be AP, and I know that I'm doing what's best for all 3 of my kids.   Sleep has been a complete disaster for us, and cosleeping was just NOT going to work (one on each side, only two boobs to go around, and no extensions to reach their faces).  So I've just had to make myself be ok with it. 

I am probably one of the crunchiest people I've met in our MoMs group, and that's fine.  I still enjoy talking to other twin Moms and hearing what they're doing/struggling with.  They have a perspective that singleton Moms just don't understand.  I just take what is useful and leave the rest.