When my older twin daughters were just a couple of months old, I, then a new, inexperienced dad, would get up at night to make them formula, and one of my worst nightmares from that period was the fear of making a mistake in dosing or overheating the bottles when I thawed them. In warm water, of course.
As we can see, not all dads actually follow doctors' instructions or their wives' advice when it comes to feeding or caring for their babies. So, user u/Alternative_Site_368, returning from maternity leave, insistently asked her husband not to heat the breast milk for their 3-month-old daughter in the microwave... only to have the man ignore all of her advice...
More info: Reddit
The author of the post is a new mom who recently returned to work after her maternity leave
Image credits: erstudio / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The author's husband stayed at home to take care of their 3-month-old daughter
Image credits: Alternative_Site_368
Image credits: The Yuri Arcurs Collection / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The mom made a frozen stash of her breastmilk and asked her husband not to microwave it
Image credits: Alternative_Site_368
Image credits: EyeEm / Freepik (not the actual photo)
However, after returning home, the author found out that her spouse had blatantly neglected her words
Image credits: Alternative_Site_368
The mom flipped out at him, but the guy tried to prove that he allegedly did a study about microwaving breastmilk—and found out that it's okay to do so
So, the Original Poster (OP) recently went back to work after maternity leave, leaving her husband to take care of their 3-month-old daughter. The caring mom pumped a lot of breast milk ahead of time, creating a special stash of frozen milk for her husband to make it easier for him to feed the baby.
Our heroine reminded the spouse several times that he should never microwave the milk, explaining to him all the reasons why the Centers for Disease Control gives such advice. The husband nodded his head in agreement—but when the OP returned home from work, she found that he had ignored her words, and instead microwaved the bottle every time.
The mom was incredibly indignant and flipped out at the hapless dad, but instead of admitting his mistake, he began to argue with her—and with the CDC recommendations as well. According to the guy’s words, he specifically Googled the issue and allegedly found many resources indicating that microwaving does nothing bad to breast milk.
It all ended in a big argument, during which the original poster directly accused her husband of disrespecting her and her words, as well as trying to harm their daughter's health. He, in turn, took offense at her ‘overreacting,’ and now the couple are not on speaking terms. And the devastated mom also decided to take it online to vent.
Image credits: Timur Weber / Pexels (not the actual photo)
"In fact, there are three main reasons why it is absolutely not recommended to heat breast milk in the microwave," says Iryna Stasiuk, an expert in syndromic therapy from Odesa, Ukraine, who Bored Panda asked for a comment here. "First, microwave radiation and heat destroy the structure of proteins in milk, depriving it of those unique beneficial properties for the baby that it actually has.
"Secondly, if the milk is heated too much—and this cannot be avoided with microwaving—the beneficial living microflora may also vanish. Accordingly, this may cause dysbacteriosis for the baby. And last but not least, the baby сan just be burned—because the milk is heated unevenly. Or it will simply curdle from overheating.
"In addition, as far as I understand, this dad put the baby bottle directly in the microwave. And if the bottle is made of plastic, then under the influence of microwaving, carcinogens may also get into the milk. So the mother's sharp reaction here is absolutely justified," Iryna sums up.
The commenters, of course, massively supported the mom, claiming that her husband behaved 100% disrespectfully and also endangered the health of their child. And, by and large, for him, as the responders believe, it was more important to prove he was right than to worry about his daughter's well-being. “He could’ve made your baby sick or worse,” someone added. So, do you also agree with this mom and the folks here?
Most commenters unanimously supported the author, claiming that her spouse actually behaved disrespectfully and neglectfully here
