I saw this debate on face book last night. Thought it was be interesting to see what you Lushies think.

Babysitting mom breastfeends friend's baby

I left my son with a friend of mine who is also breast feeding, i left a bottle of breast milk for him, I was only gone for about an hour. She said she couldn't get him to stop crying so she breast fed him, would you be pissed or am I over exaggerating?

I didn't read all of the responses, but most follow the them that... if the woman was trustworthy enough to babysit, then she's ok to have breastfed the baby. But that the babysitter should/could have called first.

another person said... " Donor milk comes from screened women. You never really know a person. People ask before they give your kids soda, candy, nuts etc so why wouldn't she call to ask could she put her boob in your kids mouth."

There are some mentions of Wet Nurses, but those women are usually screened these days.

What say you Lush? How would you react if someone nursed your child? Ok, since the child needed it? Or out of bounds?

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When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser. Socrates

In my opinion, it would be fine if a babysitter did that for my child. In fact, that might even be one of the things I would ask for the women. If my child refused the bottle but still needed to eat, it would be better if it would have the breast milk from another person then starve.

Not an overreaction. I'd be creeped out at the least, and possibly irate, if this had happened to me and my kid. It's just not something you do without talking about it first. To say nothing of the possible allergy complications. Women whose children have food intolerances and allergies work very heard to eliminate those things from their diet, only to have it undone by an unwitting (and unauthorized) "wetnurse".

I'm not a mother but if I had a kid, I'd be beyond mad if someone did that. First of all, you don't know what health issues the woman might have and just passed onto your baby (AIDS, for example). Also, depending on what she's eaten, she could be handing back a baby that's going to be colicky the whole night or have an unexplainable allergic reaction. Thirdly, if there is a break in the skin or something (as is common in the nipples of breast feeding women), she could have given the baby a blood borne diaease as well. If the mother had left a bottle for the kid, the other woman had no reason to breastfeed her baby. Plus, she was only gone an hour, the kid wasn't going to have time starve.

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I just can't imagine

I would see nothing wrong with that, provided there was good reason to breastfeed someone else's baby. To answer the original question; the baby crying and not stopping hardly qualifies as reason enough to breastfeed it if it's not yours. However, it really depends on each persons point of view and I dont think there can be a 'general rule' regarding this issue.

If I'm not mistaken, up until the niddle ages (maybe a little after that too) there were women who would be charged with nursing the baby of the households they were working in.

My first impulse is to say that it's fine to breastfeed someone else's baby. Women have been doing that since the species got started. Sprite has a good point though. The woman's health history makes a difference. It would have been better if she hadn't breastfed without permission. She should have gotten in touch with the baby's mother first to get her okay.

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I am a whore. Find something else to fight about. - Nell Gwyn (to her coachman, who was fighting a man for calling her a whore)

I would be really upset! Not only the physical worries surrounding breastfeeding someone else's child, but a lot if not all mothers see this as a bonding time for mom and baby.

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I'd be upset. It's like having someone else kiss your kid's cut better. Sure, it seems harmless, but it's still someone else's bodily fluids coming into direct and intimate contact with your child without your consent. Unless the nurse had prior consent, I think she's out of line to breastfeed someone else's child.

I breast feed all three of my babies.. and loved every single minute... for someone to invade that connection would be hurtful...personally my baby wouldn't be away from me if he or she couldn't take my milk from a bottle and second if i was gone longer then stated and didn't leave enough milk. i would hope they would try boiled but cooled water....i would not want my child to stave but this is the one thing that only i can do for my child and therefore is my most important privilege to my baby at this time of his or her life.

Nothing new here. Wet nurses and willing moms have fed others for centuries. In the old south the black maids often nursed their white baby charges. Americans are so backward when it comes to breasts and their function.

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Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy.

Exactly. NO that is not okay.......WOW............

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To me this is not okay. Breastfeeding is a time for a mother and her child to bond. I know I wouldn't want my child (which at the moment I'm not a mother) to bond in a similar way with someone else. I would be more than happy to leave a ton of breast milk in a bottle for whoever were to watch my child but I would be highly mad for someone else to do it. There are so many other things that the woman could have done to calm the baby down, breastfeeding wasn't one of them.

Hell No this is not ok!
This is purely a gut response. Breast feeding is a very intimate thing that we share with our children, to have a baby sitter perform this task sets all my mothering instincts on high alert. I'm not sure why exactly, but it does. It makes me quite territorial. My baby, my duty, mine.

The risk of disease or allergic reaction aside, there is no way I would want anyone breast feeding any of my children unless we were in a situation that desperately required it. My best friend and I had this discussion many years ago while we were breast feeding our children and we both had the same response. We would do it only in an emergency.
It's pointless bringing up that in past generations the rich used wet nurses to feed their children. Different times. We have formula now if a mother chooses or is unable to breast feed her children and the social mores of the time have well and truly changed.
It's seems extremely irresponsible of the babysitter to do this without a phone call and to be honest I would be beyond furious if this occurred

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I think the baby sitter should always receive the mother's consent beforehand. Also, HIV can be passed on through breast milk so that's something big to consider.