“Cover up”: Mum branded as “disgusting” for breastfeeding her four-month-old baby
A Melbourne woman has been on the receiving end of verbal abuse in front of her children after she attempted to breast feed her son.
Ashley Rogers was at a local café with her seven-year-old daughter and infant son when he needed to be fed.
The 30-year-old “carefully” picked a location in the shopping centre café “away from crowds”, as she stood near a secluded area that was covered by a wall.
It didn’t take long for a man, who was standing 10 metres away, to start yelling, but oblivious to what was happening, Ms Rogers turned away.
“I started to breastfeed my son while my daughter and I were ordering food and that’s when I heard the man yelling,” she told news.com.au.
“As I met with his eyes, he looked at me straight and said, ‘You’re disgusting, cover up, I can see your t**s’,” she said.
Completely taken aback by the harsh words, the mother-of-three confronted the man and said, “Excuse me? I told him, ‘I am feeding my goddamn son’, but he just kept repeating what he said, telling me how ‘disgusting’ I am.”
According to Ms Rogers, the man would have had to pay very close attention to see if she was breastfeeding as she was hidden behind a wall and wearing a large puffer jacket.
Her daughter was also sitting directly opposite to her, obscuring the public’s vision.
“It was horrible, I am not going to lie. People were just staring in shock too,” she said.
“By that stage these three beautiful women flocked to me and put their arms around me and kissed me on the forehead.
“The moment they asked if I was OK, I just burst into tears.”
The experience inspired Ms Rogers to start a blog called The Milk Mum to help support other mums who have been criticised for feeding in public.