Haylie Duff is 31 now, she’s engaged to her baby’s father, a guy named Matt Rosenberg whom US describes as an entrepreneur, and she has a 15 month-old baby daughter named Ryan. (I know Ryan as primarily a boy’s name but I’ve learned that it’s one of those names that can be interchangeable.) In case you’re wondering who she is, she’s the older sister of Hilary Duff, she was around much more when she was single, and she seems like a sweet person with only a mild amount of hustle. Haylie runs a cooking blog called The Real Girl’s Kitchen, she put a cookbook out in 2013, and she has shows on The Cooking Channel including a new one coming up called Haylie Duff’s America. As part of promotion, she spoke to US Magazine about the mommy wars, including the judgment and questions about whether women chose to nurse their babies.
Haylie Duff has a parent peeve. “All my friends have tiny little babies right now and when you go to a birthday party, the dads will be like, ‘What a beautiful baby! Are you breast-feeding?’” the mom of 15-month-old daughter Ryan tells Us Weekly. “I’m like, ‘That’s not a normal question. That’s not an OK question.”’
The Real Girls Kitchen star, who is engaged to entrepreneur Matt Rosenberg, nursed Ryan exclusively for nearly seven months, until a bout with food poisoning wiped out her milk supply. “That was awful. It was really hard for me,” Duff reveals. “I finally gave her a bottle of [Similac] … and there was no turning back. You shouldn’t be ashamed to formula feed.”
She continued: “Moms do so much comparing. This one has a gluten-free kid and that one doesn’t. This one has a nanny and that one doesn’t. Everybody needs to lighten up. We’re all doing our best.”
The actress, whose sister is Younger star Hilary Duff, also opened up to Us about the guilt she felt while traveling the country for her new Cooking Channel series Haylie’s America (premieres Thursday, September 8, at 10 p.m.). “I couldn’t bring Ryan with me, and that was the hardest part,” she says. “But when I was sad … Matt would say to me, ‘Babe, you’re setting a good example as a woman that works. So that is what I tell myself when I’m leaving for the airport.”
She said that it’s the dads who ask but do the moms ask too or do they just know based on how they see a mom feeding her baby? I didn’t feel this much pressure from other moms (or dads) when I had my baby, but that was over ten years ago and I lived on the east coast. I suspect the mommy mafia has their base among the monied women in California, who have the resources and time to do everything “perfect” and make proclamations about how other women should raise their kids. It does seem too personal to ask someone whether they’re nursing or using formula, (unless it’s a close friend) and there’s an inherent judgment in that, like you are expected to make excuses if you’re using formula. That’s a personal choice as to what works for your family and it’s hard enough to raise a baby without dealing with other people’s b.s. judgement. Also, I really liked what her partner told her about how she’s setting a good example by being a working mom. He sounds very supportive.
Here’s a cute video Haylie posted to Instagram:
?? Best time celebrating Beau! @jamielynnsigler
A video posted by haylieduff (@haylieduff) on Aug 21, 2016 at 7:03pm PDT
A photo posted by haylieduff (@haylieduff) on Aug 17, 2016 at 6:47am PDT
A photo posted by haylieduff (@haylieduff) on Aug 19, 2016 at 2:48pm PDT
A photo posted by haylieduff (@haylieduff) on Aug 9, 2016 at 6:26pm PDT
Leave a reply