Amy Hart hits back at mum-shamers in a bid to 'reassure other parents'

07 October 2023 , 15:09

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Love Island’s Amy Hart defends how she feeds Stanley after mum-shaming comments (Image: amyhartxo/Instagram)

Love Island star Amy Hart has hit back at trolls who have criticised her parenting skills, after being bombarded with messages shaming her decision to use traditional weaning for her baby.

The 31-year-old, best known for starring on Season 5 of the ITV2 reality series in 2019, welcomed son Stanley with boyfriend Sam Rason in March, much to the excitement of her loyal fanbase. Amy has since shared a number of updates about her motherhood journey, regularly taking to Instagram to post milestones from the adorable tot's first year and cute snaps of family life with her entrepreneurial partner.

Unfortunately, former flight attendant Amy's openness about her parenting has also exposed her to huge amounts of criticism. The Sussex native spoke up on Saturday about a complaint she's received now multiple times, in the hope of setting the record straight once and for all.

Amy Hart has defended her decision to use traditional weaning with Stanley (amyhartxo/Instagram)

Amy Hart welcomed Stanley in March (@amyhartxo/Instagram)

"This isn't anti-BLW [baby-led weaning] rhetoric," she said as a disclaimer at the beginning of a recent Instagram video. "It's just I'm doing traditional weaning and I get so many messages saying, 'No, you need to do baby led weaning.'

Amy then said that some of her followers had warned her that Stanley would never develop "motor skills", "be able to feed himself properly" or "get his pins to grab" unless she followed baby led weaning. Advocates of this feeding method, which involves teaching babies to feed themselves by offering them a selection of solid finger foods to choose from, argue that it can help the infant practice fine motor skills and build healthy eating habits.

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Amy has hit back at these comments, insisting that the technique is "not for me" and that it doesn't fit into her family. She then explained that Stanley had just eaten "eggy bread" without her assistance, proving that traditional weaning doesn't necessarily inhibit the baby's motor skills development.

"I didn't feed him. He fed himself," she revealed, before adding that the six-month-old had even dropped a piece of the toast on his bib and picked it up himself. Amy also said she hopes that by sharing her positive experience with traditional weaning, it will "reassure other mums" that baby-led weaning isn't the only option for encouraging hand-eye co-ordination at mealtimes.

Elsewhere in the message, she admitted that she had mistakenly thought baby-led weaning was simply 'eating with your hands' and was unaware that it completed excluded the offered of pureed foods.

This isn't the first time that Amy has been unfairly targeted by online haters for her parenting choices. The reality TV icon also suffered backlash shortly after giving birth to Stanley over her feeding plan, after revealing that she was willing to explore other options if it wasn't possible for her to breastfeed.

Emma Dooney