We mums would got to the ends of the earth for our little ones, and given just how hard and stress-inducing this can be, a little sympathy is sometimes all we need.

 

Unfortunately, this was not the case recently for Vanessa Kasten Urano, a breastfeeding mother whose airport experience will make you groan with sympathy.

 

In a message posted to Delta Airline’s Facebook page, Vanessa explained how she recently had to work away from her four-month-old and three-year-old daughters. She went on to spend 18 days pumping breast milk in order to maintain a supply for her youngest child, and she kept the milk in packages in a freezer.

 

After contacting Delta’s customer service regarding how to bring the supply on the plane, she was told to “pack it with dry ice in a cooler and check it at baggage claim”.

 

Dear Delta,I am a mother to a four month and a three year old daughter. I spent the last eighteen days away from my...

Posted by Vanessa Kasten Urango on Saturday, December 19, 2015

 

Having gone to the effort of buying the dry ice and specific containers for transporting the milk, you can imagine Vanessa’s reaction when she was told she would have to pay $150 to transport the milk – and the operator had ‘no idea’ how to handle it.

 

“He acted irritated by it, and got two other agents involved. To say they were rude and completely lacking empathy is an understatement. Long story short, they told me I could not take the breast milk on the plane because they couldn’t weigh the dry ice…and because I didn’t have the proper sticker on it to show it contained dry ice,” she wrote.

 

Faced with the likelihood of having to dump her milk, Vanessa broke down and was ‘rescued’ by some kind airport security officers. After throwing the ice out, she resigned herself to bringing the milk on board as carry-on and risking it becoming spoiled during the journey.

 

“Who knows if it will even still be frozen when I arrive home in eight hours; which basically means two weeks’ worth of breast milk will have to be thrown away. I wasted so much time and money for nothing. Thanks so much to your staff for their complete lack of compassion for a tired mom who really just wants to get home to her babies,” she wrote while waiting for the plane to take off.

 

While updates on the post reveal that Delta have apologised to Vanessa and given her a voucher, she has admitted that she is horrified by some of the similar stories other parents have shared with her.

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