Our society is obsessed with breast. Girls everywhere are showing them off and all the guys are looking. You can barely watch t.v. without a Victoria's Secret commercial pounding perfectly rounded and perky breast in your face. Or even walk through a mall for that matter. Women spend thousands of dollars every day in a plastic surgeon's office trying to make their breast look "perfect". So, why is it that our society is perfectly comfortable with all these images being thrown in our faces, but the second a nursing mom breast feeds her child in public, she gets ridiculed?
When my husband and I found out we were pregnant in the fall of 2009, we hadn't been around a ton of nursing mothers. Neither of our Mom's nursed us and none of my friends (at that point) had nursed their babies long term. My sister nursed my niece for 6 weeks and then had to return to work, so I was able to see her nurse Charlotte a few times. That was the extent of my breast feeding experience. But, the second I found out I was pregnant, I knew I wanted to breast feed my baby for at least a full year. I knew my husband was on board, but I've been surprised at the lack of support I've had from society.
I've always been pretty modest with my body. I don't wear revealing clothes or skimpy outfits, and I sure don't think my body is perfect. But, I have come to think my breast are beautiful. And I don't mean because they're a perfect C cup, perky, and round....because God knows they ain't! And I'm not showing them off either! We all know that 9 times out of 10, you barely even see flesh when you're nursing your baby. But I do think they're beautiful because they are the gate to my child's nourishment. They are no longer used for sexy time...sorry Doug, you'll get them back one day...they now belong to Keegan. And he enjoys them a lot.
It took us a while to learn how to breast feed successfully. Now that I had mastered breast feeding at home, I was ready to take myself and Keegan out into the world. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be welcomed with open arms. The first sign I had that breast feeding would be difficult in public was when I went to buy nursing shirts. Other than Motherhood Maternity, there aren't very many options for an affordable price. Usually I ended up wearing the same things over and over again. And Lord knows I couldn't live without my nursing bras!! Those things are an investment, Ladies!!! Eventually I found things that I already had that was easy to nurse in....you can get very crafty! So, I overcame that hurdle.
Then came the next jump. Keegan was about 6 weeks old and I was ready to venture out shopping at the outlet mall. I normally would never go to the outlet mall, but I had a lot of baby stuff that needed returning and so I went. We were only there for about 10 minutes when it was time for Keegan to nurse. So, I found myself a nice bench in the open-air mall and sat down. Took Keegan out of my Moby wrap, opened up my new nursing shit, and latched him on. You would have thought I squatted and pee'd right in front of the GAP. I got so many looks and stares..like..."is she really doing that in public". I felt so ashamed I packed everything up and Keegan and I walked to the car and I nursed him there. It would be a while before I nursed in public again.
I have many more experience like that one that I could share with you, but I won't bore you. This is already a really long post, so I want to get to it. Basically, our society has seem to have lost touch with the most sustainable eating there is....breast feeding. It's a basic animal instinct that's one of the last things that reminds us that we're animals!! And even though breast feeding has become more common in the last 10 years or so, it's still hard for society to watch it. If a woman is out in public and breast feeds, she's too indiscreet. Is she breast feeds in front of men (other than her husband), she's being indecent. And if she breast feeds in a restaurant...my God, that's taboo! But we have no other options! There are very few public places and absolutely no restaurants that I've ever been to that give you a place to nurse. And hell no, I'm not sitting on the toilet while I feed my baby. You wouldn't want to eat in a bathroom, neither does Keegan. (But I've done it many times, shamefully.)
I've learned to have thick skin when I nurse in public. And sometimes, I'm welcomed with open arms from store owners or other patrons and it feels incredible. I was once at a restaurant with my family out on Folly beach when I needed to nurse Keegan. There were tons of people around and I didn't want to make anyone uncomfortable so I went to the bathroom. I stood in the corner and nursed Keegan....I was so ashamed. I felt like I had stooped to the lowest level...ugh. There were many women who came in and out, all looking at me funny, and then this one middle-aged woman came in. She looked at me and just smiled. She said "it's a shame they can't even put a chair in here for you to sit on. I wish more women would breast feed and then they'd all understand." She was right, that was the answer to my question on how other women could ridicule me on how I feed my child...they don't understand! They simply just don't get it. And I want to scream at every single one of them, "I don't stare at you and make fun of you when you give your baby a bottle full of formula, don't stare at my baby while he is nursing!"
I see breast all the time. On t.v., in the stores, girls with itty bitty outfits on, so what's the big deal about breast feeding? Our society is supposed love breast. But we all need to get over it. And get over ourselves. It's just a boob.
So I give all of you this one little piece of advice: stay strong. Don't let others make you feel like you're doing something dirty. You have chosen the best nourishment for your beautiful child and you should be proud of that. And remember, it's against the law for anyone, store owner, restaurant, what ever, to ask you to not breast feed in their establishment. If you want to know the exact laws check out this website: http://www.ncsl.org/default.aspx?tabid=14389 . It's really great. I'm trying to thicken up my back bone when it comes to nursing in public. I work on it every day. And I hope you will too. If you have any stories, positive or negative, I'd love to hear them. Love to all you Momas :)
great post Carla..You go girl!
ReplyDeleteAwesome post!
ReplyDeleteI had a situation at my last job where my co-workers were grossed out b/c they thought I put my pumped breast milk in the refrigerator. They talked about me behind my back. Finally, one of the nurses (Yes, this was a doctor's office with a crap-ton of nurses) told me about it,and said she told them to stop talking about it and ask me. I finally set them straight and told them: "No, I did not put my baby's milk in your GROSS refrigerator next to your GROSS and DISGUSTING food!! I keep it in a cooler in MY bag next to me at all times". Ignorance is bliss in this case. NURSES of all people should understand breast feeding/pumping in public. It got so bad that I ended up pumping in my hot-ass car b/c I didn't want to offend anyone or make someone uncomfortable if they walked in on me. I didn't give a shizer if they saw my boob or not...this was food for my baby!!!
Eventually my milk supply started to suffer b/c of the stress that I endured at that job causing post partum depression. Eventually, I quit and my husband was completely on board. I feel so sorry for those women who don't have support from their spouse/family/friends. I breast fed Brileigh for an entire year but had to supplement at 10 months b/c she was underweight b/c my milk supply had decreased so much!! I still hold guilt for staying with that stupid job!
I feel exactly the same Carla! I nursed James for 13 months, and quit when it was hard to hold him in my lap because he was so big. He never had a drop of formula- and went straight to whole milk. I went back to work full time at 9 weeks with James (and Will), and believe me, it's hard to find time to pump working as a nurse in the ER! I got myself a great electric pump (the best investment ever) and never had any problems. I have endured many comments while feeding my babies in public. Now that I have Will (he's 5 months) I am much more confident about BF in public. I have learned how to be so discreet that people will come up & touch my baby and never even realize he is eating! I don't make my baby wait to eat any longer that a bottle fed baby would- no matter what! Even if that does mean feeding him in my car at Walmart. This time around I have also learned how to store up plenty of breast milk, and my deep freezer is full of it. My 5 month old child weighs 18 lbs, and eats only breast milk. Now who could argue that anything else could be better? I wish more women would actually make the commitment to BF and stick with it. It is even proven to decrease the risk of SIDS. Thanks for blogging about such a powerful subject!
ReplyDelete