I have no idea what kind of world or what sort of beliefs people will be fighting over or pushing for when and if you decide to have a child. My hope for you is that you do your research, decide on an opinion, and stick with it...no matter what it is (please please please do your research!). My hope is also that once you pick your side, you take a moment to appreciate and try to understand or find something positive about all of the opposing options. As your parents, Dad and I have struggled to find our footing, let alone firmly place our feet, when it has come to many of the decisions that parents have to make on a daily basis. Binkies and when to take them away, do we even use a Toddler bed, what about sippie cups and when are we suppose to stop using them, how are time-outs going to work, and are we a CIO or spanking family? Whew. At the end of the day we have made about a million tiny decisions that may or may not effect you for the rest of your life (most likely not, but who freaking knows!). Each time your Dad and I have had to make a decision, we've talked to your pediatrician and done our research and made the decision that felt right for our family. We make these decisions without medical degrees or experience. We make these decisions, like billions of parents around the world do every day, with the hope that it is what's best but not knowing for sure. In the end, your Mom and Dad love you very much and we are, honestly, just doing our best every day to not completely wreck you as a human being. ;)
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Hello again readers! Today I am bringing you a topic that, under normal circumstances, wouldn't even sort of bother me a little. My circumstances, however, have been anything but normal and this topic is just about making me a crazy person (and, with having a toddler, I don't need any more help in that department). I am speaking, of course, about all of this breastfeeding nonsense. That's right, nonsense.
Stay with me here. I say nonsense because I am a firm believer that whatever you chose for your child, as long as it is not causing physical or emotional damage, is your own darn business. You have every right to believe in and do as you please as long as you have your child's best interest at heart and you are trying your best, which almost every single parent does and is. That's why this issue and how I feel about it is such a shock for my system. Let's explore...
This whole breastfeeding issue has been floating around the media for quite a while now. The first time that I felt the tingle of impending doom in the back of my brain was when people started petitioning Sesame Street to show women breastfeeding like they did back in the day. If this issue had popped up during any other time in my life I would have brushed it off as the "crazies being crazy" and just let it go.
But it didn't.
It popped up at a time in my life when I was feeling like a complete failure as a woman. It came up at a time when my child was living in an incubator in the NICU because my body just couldn't cut it. At a time when I was desperately trying to put my emotional self back together after one of the worst pregnancies on record (okay...not the worst, but it's gotta be top 10). It came at a time when I was getting up every two hours to desperately hook myself up to machine and wring out every last drop of vital breast milk from my
Around this time is when Moms started picking sides and becoming adamantly attached to their opinions regarding the breastfeeding issue. We started seeing righteous indignation from mothers who were given a sideways glance when they fed their children in public. We saw open disgust and signs put up in businesses regarding their opinion and policies on openly breastfeeding within their buildings. Parents ridiculously judging other parents when they would mix up their bottle of formula for their little one at the park. We now have the sudden realization and judgement toward extended breast feeders which has led to magazine covers and ads that put a bad taste in everyone's mouth (pun intended heh heh), including the people that posed for the darn magazine ads. We now have activist groups about the issue. We have celebrities putting in their two cents and all of their fanatics on top of that. We have women who are purposefully not covering themselves in public while feeding their child, just to get a reaction so that they can scream, "How dare you react to this beautiful process?". We have women throwing formula on breastfeeding mothers. We have chaos.
Why breastfeeding so suddenly became such a hot button issue, I have no idea. Parents have been breastfeeding in all sizes and shapes for so long that it predates our written history. It is an incredibly natural process and should be supported as such. There is no question that breast milk is the best milk. It's been proven. By science. We all get it. You are woman! Hear you roar!
I am writing today for us who cannot. I write for the Mom with mastitis, breast cancer, HIV, breast reduction surgery, anemia, heart conditions, premature children, emotional or mental illness being treated with medication, postpartum depression, or addictions they just can't beat. I write for the Moms who are made to feel guilty because they can't. For those that want nothing more than to feel that deep and wonderful connection that comes from your body helping your child survive and thrive. I write for the Moms who want to know what it feels like to be the sole provider of your child's nutrition and to watch them grow because of this amazing thing that your body was made to do. I write for the Moms who know the physical and emotional pain that comes the day after you decide you have to stop. The Moms that know the heartache of feeling a life line, a connection, a touchstone slip through their fingers and not be able to stop it. Nothing. Sometimes there is nothing you can do. Helplessness, overwhelming disappointment, heartache, depression, sadness, inadequacy....guilt. All of this. Then something like this shows up in the news:
This is an ad that popped up all over Mexico City. It, basically, says "Don't give them your back, give them your breast." Or something close. No, this isn't in the US. No, it is not directed at mothers who can't breastfeed. No, it normally would not even bother me. But, yes, it does now. As a mother who simply could not breastfeed, this ad is a killer. I see it in the news, and I see it's message and it just rips a small hole in my heart. My son is almost 3 years old. He is happy, he is healthy, he is perfect. Breastfeeding isn't even something I'm doing or considering doing ever again. But I have been on the other side of this ad and it hurts. It kills. It brings back that deep dark place for us who cannot our could not.
Those of us you cannot or could not are often forgotten in this global issue. We are looked over, brushed aside, and thought of as a non-issue in this whole thing. The problem with that is that we are the ones that feel both sides of the argument so much more deeply than those who are actually involved. Our options, our opinions, and our plans were taken from us. Wanting to formula feed and having to formula feed are two very different beasts. We who cannot or could not truly know the wonder and honest benefits of formula but have the hurt of never experiencing the life altering miracle of breastfeeding which makes the hurt that much more. We have to sit on the sidelines and watch people fight, yell, judge, and tear each other apart over an issue that we would have liked to have even had a chance to consider having an opinion on.
My family got through it. We are on the other side and things are much greener in this pasture but I will never forget. I will never forget sitting on my bed, attached to a breast pump while my child was in an incubator, in a hospital, outside of my arms. I will never forget the feeling of despair and absolute devastation as my production trickled to nothing while I fought and clawed for every last drop. The looks on the nurses faces as I brought in less and less milk to the NICU. The tone the nurse used when she had to instruct me on how to mix formula. I found a home among formula feeding moms. Eventually I was able to see the sunnier side of things. After several months of research about how formula was helping my child in ways my body never could, I was able to smile and take comfort in our little tin of formula. Today, looking back, I am able to be grateful for the option of formula. So very grateful. But in the moment, that tin of formula was a complete and total embodiment of everything I wasn't and everything I couldn't do for my child. When you're in that place, ads like the one above have a tendency to make your blood boil and possibly have two glasses of wine before lunch.
After many many many many angry, self-righteous days and a lot of inner reflection, I am able to take away from this is a deeper and more intense understanding of what it truly means to be a parent. I'm able to see that it's all fun and games until life stops going how you expect it to. Until you find out that the books and movies may not have been 100% correct about the whole thing. The first hiccup is always a shock to the system, but after several hundred hiccups, I think I am finally figuring out that the looser I am, the easier I roll and recover. I leave you with the thought that not everything in parenting, let alone the world, is at is seems. There is always a different opinion to consider and a different situation to have compassion for. In the end, your journey may not be what you planned, but it's what you need, even if it kinda sucks sometimes. ;)
Is there anything in your life that just did not cooperate with your plans for yourself? How did you handle it? What lessons were you able to walk away with?
