The kids are home from school today because there is no school (cruel travesty of the natural order of things). We cleaned up — they unloaded the dishwasher quickly so they could watch a show about horses, and then we went to DI, where we loaded up on books for less than I owe in late fines at the library.
With several grown-up books to choose from, I agreed to lunch at Carl’s Jr with the big play place. We should have driven to a play place in the next school district over, but I am blessed to block out almost anything while reading. Two mothers near me were breastfeeding their babies.
They were both modestly covered with hooter hiders.
Some women are a lot more reasonable about this than I am. I told Chrysanthemum that if women want to wear hooter hiders, why stop there? Why not go for a burqa or a niqab? Chrysanthemum says she’s comfortable, but wants to make sure other people are comfortable too. (Which is only thoughtful.)
Saturday night I held Chrysanthemum’s baby while she ate with the menfolk after the priesthood session. I burrito’d him and rocked him in the granny recliner my mom has in her living room. I had been dying to get my hands on him all day, but I couldn’t take his sweet weight drooping in sleep for long.
I promised Chrysanthemum that I really won’t kidnap him, mostly because she knows where I live anyway, but also because when he cries, I can’t comfort him if what he wants isn’t a bounce or a bundling or a burp. I am not equipped, right now, with what he needs.
—
I’ve never loved my body (has any woman?). Stupidly, even when I was in high school and thinner than I’ll ever be again, I was unhappy with this bulge and that blemish. I was also not happy to be growing breasts. They budded and blossomed, right on time; not too big, not too small, but the mere fact of them, the changing from child to woman was not welcome. I know most girls look forward to the bras and the makeup and the high heels as markers of maturity, but I did not.
I hated that I had to wear a bra. It felt like a betrayal, a shrouding of my ribcage, a constriction of my breathing, an infringement on my freedom and rights and autonomy. And no, I wasn’t melodramatic as a teenager at all, why do you ask?
I still hate wearing a bra, but I’ve resigned myself (in public). I sometimes feel frumpy and flubbery and (I don’t say “fat” around my daughters), and I don’t mind the religious obligation I have to cover up because I have no desire to show my thighs in a short skirt or my belly in a bikini.
But at some point I started appreciating what my body can do rather than what it looks like. Function superseding form, form respected for the function that follows. My hands can knead bread, my feet can peddle the bike that pulls Susan and Spot for a ride. My womb can grow a child. (It can also miscarry, but that is normal.)
And my breasts? They sag and stretch. (I even get a few wild hairs now and then. Don’t tell Mr. Bennet.) But my breasts can feed a child all she needs for the first year of her life.
Which is almost as miraculous as never once feeling self-conscious or unsatisfied with how my milk-swelled breasts looked. Even when a stranger glimpsed a patch of blue-veined flesh.
Subscribe by email
Read your comment on MamaPop in regards to E. Smart and followed you over here, because I wanted to tell you I couldn’t agree more.
Then I read this post and felt like yelling from the rooftops, “Preach it sister!” What a great declaration to make! Will definitely be returning to read more!
Jane Reply:
October 8th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
I love mamapop.com. They are so cool, and I like reading culture commentary about dumb celebrities that sounds smart.
Ha! Burquas all the way! That way no one will even know you’re breastfeeding at all. I think Hathor the Cow Goddess had a comic about that. I’m remembering a woman in a burqua nursing, with 2 nipple holes cut out and both breasts visible. It was quite funny.
I think the blue-veined flesh is incredibly lovely. I want to find a way to take a picture that is internet appropriate.
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
I remember in Cairo actually being impressed that ladies who were very, very modest had no trouble breastfeeding.
I agree with you in every sentiment. I love my body now because it is so useful.
And those “hooter hiders” piss me off. I hate them. Nursing is normal, act like it.
When M was little and we were out in a shopping centre and she’d need a feed (which would take a good 40-60 mins!), I’d make my way to the newsagency to grab some reading material, and then make my way to the parent’s room and hope one of the curtained cubicles was free .. and spend the next 40-60 mins there feeding, trying to keep her awake, and trying to keep me awake with some reading.
Since then I’ve noticed all the comfy bored blokes seats throughout the middle of a particlar shopping centre. Couches, in the middle of the main aisles between the shops. And I’ve seen some Mums feeding there, and thought that that’s what I should’ve done. Because any time I might need to feed in a shopping centre in the future, I’ll have M with me, and I’ll want those parent rooms even more for the enclosed capture area, um, fenced in playground (yes, in the parent’s room!!)
I may have then hidden my feeding in a public place, but I wouldn’t now. And I wouldn’t hide my hooters, even though I need to develop some discretion in feeding. I’d sit on the bored blokes seats in teh middle of the shopping centre instead.
How many “things” are now marketed to us as parents and mothers that our own parents would never have even realised they were “missing out” on?
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
I don’t want to criticize women who feel more comfortable covering up, I just wonder how it would/will be if/when I give birth again. I nursed everywhere with my other three, but now that I’m in super-conservative Utah, I find myself wondering if I would bow to the social pressure to cover up and church? Because everyone else does it? And, on the other hand, I wouldn’t want to think I was nursing while teaching Sunday School to kids just as a statement, you know?
Azucar Reply:
October 12th, 2009 at 1:02 am
Go ahead and nurse in church, I always did. And if anyone has a problem with it, refer them to me.
Jane Reply:
October 12th, 2009 at 8:24 am
I did too, even while teaching primary and r.s. lessons, but somehow it seems different in this big established ward here in Utah where everyone goes to the nursing mothers’ ghetto to do it. Seems like it would be a statement, somehow.
I plan to just do as I did before, what came naturally — nurse anytime, anywhere, but in all my other wards and branches (we’ve been in four small branches), I was usually the only one pregnant or nursing, so no one could say (or think) “so-and-so nurses in private.”
after 5 kids and hardly ever wearing a bra, I have really saggy breasts. to everyone in society this would be a reason to despair, but I’ve noticed how much easier it is to breast feed with saggy long breasts than to do it with short firm breasts. i don’t need a breastfeeding pillow, i don’t need to bend down, my neck doesn’t hurt from some awkward position. now that I’m breast feeding my 5th child, i am very grateful not only for the ability to make milk but for my sagging long breasts!
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
I hadn’t thought of it that way, but good point! I like to think that I would still need a nursing pillow, but then I just love pillows.
First off… oh my CUTE baby!
I love thinking of boobs in a function rather than form capacity. Of course mine no longer function… and their form is a little off. But hey… strap these puppies up in a bra and they are AWESOME. LOL
teehee. Here is a subject that is near and dear to me.
I was reading in an anthropology paper that in some civilizations, you are not considered a woman until your breasts “drop.” That gives me hope that we can not only tolerate, but learn to admire our God-given women’s bodies as the truly amazing things that they are. Even when they don’t do exactly what we want them to do (ie miscarry, or difficult pregnancy, or no pregnancy), they still do so much for us.
I love the fact that I can not only feed, but completely nurture my children at the breast for much of that first year. They are in my arms, being looked at, interacted with and their tummies are filled with yummy nutrition all at the same time. Of course, when we’re out and about, I know that there are some who would never continue to nurse if they didn’t have the hooter hider option, so I don’t trash ‘em too bad. But if I am here to make one or two more people comfortable with a nursing mom, then I will do it.
By the way, have you seen the hiders that are a hat for the baby? They are also great.
They are in my gmail all the time…it’s a hat with a floppy brim that is huge, so it covers mom’s breasts while baby is nursing. The funniest part is that the design of some of the hats make them look like giant nipples. http://www.moboleez.com/ LOL
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:26 pm
It took me way too long to figure out the name of those was a play on “Mobile-ease.” I love hats for kids, esp. little girls, so I would probably be inclined to try one of those (if only because to get a child to wear a sunhat, it’s best to put hats on them starting young and often). They also wouldn’t be too hot for the mom. But the dark-brimmed ones with white centers — very nipple-y. So funny. Thanks for the link!
i always have to roll my eyes when i see one of those hooter hiders. if you don’t use one people can’t even tell what you’re doing most of the time. using one of those, you may as well get a megaphone and announce that it’s feeding time. however, if it makes some women feel more comfortable to use them, fine. but i don’t want people to expect me to use one, because it ain’t happening.
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:26 pm
Yes, I agree that they’re very megaphone-y, esp. the ones in cliche, pastel baby prints. yick.
The part I dislike most about my body is my breasts…seems to have always been that way. They got large quickly and have always made me uncomfortable. I did appreciate them for being able to feed my babies, but now that that purpose seems past I would love to “fix” them (reduction). I just can’t seem to justify the cost. I do like your take on looking at the body with appreciation for what it can do, though. Definitely more positive.
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:27 pm
I had an aunt who got a reduction after feeding her 8 children. She had terrible back pain that was fixed by the surgery, so I would definitely look into that if it would allow you to do other things you want to.
I don’t have any problem with people more comfortable covering up to nurse. I found that I was more discreet without a blanket or covering telegraphing to everyone what I was doing. But I preferred to remain discreet. Always thought breast feeding was an extremely personal decision.
I am always in awe about how my body can create and sustain life. Didn’t have time to contemplate my developing body as a teenager I went from nothing to full sized in about 3 months (and have the stretch marks to prove it).
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
I got a few stretch marks as a teenager, but the worst was my first pregnancy, when they ranged as far from my belly as my calves!
You think bras are bad. I’m SOOOOO glad I don’t have to wear ties. Talk about constriction, blegh!
But then again, I’m also quite happy that wearing nylons is pretty much out among the younger generation. I can’t believe we ever allowed these tight, hot, sweaty things to be fashionable. They’re not even necessary (like a bra usually is).
Jane Reply:
October 11th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
My husband always buys his dress shirts too big in the collar, so he isn’t choked by ties. This always struck me as a smart idea. Too bad you can’t really do that with bras — I’m not huge, but the straps are so narrow and not padded unless you need a really large size.
And yes, so glad nylons are out, though I’m sure some missions still require them.