Ban the Breast Pump?
I won’t go so far as to say that Friday’s blog from Judith Warner is anti-breastfeeding and it is not nearly as offensive as Rosin’s piece in The Atlantic. But is it really necessary to ban the breast pump? I have been lucky enough not to have to pump milk with regularity for my two boys, but I have pumped on many occasions. While it is not my favorite past time, it is not grotesque, nor is it something that makes my husband cringe with disgust.
A few excerpts from the article and my reactions:
She’s talking about pumping breast milk – the grotesque ritual carried out behind closed office doors nationwide by beleaguered working mothers who are fully “committed” (as the lactation consultants put it) to the goal of long-term, exclusive breast-feeding.
Pumping is not just for the working mothers. Mothers of premature babies, babies with special needs, babies with trouble latching pump milk to provide the best possible nutrition for their child. Mothers pump so they go out on the town with their spouse or friends. Why supplement with formula if you don’t want to?
Why have we made such a fetish of breast milk when there’s no evidence to prove whether, as Rosin puts it in the Atlantic video, “what’s key about breast feeding is the milk or the act of breast-feeding”?
There is no shortage of evidence that breast milk has numerous benefits for babies and the act of breastfeeding has numerous benefits for mothers.
Why, as a society, have we privileged the magic elixir of maternal milk over actual maternal contact, denying the vast, vast majority of mothers the kind of extended maternity leave that would make them physically present for their babies?
Part of what I found so offensive about Rosin’s article is that she seemed to be against that kind of maternal contact. She made feeding babies out to be a chore. Maternity leaves in the United States are embarrassing. There is no question that parents should have time to bond with their children.
“…I’m hoping pump companies will just disappear.”
So am I. In fact, I hope that some day, not too long in the future, books on women’s history will feature photos of breast pumps to illustrate what it was like back in the day when mothers were consistently given the shaft. Future generations of female college students will gaze upon the pumps, aghast.
“Did you actually use one of those?” they’ll ask their mothers, in horror.
And the moms, with a shudder, will proudly say no.
Disappear? Really? So the preemies who need it most shouldn’t have breastmilk? So babies who have difficulty latching right away should be deprived? Why is it an all or nothing proposition? Why can’t women choose to supplement with formula without banning breast pumps?
My StumbleUpon Page