Tuesday, July 29, 2008

milk it

TMI warning. Read at your own risk, suckas.

I really don't know why I click on links on my welcome screen. Especially since I was just claiming in here within the last week that I learn from experience. Sigh.

Today's "news" is that 45% of respondents to a poll in Babytalk (which is apparently some sort of parenting magazine, but I wouldn't know, being out of the loop on such things these days) find cross-nursing--and I quote--disgusting or weird. Cross-nursing, if you are unaware of the fancy-shmancy terminology, is nursing another woman's infant. Like, you know, wet nurses and family members have been doing for millennia. "Disgusting," huh? I mean, I can see how people in our strange, body-phobic society might find it slightly "weird", wet nursing being out of fashion for 70 or 80 years, but disgusting? Are you serious?

So, then, to completely use up all my sanity points for the day, I read the comments to the online article. You know, this is definitely where you find that the American Public R stoopid. And ignorant. And far, far more crazy than I ever thought of being. One woman felt compelled to opine that breastfeeding itself is disgusting and since *bottles* have been invented, everyone should use them. After all, "we aren't animals, we've evolved." I wonder if she ever has sex with anyone, since that's something animals do too. If so, why isn't she just using a vibrator, since technology has taken care of that too? Flesh! Body fluids! Ooo! Gross!

Anyway. Lemme just say this. Back when baby D was drinking from the tap, so to speak, even though I had to go back to work when he was 6 weeks old--in pediatrics--other women's babies would cry and my milk would let down. In fact, for months after he was weaned, I, as women do, could still produce some milk with proper stimulation. And sometimes, I'd have a baby screaming in my office, and for some reason or other, the mom wouldn't be there, and I'd be jiggling and rocking the baby and trying to give it a bottle, which it didn't want, in order to quiet it down so I could test. And the baby would be "rooting" as they say, in my arms. And I'd think, crap. If I could *just* whip out my tit without getting fired, everyone's problems would be solved. It's kind of a natural instinct when you're a nursing mother.

Okay. Now that I've planted that image in your minds, you all can just go back to thinking of my breasts as something that hold up expensive camis and confuse the FIOS guy. 'K? hahaha

xoxo

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not the point of your post, but I wonder if anyone's ever researched whether babies drinking from multiple sources gain greater microbial immunities than those who are only exposed to their mother's milk?

"Cross-nursing" may not be the modern way, but I wonder if it could be more beneficial?

Uncle said...

Let's think. Birth by c-section, nourishment by bottle,(ergo no acquisition of natural immunities) no immunization because the quacks and captivated celebs say its soo bad. This could be, what you say, a self-correcting problem. Pity it's the kids that get the short end.

Breasts are such multi-functional organs. What a pity some people can't get to the most important one.