I have never yet written about my breastfeeding experiences. I have wanted to many times, but every time I think about doing so, I think about all the people I don't want to feel bad - for not being able to, or for choosing not to. I think about coming across as superior, or know it all, and that pride comes before a fall.
I am not a perfect parent or a super mummy. I have been successful at breastfeeding entirely by accident. Had we stumbled in our journey, I'm not sure whether we would or could have continued. I am well aware that I did not choose to breastfeed. I come from a middle-class, breastfeeding background. Breastfeeding was my instinctive desire, and I was more likely to succeed at it than those from different backgrounds. We were also very lucky in not encountering physical impediments to feeding. Had I not breastfed, would my son have been any less healthy? That I don't know. Would I have been a lesser mother? The answer to that I know. I look at the mothers I know - who feed their babies in differing combinations of methods - and the differing ways they feed their infants has no impact that I can see on the quality of the overall parenting that their children receive. Yes, some mothers are 'better' at mothering than other mothers. This cannot be disputed. However, in my experience that has little to do with the individual choices women make and entirely much more to do with the overall quality of love and care shown to the child.
And yet my feelings are mixed and complex.
As a feminist - and since my son's birth, I am very aware of being passionately feminist - I feel angry about the ways that womens' breasts are treated by society. I am angry that men have appropriated their use for something which is much less practical and beneficial than their intended use. (I am a Christian, and I believe that breasts as all things were created and intended for use.) I am angry that society has appropriated this and uses it so suppress the right of women to use their bodies as they choose. In a way that is more healthful for them (breastfeeding past six months - and past six months only, increasing with every month fed past six months - delays the onset of female cancers by around ten years). In a way that is more healthful for the environment, producing less waste. In a way that needs no artificial manufacture. In a way that promotes a financially sustainable lifestyle. I am angry that poor women, who need the added income most, are least likely to breastfeed. I am angry that people blame immigrants for economic burden, and yet nobody is thinking that supporting breastfeeding is a way of reducing economic burden - to the NHS, and in benefits (women need higher benefits to pay for formula). I feel angry that women feel guilty if they don't breastfeed, given that they are trying to breastfeed against such opposition and with very little practical support. I am angry that it is seen as ok by women to judge each other in the choices they make in mothering. I am angry that we are told where, and for how long, it is acceptable to use our bodies - in the way that they were designed to be used.
I am angry that we discuss babyfeeding in terms of 'bottle/formula feeding' and 'breastfeeding' - as if there is an opposition between the two, instead of women raising their babies well using the tools available to them. If breasts were more highly valued, and women trusted to make decisions, such language would become totally redundant. The only reason these terms are so emotive is the authority we believe we have to judge the decisions of mothers and weigh their efforts.
I grew up with this. I am guilty of this. I can remember my father critiquing the attempts of various mothers raising their children around him (each closely connected to him). I have personally judged the mothering efforts of those nearest and dearest to me and I often notice myself doing it even since bearing my son and experiencing such judgement myself. My husband judges mothers.
My personal experience is testament to the liberating power of trust. Every decision I made as a child was questioned and I became full of self doubt. I wasn't allowed to choose whether I wanted to wear a top without sleeves into the city at age fifteen; an issue my brother didn't have to contend with, and endowing me with guilt, shame and responsibility surrounding my body. Instilling me with the notion that my body is a limitation and a curse; something to be hidden away and condemned. I still struggle to make even the smallest decisions. However, I was lucky enough to meet someone who supported me to make huge, life-changing choices, and who respected my experiences and instincts. The years of our relationship have liberated and empowered me in ways I didn't anticipate and have healed me in ways I didn't know I needed, although the healing is not done yet, for either of us.
Trust empowers.
My husband struggles with food. It is a challenge every day to trust him and God with that issue. I often fail, because I don't know the ways to support him to make changes and I deeply desire that he makes changes for the well-being of our son. But mostly I fail because deep down I do not respect his desire to autonomy. And this lack of respect within me is destructive and painful, to him and to me. The conversations we have about this issue do not end well.
It is only once the weight of this judgement is lifted away from women that they can be empowered to reach their full potential in life - whether that be in baby feeding choices or other decisions.
This is a plea. This needs to end. Women deserve to live their lives fully and without judgement. In a way which empowers rather than limits them.
Let's live intentionally and set women free from the burden of shame and guilt.
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