Maybe It's YOU With The Problem

Breastfeeding. Yep. I admit it, I am a breastfeeder. Maybe you know someone that breastfeeds. Your neighbor, your boss, your child's teacher. Breastfeeders are everywhere. Only we are not. The most natural thing in the world is forced into hiding. We are continually told that we should feed our children in private, lest we make people uncomfortable. Chances are, we could breastfeed without you getting a single glimpse of anything "inappropriate". Is there something about that tell-tale position that just sends shockwaves radiating out from us? Some invisible barrier when you see an infants head at breast level that makes you give us a 10 foot bubble that you must not enter, but will stare daggers through? It would take some serious effort on my part to actually get breastmilk on you, and honestly, I just don't care enough to try. But for the record, it is no more disgusting that what you buy in the grocery stores in those plastic containers(for clarification, I am referring to cows milk). And when you think about it, what my son is eating is far more appropriate for a human to consume than what is contained in those plastic containers. And it has a lot less antibiotics involved, a whole bunch less processing and I am not kept in a field with thousands of other breastfeeding moms, standing in my own feces and eating some random "feed" that is not designed for me to digest.

But I digress. My point is, if the fact that I am feeding MY son what he is BIOLOGICALLY made to digest bothers you, take a look at yourself and figure out what YOUR problem is. What is it about such a natural process that makes you freak out? Is it the *gasp* breast shown?! Because mine are never really showing. I have seen way more teens in the malls showing more boob than I ever do feeding my son. Do you complain every time you see that? Do you ask them to go in private if they are going to dress like that? Do you ask that they put a blanket over themselves? Are they requested to wear their outfits in the bathroom if the "must wear them"? No. Boobs are 'sexy' so what THEY are doing is ok, but how dare I use these sexy things to feed my baby? Are you afraid some milk will get on you? Or because it is a bodily fluid it must be germ-infested? Because as previously mentioned, I would have to go to great lengths to do this. And generally speaking, if a mother has a disease that could be passed through breastmilk-she probably is not breastfeeding. So don't worry about me spraying you with AIDS infected milk from 10 feet away.

See, breastfeeding mothers don't have any problems. We are simply doing what comes naturally to us, and you people are the ones creating such a problem. Don't like it? Look away, maybe YOU should go hang out in the bathroom while we feed our child, maybe YOU should stay home if it bothers you. Before you complain to someone about a breastfeeding mom, or before you make a comment to her, stop. Just stop it. And think why it bothers you. If you still decide to complain, pull your head out of your ass and stop being so ignorant and ill informed. Maybe you should start working on changing your perspective of the female body. Maybe everyone needs to change their perspective. This, I believe is the first step in making breastfeeding a normal part of our lives, not one that is shunned and forced into dark corners.