Breastfeeding is one of the most beautiful things I have ever done in life.  I love how close I feel to my daughter knowing that I can be a source of nourishment and comfort for her. Breastfeeding has such benefits for both mom and baby. It provides the ideal nutrition for babies while helping moms to lose the pregnancy weight and helping their uterus to contract.

Thus far, my breastfeeding journey has been filled with many mishaps and learning experiences (sometimes embarrassing ones, really embarrassing ones) along the way but also many real moments of love and empowerment.

Not so great beginnings

It seems so long ago but it was just about nine months ago that I started breastfeeding. I remember feeling frustrated that I didn’t know how to position my baby properly and that I wasn’t sure she was “latching” correctly and getting enough milk. My nipples were sore and at one point (no pun intended), one of them actually got so damaged that I thought it would never come back from that. Thankfully, it was the less attractive one so no worries (c’mon, ladies, you all know you have a favourite boob). But for any new mamas, trust me it gets better and much easier, and then one day, your baby will be doing acrobatics on your nipples and you would be unfazed. 

Even the fact that I had to wake up every 2-3 hours to feed my baby girl started to take a toll on me but one of my formula-feeding mommy friends put things into perspective for me – “At least you don’t have to get up and actually prepare a feed every 2-3 hours”. I became much more grateful from that point on that I was able to breastfeed. Kudos to all you formula-feeding mamas too, I know a lot of the times you may not be doing it by choice but I know you are doing your best too.

Wardrobe changes

When you become a breastfeeding mama, you basically also have to reconsider your entire wardrobe. ALL of your outfits have to breastfeeding-friendly, i.e. you need outfits that allow you to whip out them bad boys at any moment, in a way that exposes them enough to your baby and yet discreetly enough so you are not flashing innocent passers-by.

Though I am very appreciative that most Trinibagonians seem very accommodating to breastfeeding mamas. No establishment or person has ever shamed me or asked to me to leave or to stop breastfeeding whenever I needed to. I remember even the workers at Auntie Anne’s in Trincity Mall were kind enough to allow me to sit in one of their booths to breastfeed my baby even though I wasn’t a paying customer.

Don’t cry over spilt or leaked milk…

So in the first few months, my breasts leaked…A LOT. It felt like I would try everything to keep my clothes from being soaked but to no avail. Then there was this amazing feature when you just think of your baby and your breasts decide to have that big let-down. Sometimes, the nursing pads wouldn’t be enough and I would have to keep changing them very often. I had forgotten what it felt like to be dry all day. I dreaded going back to work, having a fear that I would be at a meeting and then my clothes would be slowly getting soaked.

When my baby was about three months old, we had a get together at my home and I had a bit of a leak. One of my male friends and I were talking and it was so clear that we were both trying so hard to ignore the elephant in the room, or should I say the “e-leak-phant” on my dress.  Thankfully, my breasts are way better behaved now than in the beginning.

Pumping it up

The anxiety about going back to work was still real though. I started to wonder how I would be able to pump breastmilk during the day. I quickly realised that considerations were not really given at workplaces for breastfeeding mamas. I really wondered how working moms do it. Nothing is more uncomfortable than needing to express your milk but being in a meeting or not having a proper place to do it. I applaud the few organizations that have rooms dedicated for moms to express their breastmilk in a place where they can get enough space and privacy. Expressing breastmilk is no joke, it is hard to do it in a storage closet or even a normal bathroom. If you continue reading, you will understand why.

But before I get to my MOST embarrassing story, I will tell you a funny but empowering one. I had to go to a meeting in another office of my organization. There were no facilities for me to privately express my breastmilk so I had to use the usual bathroom facilities. I used the handicapped bathroom because it was the most spacious. All the while, I was feeling especially nervous because if anyone were to come in, they would hear the oh-so-subtle ‘”urggg, urggg, urggg” noises from my breast pump.

After a little while pumping, a woman came into the bathroom. Oh no. I hear her say “hello?” I hesitate. I guess I will have to explain to her what I was doing. She repeats, “Hello?” I am about to answer when I realise that she is not speaking to me but she is in fact on her cellphone. I sigh with relief.

Now, I am a person who doesn’t like to do her “business” while talking on the phone so I figure she would take the call and then use the bathroom. Instead, she proceeds to use the bathroom while on her phone. The thing is that she was peeing SOOO loudly that I was sure the person on the other end was hearing. It was then I had an epiphany. She was clearly not embarrassed by her call of nature while on her call, so why on earth was I embarrassed by my body’s natural ability to make milk for my little one?

Opening the wrong floodgates…

So in my usual office, I had fallen into a breastmilk pumping routine. There was a semi-private bathroom upstairs in an office with three of my female co-workers. After lunch, I would take my “equipment” and we would do the usual greeting and I would head on into the bathroom to pump. So last Friday, it was no different except maybe it was a bit later than I would usually go. Now like I said, most offices do not really have any provisions for this activity so you have to work with what you got. So I would lay paper towels on top of the toilet tank to rest the electric part of the breast pump and I would stand closer to the sink (which was very close to the actual toilet).  While pumping, I would either be checking my email on my phone or just enjoying the view out the window.

This time, I am not sure what happened but I guess it was too uneventful of a day. Maybe the pump vibrated a tad too much or I had moved too much. But before I could stop it, my breast pump was falling straight onto the pipe that was connected to the toilet tank to fill it with water. Even WORSE than that was that it instantly broke off the valve that was there to help stop the water. Water started pouring out furiously onto my feet, onto the bathroom floor and started heading into the office. I was in shock. I ran out and one of my co-workers was in the office, frantically trying to call someone to turn off the main water supply to the building.

We started trying to unplug things and picking up stuff from the floor because the water was moving fast onto the carpeted office floor. While we were still trying to get someone to turn off the water, people started appearing to see what was happening. I was basically mortified, holding my bottle of expressed milk and a guilty look on my face. I am sure I confused a lot of people.

Eventually the water was turned off and the cleaners were able to scoop up as much water as they could. I only wish they could have scooped up my embarrassment too. My co-workers were being nice to me about it, saying that everyone did something like that in the office (I bet not to this degree), that particular room was haunted and that it was basically a boring day so I provided some entertainment. Sigh. I imagine I will go down in the history books for this one. Not really how I wanted to be remembered.

I wanted to help but didn’t know how. My shoes were soaked and I was trying to salvage whatever milk I had expressed. When the commotion and most of the clean-up was over, I returned to the scene of the crime. The carpet was water logged, making squishing noises as I walked through, the pipe yet to be prepared. My only hope is that it was fixed over the weekend and that they don’t assign a chaperone to me the next time I go to pump.

My plea

My plea in all this is simply for more consideration to be given to breastfeeding mamas. I was speaking to my male friend after the incident and he confessed that he never considered all that has to be considered when a mom is breastfeeding. It takes a lot of dedication on the part of a mom so it would be nice if certain provisions could be made so that it makes it all a bit easier for us. I just wish it was more of a common consideration rather than something that seems to be a far thought for most.

Needless to say, I am still proud to be a breastfeeding mama. Less proud that I am a klutz but then what would I even have to write about? I mean, I partially flooded out the office but did you die?

P.S. A good drinking game for non-breastfeeding mamas would be to take a drink every time you read the word “breast”. You’re welcome!

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