Breastfeeding is Rainbows and Unicorns. Oh yeah, and a lot of work.

"Milk drunk" by MamabytheBay is the follow-up article to "A Second Chance at Breastfeeding" which I had originally read on the Huffington Post.  This article sort of captures how I felt when realized I finally had enough milk for Calvin after a long three months of supplementing with formula after every feed.  Oh, the relief and amazement and triumph of a woman's milk fully coming in!

In public health efforts to increase breastfeeding, the campaign strategy seems to be "don't tell them this can be hard!" -- because otherwise, there's a risk that mothers might not even bother trying to boobfeed if they're ambivalent about the whole thing anyway.  Except, no.  I can't accept that it's ethical to promote breastfeeding without the caveats.  It's unethical to tell women that breastfeeding is natural and easy without telling them that, sometimes, there is a lot of work involved, but that a lot of mothers find it to be worth it.  That sometimes, it doesn't come naturally, but you'll probably get better at it.  How many mothers stop because they've been told that it's easy?  How many mothers would have kept breastfeeding for longer if they weren't under the false impression that it was like rainbows and unicorns from the start?

In closing, I'll leave you with my favorite excerpt:

Breastfeeding is kicking my ass.  It’s not easy, it doesn’t always feel natural, and for me, it hurts like hell.  Where were the rainbows and unicorns and happy nursing fairies that you all kept telling me about?

Somewhere in between a 3 am nursing session and surfing the internet for “nursing camisole size large” I realized that I had misunderstood all of you breastfeeding moms.  When you chanted “What’s your superpower? I make milk!”, I used to secretly scream at you to go f--- [sic] yourself.  “Oh look!  My little angel is milk drunk!” you’d coo.  And I’d want to puke.  There was nothing cute about posting a picture of your baby drooling milk out of their mouth while fast asleep.  It all just seemed so self-congratulatory and boastful to me.  Until I realized how damn hard it is to actually succeed at breastfeeding.