Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Screw the Cow, I'll just buy the Milk...

My mother used to tell me when I was a kid that no one buys the cow when they can get the milk for free. While it's a nice sentiment (and certainly makes guilty Catholics everywhere feel good about that whole abstinence business) my husband disproved that one when he married me.

I would now like to modify that statement. "I would rather buy the milk as long as I don't have to be the cow." Let me explain....

I recently returned to work and I now have a serious love hate relationship with a breast pump. For a total of 40 minutes a day I am exposed and hooked up to what amounts to a fancy vacuum. I have purchased a pumping bra that my husband believes is some sort of S&M paraphernalia. It's a messy business..blockading the office door, pulling the blinds, whipping out the girls, strapping yourself in, WOOSH WOOSH WOOSH. I just know that everyone can hear this wooshing from 6 offices away.

All the while reading articles like this and this. Yet I continue to put my little containers in the office fridge and redress myself twice a day. Here's why, and my work husband can mock all he wants with comments about about organic food and ergo strollers... I can't be sure that this whole breast milk thing isn't important, so I'll do it just in case.

So as I sit there thinking how undignified it is to be hooked up to a Hoover, I read something like this and I think about how bad I would feel if someday my poor kid has nasty dermatitis all over her just because my selfish ass didn't want to be Bessie the Milk Cow.

Well, even Bessie has her limits. There are only so many times a day you can get naked in your office and still reasonably conduct business. That said, our little friend gets one bottle of formula a day. It's one out of roughly 6-7 feedings. So by my calculations I'm only a good mother 83-86% of the time. I think I can live with those numbers.

1 comment:

lostonthetubes said...

OK - you really read a 413 medical document about breastfeeding???