Really, there's only one blog that I generally bother to check regularly that is maintained by a "stranger" (well, at least someone whom I've never met in person and with whom my first contact was via their blog). It's the blog of TheLactivist.com - http://thelactivist.blogspot.com. Her most recent post found here was really something I needed to read after the emotions of the last week (as blogged below and other things not mentioned, at least as of yet - don't worry, Piglet and the rest of the in-house family is fine, as are all of our good friends to the best of my knowledge, and I'm still pregnant tho SO ready not to be anymore at this point, I'm ready to be able to hand the baby to someone else for 5 minutes or so now!).
Weird little coincidences have been cropping up in my life lately and Jen the Lactivist's post is just the latest (well, I've only been awake for about an hour so far today anyway - yes, I'm having trouble sleeping, no I do NOT enjoy being conscious at 6:30am for no necessary reason when my hubby is home and can be delegated care of the toddler so I could sleep more but my body isn't giving me a choice in the matter... please don't let this mean I'm about to bear a morning person! AAAAAAACK! Is that horror music I hear?!?).
Liam's awake (sort of) and spread himself across my lap (using the loveseat's armrest to hold the keyboard)... trying to convince him to go wake up daddy but it's not working. Must go fidget.
I said it in my comment on Jen's blog but I'll say it again here (for myself and for you guys to repeat as needed): You don't need to be Wonder Woman to be a Wonderful Woman.
Live your day in wonder, at least for a few minutes, for me, OK?
Friday, June 22, 2007
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Googling myself, finding Father's Day 2006
I don't think I posted this here last year, but for those who didn't know, last Father's Day I served as Worship Associate and delivered 1/3rd of the sermon. Here's the text of what I said, in tribute to Garvin (since I was in a bit of a nesting snit and kinda blew off Father's Day this year).
Fathers of the Future
A Homily by Ahmie Yeung
Sunday, June 18, 2006
West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church
Rocky River, Ohio
In counting my blessings, which I try to do on a fairly regular basis, the constant presence of a strong male role model in my childhood is, unfortunately, absent from that list. I, like too many of my generation, was raised by a single mother struggling to do her best with little societal support. My father left us for another woman when I was two years old, the same age my own child is now, which is why there wasn’t a picture of my father in that slide show – while searching for an appropriate one of the two of us to use, I found plenty of my cats but none of myself with my dad.
The realities of growing up without much involvement from my biological father have had many varied effects on the person I’ve grown to be, not the least of which is an irresistible urge to growl and snarl when I hear self-righteous politicians talk about “defending marriage” and “strengthening families” by denying the status of “marriage” and “family” to people based on the genders of those involved. Nothing they’re proposing would have stopped my dad from walking out on us. Nothing they’re proposing makes my own husband a better father than he already is.
With the decisive lack of positive male role models in my gene pool, I was left to seek elsewhere for the kind of guidance that I felt an inner need to obtain. I was not raised as a regular church-goer, so I don’t have any wonderful stories of someone like Wayne here stepping into that role and guiding me through the rough patches that I weathered. I did, however, have some absolutely wonderful male public school teachers. In a typically female-dominated job of elementary teacher, I was blessed with the presence of three men who, for the years I knew them, filled a whole in my life during the daytime hours that went far beyond reading, writing, and arithmetic. Mr. Koester, my 6 th grade teacher, has the honor of a spot in the slide show tribute during our offering today, for being a positive role model of not just a male caring for and teaching children, but also as a spouse. Mr. Koester was the husband of the school’s physical education teacher. Watching the two of them interact - in their joking manner somewhat reminiscent of our own Bill Pearson’s humor – as he’d pop in to say “hi” during PE classes throughout my 6 years at North Star Elementary in Colorado, and then in my final year when she would occasionally be waiting for him in the hallway at the start of lunchtime, showed me a way of families working together that has shaped my own relationship with my husband nearly 2 decades later. I also honor and remember Mr. King, to whom I wasn’t assigned, who took me into his class’s embrace when one of his students, a friend of mine, was killed by a drunk driver in 5 th grade. His kindness started to heal my torn young soul, though it didn’t stop me from pouring every drop of alcohol down the drain when I got home. He listened when I spoke of the pain and fear I had that something like what happened to my friend’s family could happen to my household, where I only had my mother in the surrounding hundreds of miles. I see similarities of spirit between Mr. King and Jeffrey Lee, in the way he always leaves anyone he speaks to feel heard.
So, where has this lead me? Well, for a long time it lead me to really ignore the third Sunday in June as just another date on the calendar, sometimes in the last decade of couplehood remembering to send off cards to Garvin’s father and my own. Father’s Day really didn’t become a solid concept for me until two years ago, when Garvin got to celebrate his first Father’s Day as a dad before I got to celebrate my first Mother’s Day as a mom, since Liam was born between the two marks on the calendar. When I was young, I worried that I would follow the usual trend and marry someone like my opposite-gendered parent, but looking at my husband the similarities between the two men, my own father and my son’s father, are extremely limited – they’re both English-speaking men who married in their twenties and had their first child at the age of 27, and both of them are fond of science fiction and modern technology gizmos. But the similarities pretty much end there. Believe it or not, it actually wasn’t until I started thinking about what could I, someone who grew up with an absentee father, have to say in front of a church on Father’s Day, that it dawned on me. I did marry my surrogate opposite-sex parent. I married a teacher. May he go on to teach his own students, and our son, much more than just the information covered in their textbooks. Our own children, and his students at school, couldn’t ask for a better role model.
When in distress, go statistical
I'm such a Hermione.
Anyway, analysis of stuff going on inside my head since the news of the last post.
From the dates of the emails my uncle forwarded me, it looks like my sister wasn't released from the hospital for at least 3 days after the birth, which suggests she may have been the 3rd of my generation to birth via c-section (out of 4 of us thus far to have children). The baby is the 5th child of it's generation on that side of the family (as far as I know), and the one I'm carrying now will be the 6th (again, as far as I know). Liam was the 3rd born of his generation, but the first to be born vaginally (and also the first to be born in wedlock). One of my cousins who had a c-section (actually the first to birth of my generation) has since had a second child via VBAC (and had married her firstborn's father in between births).
So, as long as I'm not missing someone (I do also have male cousins and a brother, who presumably could have impregnated a girl that I'm not aware of - there are 15 members of my generation on that side of the family, 7 of us are female and one of the females is mildly mentally retarded, 3 of the girls are daughters of the uncle who informed me of my niece so I'm pretty sure if he'd had another grandchild he would have mentioned it on the phone, his eldest daughter - my only cousin older than I am - has been married for a few years now), and presuming that I'm able to birth this child as easily as I did Liam, and if I'm right about my sister's situation... out of the 6 members of Liam's generation, 3 were c-sections (50% section rate). All three of the other mothers of my generation were also 20-21 years old when their first babies were born (I was 27 when Liam was born). And all three of them had the constant presence of their fathers in their lives throughout their childhood (two of them are products of "intact" parental marriages and the other cousin has a very actively involved father).
I'm just marveling at the statistics a bit more because I don't fit in with them than any judgmental thing about unwed mothers or anything like that (heck, my mom had her second kid out of wedlock... my only real issue with it is how much more of a struggle it makes everything).
Another interesting factoid... of the 6 kids in Liam's generation, 5 are multiracial (apparently the father of my niece is Hispanic, and one of the cousins that has kids is herself half Puerto Rican, her kids' father is Mexican). Considering my paternal grandfather had a hissy fit and disowned my aunt for a couple years over her relationship with said Puerto Rican uncle (to whom she is still married ~30 years later, mind you - out of the 6 kids in my dad's generation only the two girls are still on their first marriages... 1 of the boys never married and my dad is on his second marriage, which has lasted ~27 years now)... I find it a little ironic that the majority of the great-grandchildren (thus far) of this guy are multiracial. This is my dad's dad, so you see, my dad comes by his dickwadness honestly at least. Like I mentioned in my comment response to Serena, we're taught how to cut one another out of our lives early and well in this family.
Oh, and since I blogged about it before... another interesting note. I've not cried about this finding out I'm an aunt thing. I'm a little surprised about that, since at this point the hormones have me crying over random commercials on prime time television. It's a dull ache but not the stabbing pain I thought it might be. I'm angry, but not surprised enough to be upset I guess. My dispassionate response at the moment is making me wonder how I'd have taken it if I'd heard a member of that side of the family died instead of being born.
Anyway, analysis of stuff going on inside my head since the news of the last post.
From the dates of the emails my uncle forwarded me, it looks like my sister wasn't released from the hospital for at least 3 days after the birth, which suggests she may have been the 3rd of my generation to birth via c-section (out of 4 of us thus far to have children). The baby is the 5th child of it's generation on that side of the family (as far as I know), and the one I'm carrying now will be the 6th (again, as far as I know). Liam was the 3rd born of his generation, but the first to be born vaginally (and also the first to be born in wedlock). One of my cousins who had a c-section (actually the first to birth of my generation) has since had a second child via VBAC (and had married her firstborn's father in between births).
So, as long as I'm not missing someone (I do also have male cousins and a brother, who presumably could have impregnated a girl that I'm not aware of - there are 15 members of my generation on that side of the family, 7 of us are female and one of the females is mildly mentally retarded, 3 of the girls are daughters of the uncle who informed me of my niece so I'm pretty sure if he'd had another grandchild he would have mentioned it on the phone, his eldest daughter - my only cousin older than I am - has been married for a few years now), and presuming that I'm able to birth this child as easily as I did Liam, and if I'm right about my sister's situation... out of the 6 members of Liam's generation, 3 were c-sections (50% section rate). All three of the other mothers of my generation were also 20-21 years old when their first babies were born (I was 27 when Liam was born). And all three of them had the constant presence of their fathers in their lives throughout their childhood (two of them are products of "intact" parental marriages and the other cousin has a very actively involved father).
I'm just marveling at the statistics a bit more because I don't fit in with them than any judgmental thing about unwed mothers or anything like that (heck, my mom had her second kid out of wedlock... my only real issue with it is how much more of a struggle it makes everything).
Another interesting factoid... of the 6 kids in Liam's generation, 5 are multiracial (apparently the father of my niece is Hispanic, and one of the cousins that has kids is herself half Puerto Rican, her kids' father is Mexican). Considering my paternal grandfather had a hissy fit and disowned my aunt for a couple years over her relationship with said Puerto Rican uncle (to whom she is still married ~30 years later, mind you - out of the 6 kids in my dad's generation only the two girls are still on their first marriages... 1 of the boys never married and my dad is on his second marriage, which has lasted ~27 years now)... I find it a little ironic that the majority of the great-grandchildren (thus far) of this guy are multiracial. This is my dad's dad, so you see, my dad comes by his dickwadness honestly at least. Like I mentioned in my comment response to Serena, we're taught how to cut one another out of our lives early and well in this family.
Oh, and since I blogged about it before... another interesting note. I've not cried about this finding out I'm an aunt thing. I'm a little surprised about that, since at this point the hormones have me crying over random commercials on prime time television. It's a dull ache but not the stabbing pain I thought it might be. I'm angry, but not surprised enough to be upset I guess. My dispassionate response at the moment is making me wonder how I'd have taken it if I'd heard a member of that side of the family died instead of being born.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Apparently I'm an aunt - or reason number 2349873450725 my father is a dickwad
So I just got off the phone with my uncle in Virginia, whose middle daughter is getting married this Saturday (obviously we can't make it to the wedding). We had a nice conversation about why my father hasn't seen his grandson since June 2004, and it came up in conversation that apparently my sister had a baby girl on October 25, 2006. Born right around when I was starting to suspect I was pregnant this time around (I tested positive for pregnancy at home 2 days later). My uncle forwarded on the emails with tons of pictures, my father and his wife are apparently "SOOOOOOOOOO" thrilled with their little granddaughter (not kidding, the emails that were allegedly coming from my father's email address had the extra vowel thing like that going on, but they were signed with both his and his wife's names and I'm willing to bet that she wrote them because I've known her to use his email address before even though she has her own). How nice that they're celebrating when they've not bothered to even CALL me and see how we're doing, and there was clearly no attempt to include me in the email they sent out. Yes, he has my email address. He has my mother's phone number. He made no attempt.
Fuck him.
Seriously. Why do I bother feeling a sense of loss over not having this jackass in my life? I really do sometimes think my kids are better off believing that the majority of that side of the family all died in a train wreck or something. I've been wondering how I'm going to explain the absence of all these people from our lives that are in our wedding pictures, especially the ones that are clearly "extra important people" (i.e. my dad's other two kids, my dad) in the pictures that have very few people in them. I was fascinated by my parents' wedding album in early childhood, I remember pulling it out and thumbing through it even though my parents had been divorced for years by that point (they divorced when I was 2 1/2). That's the major concern I have. How am I going to explain this dickwad's absence to my kids? I just know the day isn't too far off when Liam asks me "who is that man putting a necklace on you, Mama?"
Fucking dickwad. It's a shame I'm too old to claim to have been a sperm bank baby.
Fuck him.
Seriously. Why do I bother feeling a sense of loss over not having this jackass in my life? I really do sometimes think my kids are better off believing that the majority of that side of the family all died in a train wreck or something. I've been wondering how I'm going to explain the absence of all these people from our lives that are in our wedding pictures, especially the ones that are clearly "extra important people" (i.e. my dad's other two kids, my dad) in the pictures that have very few people in them. I was fascinated by my parents' wedding album in early childhood, I remember pulling it out and thumbing through it even though my parents had been divorced for years by that point (they divorced when I was 2 1/2). That's the major concern I have. How am I going to explain this dickwad's absence to my kids? I just know the day isn't too far off when Liam asks me "who is that man putting a necklace on you, Mama?"
Fucking dickwad. It's a shame I'm too old to claim to have been a sperm bank baby.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Awake too early and really pissed at my spouse
You know, there's a REASON I tell the guy to do things a certain way. Like advising him to discuss Chinese names for this baby back in late February, before his father went to visit his brothers (who speak English better than he does), instead of being an idiot like last time and avoiding the subject until my last month of pregnancy. But no. Mister Conflict-Avoidant couldn't quite seem to bring up the discussion until the last few days, when I'm even CLOSER to my due date than I was when we had the big blow up about Liam's Chinese name (for those who don't already know, the first time they got Garvin's cousin to email me an attempt at spelling it for the birth certificate, the email I got said my firstborn son's name should be Charmin. Yes, exactly like the toilet paper. And it resulted in a big screaming argument over long-distance phone lines and me throwing slippers and such at walls until *I*, in all my resplendant late pregnancy patience, suggested we go with the Mandarin spelling and pronounciation instead, which is how the child came to have Zhuo-Ming on his birth certificate instead of a brand of toilet paper since his DADDY wouldn't fucking stand up and say "NO" to his grandfather about this).
So what's the problem? This time the suggestion for the second character (first is determined by generation) is Yin. For boy or girl. The way that the English-to-Cantonese websites spell the boy version is Cheuk-Yin. Not so bad, right? Here's the problem. When my fluent-Cantonese-speaking in-laws say Liam's name in Cantonese - Cheuk-Ming - it sounds to my English ears like "Chirk-min(g)" (the g is barely there). Now let's say it together with Yin instead of Ming... "Chirk-yin"... sounds an awful lot like "chicken" to me, especially after watching way too much Robot Chicken before going to bed last night (hey, it was the Star Wars special. Twice) and waking up to release a lot more liquid than I usually do into the toilet at 5am, making me wonder if I've sprung a little bit of a amno leak. Then going back to bed and having the baby get the hiccups... which distinctly felt like pecking at my lower uterus.
So I kicked Garvin out of bed at about 5:45 in tears after repeatedly trying to go back to sleep only to visualize giving birth to a baby boy covered in downy little white feathers every time I closed my eyes (ah, the joys of a pregnant brain). His dad is usually up at 5am anyway, I told Garvin that if *I* can't sleep because of something that is quite distinctively and avoidably his fault, there's no fucking way in hell he gets to sleep in either. He's downstairs now talking to his dad (maybe his mom too, don't know if she went into work early today or not). I don't feel the need to be part of the conversation but I swear, if he doesn't come back with some acceptable-to-English-ears options, if this baby is a boy his middle name will be Charles (after my grand-uncle who was the family photographer - sorry, Uncle Chuck, but I don't like your name enough for a first name). And I'm NOT going through the fuss of changing the name birth certificate later. The argument last time about "It's a good name in Chinese" stamp-stamp-stamp-pout-pout (from Garvin's father's end of the conversation - that was about all he'd say on the subject) doesn't hold water. They call Liam by his Cantonese name in public pretty much at every opportunity. I'm NOT having them call my second son what sounds like "chicken" in public. The kid's not growing up in Hong Kong, it's growing up in a ~95% native-English-speaking suburb of Cleveland (and that other very small minority of non-native English speakers are mostly Spanish speakers - if there are more than a handful of non-US-born Asian families in Lakewood I'd be surprised, from what I remember the census said there were ~800 Asians total in the suburb, quite likely including hapas like our kids).
The fact that Garvin's parents WON'T be refering to a second grandson by his English nickname doesn't help matters at all - the name we have picked out is Delano, Del for short... well... Del sounds like the Cantonese word for "throw away" (aka disposable). So they'll likely be relying on the Chinese name even more than they do for Liam (who I'd estimate gets called Cheuk-Ming about a quarter of the time by them, when they're just around the house... when we went out to lunch with their Cantonese-speaking friends from church, it was more like 80% of the time at least).
I consider myself a very patient preggo that my husband is not severely bruised at this point in time. I didn't even smack him repeatedly with the pillow. Especially considering that Liam was projectile vomiting last night for no decernable reason, setting off the mama hormones and preggo nose quite nicely, part of the reason that I didn't get to sleep until after 1:30am in the first place... so all this is on about 3.5hrs sleep (minus a bathroom trip and wake-up-in-pain-with-a-shin-splint in there somewhere).
So what's the problem? This time the suggestion for the second character (first is determined by generation) is Yin. For boy or girl. The way that the English-to-Cantonese websites spell the boy version is Cheuk-Yin. Not so bad, right? Here's the problem. When my fluent-Cantonese-speaking in-laws say Liam's name in Cantonese - Cheuk-Ming - it sounds to my English ears like "Chirk-min(g)" (the g is barely there). Now let's say it together with Yin instead of Ming... "Chirk-yin"... sounds an awful lot like "chicken" to me, especially after watching way too much Robot Chicken before going to bed last night (hey, it was the Star Wars special. Twice) and waking up to release a lot more liquid than I usually do into the toilet at 5am, making me wonder if I've sprung a little bit of a amno leak. Then going back to bed and having the baby get the hiccups... which distinctly felt like pecking at my lower uterus.
So I kicked Garvin out of bed at about 5:45 in tears after repeatedly trying to go back to sleep only to visualize giving birth to a baby boy covered in downy little white feathers every time I closed my eyes (ah, the joys of a pregnant brain). His dad is usually up at 5am anyway, I told Garvin that if *I* can't sleep because of something that is quite distinctively and avoidably his fault, there's no fucking way in hell he gets to sleep in either. He's downstairs now talking to his dad (maybe his mom too, don't know if she went into work early today or not). I don't feel the need to be part of the conversation but I swear, if he doesn't come back with some acceptable-to-English-ears options, if this baby is a boy his middle name will be Charles (after my grand-uncle who was the family photographer - sorry, Uncle Chuck, but I don't like your name enough for a first name). And I'm NOT going through the fuss of changing the name birth certificate later. The argument last time about "It's a good name in Chinese" stamp-stamp-stamp-pout-pout (from Garvin's father's end of the conversation - that was about all he'd say on the subject) doesn't hold water. They call Liam by his Cantonese name in public pretty much at every opportunity. I'm NOT having them call my second son what sounds like "chicken" in public. The kid's not growing up in Hong Kong, it's growing up in a ~95% native-English-speaking suburb of Cleveland (and that other very small minority of non-native English speakers are mostly Spanish speakers - if there are more than a handful of non-US-born Asian families in Lakewood I'd be surprised, from what I remember the census said there were ~800 Asians total in the suburb, quite likely including hapas like our kids).
The fact that Garvin's parents WON'T be refering to a second grandson by his English nickname doesn't help matters at all - the name we have picked out is Delano, Del for short... well... Del sounds like the Cantonese word for "throw away" (aka disposable). So they'll likely be relying on the Chinese name even more than they do for Liam (who I'd estimate gets called Cheuk-Ming about a quarter of the time by them, when they're just around the house... when we went out to lunch with their Cantonese-speaking friends from church, it was more like 80% of the time at least).
I consider myself a very patient preggo that my husband is not severely bruised at this point in time. I didn't even smack him repeatedly with the pillow. Especially considering that Liam was projectile vomiting last night for no decernable reason, setting off the mama hormones and preggo nose quite nicely, part of the reason that I didn't get to sleep until after 1:30am in the first place... so all this is on about 3.5hrs sleep (minus a bathroom trip and wake-up-in-pain-with-a-shin-splint in there somewhere).
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Yup, still pregnant
Just had a bit of a busy week "organizing" (what a misnomer when it comes to something I do, eh?) a Potter-Fest at church yesterday, so I've been non-responsive to unrelated emails and haven't posted in the flurry of last-minute preparations (such as making Questionable Quality Quidditch Supplies and a few dozen chocolate frogs and such).
Just realized that some folks don't know about (and a couple other reader/lurkers need to update their email addresses with) the yahoo group I set up when I was expecting Liam. If you'd like an email notification when the baby is born, you can subscribe to the email list right here:
The group is set to only allow moderators to post and any replies go to the list owner (me) so you won't get spam through it. I'm planning to make folks who are/plan to be present for the birth into moderators so any of them can send off an email to the group when they've got a free hand to do so (assuming that Garvin and my hands will be rather busy with the then-two extrauterine kiddos). I'll post the full birth story here so that folks who DON'T want the gorey details on that email list just get the basic stats (tho I'm considering making the folks with blogger accounts that are likely to be here for the birth temporary editors or whatever it is on this blog so they can post the gorey details here from their perspective if they'd like ;) ). If only Blogger had the feature like LJ does that you can hide part of the post so people have to click on it to get the "spoiler" information or whatever... I think there's a way to do it but I haven't figured it out yet. Whatever.
Feet are very swollen, pelvis is unthrilled with the abuse I've been putting it through and I keep getting charlie horses at night (3x last night, not fun, poor Garvin got screamed at for not using the right technique to help because it wound up further pissing off my psoas muscle in the process - I yelled at him more last night than I did during the entire 5 days of labor with Liam I think). Other than that the baby and I are fine. Baby's been getting hiccups at least once a day noticably lately and is wiggling it's knees and feet in my ribs as I type this.
Any day now, little one, any day now.
Just realized that some folks don't know about (and a couple other reader/lurkers need to update their email addresses with) the yahoo group I set up when I was expecting Liam. If you'd like an email notification when the baby is born, you can subscribe to the email list right here:
The group is set to only allow moderators to post and any replies go to the list owner (me) so you won't get spam through it. I'm planning to make folks who are/plan to be present for the birth into moderators so any of them can send off an email to the group when they've got a free hand to do so (assuming that Garvin and my hands will be rather busy with the then-two extrauterine kiddos). I'll post the full birth story here so that folks who DON'T want the gorey details on that email list just get the basic stats (tho I'm considering making the folks with blogger accounts that are likely to be here for the birth temporary editors or whatever it is on this blog so they can post the gorey details here from their perspective if they'd like ;) ). If only Blogger had the feature like LJ does that you can hide part of the post so people have to click on it to get the "spoiler" information or whatever... I think there's a way to do it but I haven't figured it out yet. Whatever.
Feet are very swollen, pelvis is unthrilled with the abuse I've been putting it through and I keep getting charlie horses at night (3x last night, not fun, poor Garvin got screamed at for not using the right technique to help because it wound up further pissing off my psoas muscle in the process - I yelled at him more last night than I did during the entire 5 days of labor with Liam I think). Other than that the baby and I are fine. Baby's been getting hiccups at least once a day noticably lately and is wiggling it's knees and feet in my ribs as I type this.
Any day now, little one, any day now.
Friday, June 01, 2007
Breastfeeding in public
Probably getting more obsessed with this concept since I'll be doing it again so soon (when Liam could handle finger foods I "weaned" him from nursing in public because it was simply too hard on my arms/back, so it's been probably almost 2 years since I've nursed in public regularly). I was sorting through pictures to upload to our online photo gallery and came across many pictures of Liam nursing (gee, considering the percentage of his time he spent doing it, big surprise there). None of them have us covered, and the ones in public places you pretty much have to KNOW what you're looking for to realize what you're seeing (which is part of the argument I have with "certain people who shall remain nameless" about how "no one ever does THAT in the US" - yes, they do, you just look right past them without realizing it...)
So I ask you, which is more discreet... this type of breastfeeding in public:
(both of the above images are swiped from commercial websites wanting to sell you these nursing covers, which I have problems with on two counts - one, it furthers the idea that breastfeeding is something that should be hidden and hence bottlefeeding is more "convenient" and two, it's just another way to commercialize motherhood and make money off of people's insecurities, so I'm being evil and not linking to them. After looking through a few hundred results of google images for "breastfeeding blanket", "breastfeeding cover", and "breastfeeding drape" I couldn't find a SINGLE NON-COMMERCIAL PICTURE of a mother covering herself with a blanket to nurse - surprise surprise).
Or are these more discrete:
(funny, i think I'm wearing the same outfit both times, the first one he's less than a month old because that was when we still lived in Virginia, the second one he's about 2 months old at the Feast of the Assumption)
Yes, I'm using a sling in both pictures, which adds to the ease of being discrete, but I've shown an equal amount of skin when not using a sling, just can't find those pictures (the one that wound up in the Plain Dealer of me nursing Liam at the CWRU bookstore would be an example).
I swear I'm going to take one of the five trillion receiving blankets we have around here and write on it in big red letters "HEY LOOK I'M BREASTFEEDING!" and keep that in the diaper bag in case anyone gives me crap this time, see if that makes them more "comfortable".. or at least it'd be fun for a photo-op ;) I've got a couple lactivist pictures that I want to take floating in my mind as it is. I'll post them here when I do them (one of them will probably be in the coming weeks while I'm still pregnant).
So I ask you, which is more discreet... this type of breastfeeding in public:
(both of the above images are swiped from commercial websites wanting to sell you these nursing covers, which I have problems with on two counts - one, it furthers the idea that breastfeeding is something that should be hidden and hence bottlefeeding is more "convenient" and two, it's just another way to commercialize motherhood and make money off of people's insecurities, so I'm being evil and not linking to them. After looking through a few hundred results of google images for "breastfeeding blanket", "breastfeeding cover", and "breastfeeding drape" I couldn't find a SINGLE NON-COMMERCIAL PICTURE of a mother covering herself with a blanket to nurse - surprise surprise).
Or are these more discrete:
(funny, i think I'm wearing the same outfit both times, the first one he's less than a month old because that was when we still lived in Virginia, the second one he's about 2 months old at the Feast of the Assumption)
Yes, I'm using a sling in both pictures, which adds to the ease of being discrete, but I've shown an equal amount of skin when not using a sling, just can't find those pictures (the one that wound up in the Plain Dealer of me nursing Liam at the CWRU bookstore would be an example).
I swear I'm going to take one of the five trillion receiving blankets we have around here and write on it in big red letters "HEY LOOK I'M BREASTFEEDING!" and keep that in the diaper bag in case anyone gives me crap this time, see if that makes them more "comfortable".. or at least it'd be fun for a photo-op ;) I've got a couple lactivist pictures that I want to take floating in my mind as it is. I'll post them here when I do them (one of them will probably be in the coming weeks while I'm still pregnant).
A good reason NOT to use those "private nursing areas" in malls
Breastfeeding mother groped in mall
In Australia, a mom of a newborn was approached and sexually assaulted by some sicko in one of those "family rooms" that "breastfeeding friendly" retail locations are becoming increasingly fond of. (granted, the baby was a WEEK OLD and Mama may have still been adjusting to the whole task of breastfeeding and desired the extra privacy, and this particular instance the room is also a baby changing room so she may have just been multitasking - frequently right after needing to be changed a newborn needs to nurse, after all, so I totally give her the benefit of the doubt)
Think about it, if she'd been sitting out in a chair in the middle of the mall, would this have happened? Most likely not, or at least someone could have come to her aid sooner.
If malls really want to have those separate areas, they need to make them MUCH more secure for moms out by themselves, such as by stationing a security guard nearby and/or having cameras WITH AUDIO that someone is PAYING ATTENTION TO installed, in case of such an event. The one example locally of such a separate room that I can call to mind (Great Northern Mall, North Olmsted, Ohio) is set WAY back down a LONG, infrequently used by non-parents hallway between a major department store and the side of some other stores. A woman screaming for help in such a place would only be heard if someone happened to be in the hallway about to enter, or possibly through the wall to the store next to the room, but would they know where the call was coming from? Would they react? The social psychologist in me knows human nature too well to think they would jump to the rescue, even if they DID realize where the call for help was coming from - human nature assumes "someone else" will do it, especially in a place with paid security staff.
This is why I will NEVER use one of those rooms off all by themselves, without another adult with me. Too vulnerable. I'd rather nurse right out in the open in the middle of the main hallway where the staff can see if someone is harrassing or ASSAULTING me! And I'll change diapers in the regular restroom, thankyouverymuch, which have much higher traffic than those special rooms do. Even at Babies R Us kind of stores. THIS is why we need to demistify breastfeeding and work to make it common and acceptable to do it in public instead of locked off in "private" areas.
In Australia, a mom of a newborn was approached and sexually assaulted by some sicko in one of those "family rooms" that "breastfeeding friendly" retail locations are becoming increasingly fond of. (granted, the baby was a WEEK OLD and Mama may have still been adjusting to the whole task of breastfeeding and desired the extra privacy, and this particular instance the room is also a baby changing room so she may have just been multitasking - frequently right after needing to be changed a newborn needs to nurse, after all, so I totally give her the benefit of the doubt)
Think about it, if she'd been sitting out in a chair in the middle of the mall, would this have happened? Most likely not, or at least someone could have come to her aid sooner.
If malls really want to have those separate areas, they need to make them MUCH more secure for moms out by themselves, such as by stationing a security guard nearby and/or having cameras WITH AUDIO that someone is PAYING ATTENTION TO installed, in case of such an event. The one example locally of such a separate room that I can call to mind (Great Northern Mall, North Olmsted, Ohio) is set WAY back down a LONG, infrequently used by non-parents hallway between a major department store and the side of some other stores. A woman screaming for help in such a place would only be heard if someone happened to be in the hallway about to enter, or possibly through the wall to the store next to the room, but would they know where the call was coming from? Would they react? The social psychologist in me knows human nature too well to think they would jump to the rescue, even if they DID realize where the call for help was coming from - human nature assumes "someone else" will do it, especially in a place with paid security staff.
This is why I will NEVER use one of those rooms off all by themselves, without another adult with me. Too vulnerable. I'd rather nurse right out in the open in the middle of the main hallway where the staff can see if someone is harrassing or ASSAULTING me! And I'll change diapers in the regular restroom, thankyouverymuch, which have much higher traffic than those special rooms do. Even at Babies R Us kind of stores. THIS is why we need to demistify breastfeeding and work to make it common and acceptable to do it in public instead of locked off in "private" areas.
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