A tough day as a nursing mum

Yesterday was a day that I have been dreading for some time: my first real day back at work. I'd already been in for a few meetings and things but this was the real thing! The gods of good timing were fortunately shining upon us as it just so happened to be sports day, so my newly appointed stay-at-home-husband would be able to hang out in the vicinity for the morning, watching the two middle squidges skipping, jumping and running. I was hoping I could just take my breaks at breastfeeding time instead of over lunch, and just sit on the sidelines of the sports day with all the other parents. But it did make me wonder about how this would go down.

I was worried that others might view my nursing as a nuisance. That the children in the playground should be protected against seeing something so vile and disgusting as feeding a baby when it is hungry. True, may of the children in our great city have never seen a bare breast except for the ones in page three of Daddy or Grandad's newspaper. They may have grown up in families thinking that breastfeeding is something exclusive to wierd hippys with no sense of the modern world with it's "conveniences" like powdered cows milk and nice silicone and plastic bottles (which of course have to be carefully sterilised). But I feel like this: Yes of course formula has its place, but shouldn't we be teaching our children that nursing our babies with what god provided us with is the norm?

I so want to continue feeding for as long as possible despite me working, as I truly believe that every drop of the stuff counts. Colleagues have tried to reassure me that she will be ok on formula as it is more or less the same, just as good etc, but the fact is it is not. Formula might make their little tummies equally full but it does not protect against bugs, help digestion and growth by tailoring the nutrients in each feed, combat athsma and excema, reduce the risk of SIDS, help guard mum against breast and ovarian cancers, and baby against obesity and high cholesterol in later life, heck it is not even free nor is it on tap at the right temperature as and when required!

I was so happy a few weeks ago when a foreign-tongued lady, Russian I think, guided her two toddlers over to me in the health centre waiting room, so they could look at the baby nursing. It would make my day if the same thing happened in the school playground.

(P.S. When I googled "benefits of breastmilk" two of the top links were from the pages of Aptimil and Cow and Gate making a vain attempt at comparing artificial milk to the real thing. Is it any wonder the UK has hangups?)