I dream of boobs!

Lauren Derret - 9 Feb 16

I’m pretty sure that the very title of this blog puts a whole different idea into your mind than the one that I’m trying to convey……hold that thought…..

Let me explain. I was raised in a society whereby EVERYONE around me formula fed their babies. It went unquestioned and it was the ‘norm’, any images of boobs were only on the cover of ‘Razzle’ magazine (when porn was printed onto actual paper rather than at the touch of an ever available button). It was hard wired into my immature brain that to feed and nourish your baby you put water in a bottle with some white powder and shake vigorously.

I took the image I had seen on the cover of afore mentioned magazine (I had 2 older brothers, they weren’t that good at hiding their stash) and I filed that under seedy, I then took the images of babies who were milk drunk and full of powdery white ‘goodness’ and filed that under nurture.

When I went on to have my son at 23 I was very immature and uneducated in the natural approach to pregnancy, birth and babies, I went with the flow, I followed the patterns of what had gone on before, I got the epidural, I sterilised bottles and mixed up formula confident in the fact that this was just what you did.  I followed this unconscious practice with my following 2 children, still oblivious, still doing what I felt was as it should be.

And then I got pregnant again, later in life and more curious, asking more questions, finding more information.  I hired one of them doula women who introduced me to the idea of me breastfeeding. I COULD NOT get my head around the idea that my baby would feed from my boob? It felt wrong on every level, but, during my pregnancy we talked more, I read more, I watched more and I remember towards the end of pregnancy my loving doula saying to me “so, have you decided on how you will feed?” all I could come up with at that point was “I’ll have to see how I feel at the time” I still couldn’t make any promises my head just would not get in the game, but I was hoping that after my baby was born at home all au natural I would feel a desire to put him to my breast.

My birth was amazing, all went to plan largely thanks to the hypnobirthing I had learnt and my ever patient doula,  the time had come, he wanted a feed.  I felt empowered, I felt primal, I felt maternal and I put him to my breast.  This lasted about 2 seconds before I was screaming out “get him off, get him off” clearly I’m not proud of this reaction but my conscious brain kicked in and I freaked out, for me, it couldn’t have felt more wrong.

So why then do I dream, on quite a regular occasion, of breast feeding my son who is now almost 4? I wake after every one of these dreams and feel sad, so so terribly sad, on one occasion when he was around 9 months I actually thought about trying to put him to the breast to see what happened. I didn’t.  All my feelings and emotions surrounding the great feeding debate do not come out of guilt that my babies went without all the wonderful benefits of having my breast milk, they come from a place of sadness, a place of frustration, nobody had told me that I could express and use my milk from a bottle? Why had nobody told me? That would have been a solid option for me (I think? Hindsight is a wonderful thing)! I also come from a place whereby I feel cheated and damn fu*king angry with a society who think it’s ok to objectify boobs on Victoria Secrets posters 8 foot high but tells breastfeeding mothers ‘ewwww, put your tit away, you’re disgusting’ so, so damn angry!

I applaud breast feeding mothers and still hold a fascination when I see a women feeding from her breast (I see it a lot in my job) I have no hatred nor jealousy , just a natural curiosity as to why some mothers can and choose to breastfeed and some choose to formula feed. I know that the most important thing is to ‘feed the damn baby’ but feeding isn’t just about the well-being of the baby and nutritional values, mums matter too, it’s her choice how she feeds her baby and if for whatever reason she chooses formula feeding as her preferred choice then who are we to judge??

Let’s all support each other by understanding that nothing in life is black and white nor is it cut and dried, that behind every mother there is a story and she’s doing HER best with the tools she has been given.

#peaceout

Lauren Derret

I’m Lauren, mum of 4 humans, each with their very own birth story. Red wine drinker, keen blogger, trash tv watcher and pretty hard core potty mouth! But, with a good heart and a passion for setting lovely women like you onto a path towards a positive birthing experience, and we’ll have fun doing it; always a bonus! I teach The Wise Hippo Birthing Programme and am a Doula Uk recognised Doula

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