slow food parenting, part III

(part III of a IV-part series)

I spent much of my pregnancy dreading breastfeeding, both as ‘one more thing’ (How will I spend so many hours just sitting there?) and as vaguely unnatural (How can I let a baby put its mouth on my nipple?). Comfortable with the idea of other women breastfeeding, and committed to breastfeeding my own baby, I nonetheless cringed at imagining a baby at my breast. I grew up in a culture of bottle-feeding, where breasts are solely sexual; just as I never saw a birth before I gave birth, I never spent time with a breastfeeding mother before I nursed my son. In retrospect, my pregnancy might have been a little less anxious had I started out viewing breastfeeding through the lens of Slow Food rather than using the perspective of a culture I already considered wildly unbalanced. The transition I ultimately made, to satisfied and satisfying nurser, might have been easier to imagine if it had occurred to me to consider breastfeeding in the context of my values about food rather than my concerns about sex and work. After all, what food is more traditional and pleasurable than a mother’s milk? And what food tradition has been more endangered by a modern drive to absolute efficiency and control than breastfeeding?

Fortunately, the concrete realities of nursing soon helped me embrace its unavoidable Slowness. Early in my baby’s life, once my back and neck muscles relaxed from a long labor and my mom ran out to buy us a Boppy so we could prop ourselves up to nurse in comfort, I realized the amazing respite offered by breastfeeding—the incredible pleasure and sweet togetherness we shared as he ate at his own pace. I was fortunate in having an eager little gourmand who, with virtually no assistance or guidance, latched on and ate twice during the first hour of his life. And as so much of our life because a whirlwind of diaper changes and laundry, abrupt wakings, and ill-timed congratulatory phone calls, I grasped that my lack of control over breastfeeding was a saving grace rather than the imposition it had seemed in the abstract. It felt wonderful; my over-full breasts released, my soul filled with love, and my body relaxed under my baby’s warmth. It gave him such pleasure, too, as those lovely little “mmm” noises announced quite clearly. Rather than taking up time better spent in active tasks, it sometimes seemed to stop time so I could quietly adore my baby, stroking his feet and head or holding my hand against his so-soft back.

In fact, the reality of breastfeeding proved the opposite of my abstract concerns about it—because breastfeeding, like all food, is above all concrete. I may live in a culture that wishes I would feed my baby the efficient, scientific way (with formula we can measure by the ounce), but the experience of nursing has reminded me of my long-standing conviction that preparing and consuming food should serve values other than efficiency. And whether or not some people wished I would at least hide in the bathroom to breastfeed, my child’s hunger and appreciation stood as constant, tangible reminders that he enjoys his meals and my body just like I enjoy artisanal cheeses or local summer tomatoes—that with each feeding, this little boy was developing a positive relationship with food.

I am not about to suggest that our thousands of breastfeeding sessions were uniformly blissful and focused, or even that I wish they had been. I usually needed to work while I nursed, and sometimes the most soothing thing I could do for myself was cross a little task off my long to-do list; I responded to many, many students’ e-mails while holding my baby in one arm. I’ve hoped he would keep eating just a few more minutes so I could finish reading an article or paying a bill. And I’ve sat there during an unexpectedly long meal, feeling helplessly pinned, just wishing I could get up and pee. But what pleasure we both received from my more attentive moments! Understanding that my child was experiencing a meal (not merely gathering nutrients or performing some vaguely sexual bodily function) prompted me to set aside at least part of each feeding for shared pleasure. From the very beginning, my baby brought a spirit of appreciation and attentiveness to breastfeeding; it took me a while to realize how important it was for me to do the same.