As most of you know I just had an adorable little girl. Ever since I pooped this little monster out of by baby hole I've discovered a thousand more stupid things that I hate but have been refraining from writing about them all in the interest of this not becoming the bitchy mom blog. My silence, however, ends here.
I never realized how much our culture demonizes women who choose to formula feed their children until I had one of my own. I'm going to try and tell the back story without any of the gory details, I don't want to have to deal with the guilt of having scared one of you sterile. (If you want to know you can ask me, but seriously, it will make you terrified of ever going to the hospital again.) Long story short, after her birth because of some complete incompetence on behalf of some medical "professionals" I ended up with a bad infection that because of some more medical incompetence didn't get caught or treated for more then a month. Because of complications from said infections I was not able to breast feed. It was sad, but I got over it... at least I would have gotten over it if nosy middle aged women didn't continue to rub it in my face all the f-ing time.
When did it become any ones business anyway? 'What are you doing with your boobs these days' has become the part of the standard line of new baby questions, everyone who sees her "Ohh! She's so cute! (standard question #1) How old is she? (standard question #2) Is she a good sleeper? (standard question #3) Are you breast feeding?" This isn't women I know either, this is random women in the grocery store, this is women from church that I recognise but don't actually know the names of. When I tell them that no, I'm not breast feeding, they either purse their lips and give me this disappointed look that seems to say 'Well I'm sorry you don't love your child enough to give them the best.' or they stare in horror and me and exclaim "Why!"
None of your damn business, that's why! There isn't a way to answer that question even if I wanted to because the only thing more awkward then being asked by a near stranger what's happening with your boobs is having to answer with a story about what's going on with your vagina and it's healing process. And you know what, plenty of children have grown up just fine on formula... I myself was never breast fed and it's pretty insulting when these women start quoting studies to me on how child who don't have mothers who care enough to breast feed them end up lazy brained. Unless I'm shaking them in your husband's face, what I choose to do with my titties is none of your concern! And the most frustrating of all is that I really wanted to breast feed and I have a good explanation for why I'm not, but I shouldn't have to explain it to anyone!
Dear world, yes I am bottle feeding my child, and no, that doesn't make me a bad mother. You can shove your pretentious breast feeding judgements up your ass.
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Ya know, I was allergic to breast milk. It could have killed me they said. I grew up on formula.
ReplyDeleteI can drink regular milk now and I love it, but I don't think I am any 'slower' cause I was denied my mom's boob as a baby.
In fact, I grew up to be a decent structural engineer who also teaches 5 fitness classes a week, trains for 1/2 marathons and manages to see at least one friend everyday in a social setting.
I think I turned out just fine.
Tell them to mind their own damn business.
And I think you should post this to facebook. So all those mom's you wrote about in your earlier post can grimace :)