Rape is a strong word. It is an act of violence. It is criminal offense.
It is most often against women. The feelings are deep, lifelong and painful.
Years later you can talk about the experience and feel the same emotions,
the fear, the helplessness.
Okay, now find me another word that is exactly as strong to call what is
happening to women in birth and breastfeeding 'help' in hospitals and I will use
it. I could use a word to offer them so they can put a name to it. When I am
talking to women, they are crying and the words they use are fear, pain,
helplessness, overpowered, defeated, degraded. Some of these women have been
raped, they recognize the feelings well. I think we do need to pay attention
to what is happening to women today because it is hurting them and hurting
their babies. We need to remember our statistics about women and abuse and
assume the women we are working with have likely suffered some form of abuse and
proceed with utmost respect and gentleness. The sad thing, many women just
assume this type of treatment was necessary, and to add to their other
feelings they also feel guilt for feeling the way they do about something that just
had to be done to them....it was for their own good, for their babies own
good, and they should not be so upset about it. How wrong is that for a
woman...to feel so wrong at a time in her life when she should feel so wonderful?
I understand we want to reserve certain words for what they are meant for.
But inappropriate touch is not a strong enough expression of what happens and
it certainly does not meet the emotions it brings up in the women who
experience it. The original post said the 'mother' used this word to express what
it felt like. She is not the first. I have had mothers use that word to
describe how they felt, I have used it when I hear the story shared and the
mother acts like it was all her fault....and she should have done more to stop
it, and if only she wasn't doing 'fill in the blank'....so much like a rape
victim blaming herself for the violence against her. Maybe the mom didn't use a
word we like, but it was her word, her feelings, and what we should be
talking about is not how wrong that word is, but how horrible that it is how a new
mother felt when being helped to feed her baby.
Take care,
Pam MazzellaDiBosco, IBCLC, RLC
Florida
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