Dianne Oliver gives wise advice about this editorial on 'right' and 'wrong'
ways to be a mother - don't touch it, except to correct a factual error.  I
second the suggestion.  If the advice to pump and discard milk after
drinking one beer is indeed on the website referred to in the editorial, the
website editor should also be informed of the error.

Not long ago I had occasion to respond to something comparable in the press,
and the writer was actually touchingly grateful that I chose not to engage
in any polemicizing about her choices, but reacted as Dianne recommends.  My
response went to the writer and to the editor; it was not published but the
writer responded directly to me.  It ended up being one of the more
interesting and fruitful dialogues I have had with someone I didn't know,
and whose attitude to breastfeeding at first glance seemed very negative.
It wasn't, really, and we found a surprising amount of common ground, and I
learned LOTS about communicating without arousing defensiveness.  

If the piece I responded to had been in the genre of advice to mothers, I
would have handled it brutally.  But it was not; it was 'here is my
experience, and I am not finding it mentioned in any of the politically
correct books on mothering or breastfeeding, and it's my real-life story,
and what are any of you going to say about it?'  So, I pretended I was
talking to her one to one in my office, and I hope she found it half as
useful and eye-opening as I did.

Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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