Fellow Lactneters,
I thought that I would let you know of an experince that I had last week.
I was in the final stages of getting my business off and running, but had
to get back on the Hamster wheel to get all of the proper licenses and
regulatory numbers filed with the governmental agencies in my city, parish
(county), state, and federal.  I went to the state building to get my
state sales tax number.  Not being familiar with the building, I asked a
worker if I was in the correct area.  She asked me what type of business I
was starting, I told her that it was a Lactation Consulting business, she
asked me what that was... I told her that when mothers were having
difficulty breastfeeding their babies, they could call me and I would
help.  I was so surprised by what happened next...  She started to laugh
and ridicule my business, then she started announcing to other workers
what she just heard, and I could hear in their tone that they just
couldn't beleive that someone would be so silly to start a business like
that.  As I was sitting there, hearing them cackle about this, I was
looking at the "suggestion" box, and wondered where I could get a form to
fill out to let their bosses know of their inapproprate behavior.  Before
I could find one, I was called back to the desk to start the procedure.
This woman also chuckled about what the business objective was, which put
me even more on the defensive.  I just clammed up and let her talk... (My
mom always told me to keep my mouth shut if I didn't have anything nice to
say! until I could reply calmly).  She went on to say how she "tried that"
(bf), but it "hurt" too much, and she wasn't going to go through that much
pain every few hours.  I empathised with her, and told her that I was
sorry that there wasn't anyone there to help her with her breastfeeding,
that she shouldn't have fell through the cracks.  When I told her that it
shouldn't hurt, she looked amazed.  I went on with a thought I remembered
from Lactnet... "Our species would have died off long ago if bf hurt".
And that in todays society, when our mothers, aunts, and friends didn't
bf, we have no one to ask questions or even observe, and that women
sometimes need help, and that was what I was going to do.  She then
started asking the first worker about bf her child, she too stopped for
some simple reason.  I explained how a LC could have helped her too, and
that I was sorry that society failed her.  I couldn't believe that by the
end of the process, I had 3 women who were wishing me well on my new
adventure in the business world!  So... there it goes, I learned that
sometimes you just need to keep your mouth shut for a while, and others
will see value in areas where they never would have if I had been
defensive or rude.

Brenda Dalton RNC IBCLC
Lactation Resource Center
NW Louisiana

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