As a nurse as well, it took me a long time to change my thinking from "always doing to just being".  Intervention, rules and strict guidelines are the "comfort zone" for most medical professionals because this is how we are taught and many patients lives depend on that way of thinking. 

But this does not bode well for birthing babies or breastfeeding.  Re-training a mindset is very difficult.  These are people who are trained to deal with conditions/illness where the body IS broken or something HAS gone wrong. (trust me, I know, was an ER nurse for 30 yrs as well) So what has happened is something simple and natural has been contorted to fit the system of intervention, monitoring, calculating and quantifying.  That's what I think she is referring to as "the professionalism of breastfeeding" which I think it is more the "medicalization of breastfeeding"

So now new parents are expecting breastfeeding "experts" when they go to the hospital (why shouldn't they) and that is not at all what they are getting...... They assume that the staff as well as their physicians are properly trained to assist with breastfeeding (which requires little intervention, rules and calculating) There's your problem! They are not trained for that type of thinking.    Thus the "professional event" she is referring to:

"When breastfeeding becomes a professional event, fraught with instructions and prohibitions, we as professionals assert our expert authority and stop women using their own judgment and knowledge of their babies."

Those of us who are real "professional experts" have the "correct way of thinking" when it comes to birthing and breastfeeding.  We don't view a body as "broken" or a baby as "helpless".  We appreciate the importance of allowing a mother and baby to "just be".   This type of mindset can be quite humbling and takes acceptance, experience and confidence.  

Personally, I was so glad to "crossed-over" but I do understand the difficulties stemming from the way medical prof. are trained and the fact that a hospital atmosphere just reinforces that mindset of physical illness and dysfunction.

Maria Parlapiano RN IBCLC
Postpartum Place
Chatham, NJ

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