Kathy is talking about the women in Mali, West Africa.....

> But rather than
>distancing themselves from the intimacy because it would hurt too much, they
>do just they opposite -- they enjoy their babies, as babies, to the maximum
>extent possible.  They love them to distraction, nurse them on demand, carry
>them everywhere, play with them all the time, sleep with them, etc.  They
>know that they may very well have only a few weeks, months, or years, with
>their child.  They lavish affection and intimacy on them.
>
Madeleine L'Engle is talking about women in western cultures (specifically
US) of the late 1800's and early to mid 1900's (she has a whole discussion
about the rows & rows of little graves in the cemetaries of the south where
her family comes from)

>So, I think she's (Madeleine l'Engle) a little off track here.  It was
>usually upper-class women in north and western Europe who thought that
>breastfeeding was disgusting and dirty, cow-like, peasant-like, etc., and
>who therefore employed wet nurses.  And in those places where wet nurses
>were common, children were treated like commodities -- heirs, for example --
>rather than as living breathing human beings to love and cherish.

I suspect L'Engle is right on, depending on the culture in which you lived.
 I think there are many women (my mother, bless her heart, being one of them)
who were afraid to love their babies too much because of fear that they would
be "taken away" through death.

 The focus
>in those societies was on the husband-wife bond, not the mother-child bond,
>and the upper class woman had to be "free" to help her husband, entertain,
>schmooze with other high-society ladies, etc.

Hmm -- the above sounds suspiciously Ezzoish to me...... though I'm not sure
about schmoozing with other high-society ladies!  :)

Remember, L'Engle is a writer, primarily of practical theology and science
fiction.  We aren't talking a historian or anthropologist or medical
professional (her husband was an actor -- I believe he played a physician on
one of the daytime soap operas); so it is interesting to see how she viewed
wet nursing and feeding formula.  More importantly, it is wonderful to see
how this marvelous writer and woman viewed breastfeeding!!!  (And keep in
mind, if she is in her mid 70's, she was of an era in which women didn't
breastfeed their babies, as her children were probably born in the 50's).  I
suspect a lot of women stop bf early or don't bf at all because they are
afraid of the intimacy of that relationship; yet they may not even be able to
verbalize it.  Women who are told over and over if they pick up their babies
too much they will spoil it -- and yet, what is nursing?  It is touching,
picking up, holding, in the most intimate of relationships....and it is doing
it frequently, not on a schedule....and the "fear of spoiling" [don't you
hear this when you suggest co-sleeping??] is rampant in our society!

Kathy, what you have said about the Mali women really touches me.  Isn't that
as it should be?  Loving our babies/children -- lavishing affection and
intimacy on them?  Enjoying them, teaching them, having fun with them,
disciplining appropriately (the lavishing affection & intimacy and
appropriate discipline are not mutually exclusive....)  We have lots to learn
about parenting/mothering, and probably lots to teach others....

And somehow, we need to teach that loving a child does not mean the child is
spoiled.

Jan Barger -- where the sun is shining, it is supposed to get to 97 today,
and we started the morning with no electricity for several hours....