Karleen doesn't see a problem with mothers not enjoying breastfeeding, and
likens it to changing nappies or carrying out other childcare tasks that are
not traditionally associated with pleasurable feelings.

I'm not comfortable with the analogy, but then I don't like it when parents
wrinkle their noses and grimace and make remarks of disgust while changing
nappies, as though the baby could actually excrete waste in a more aesthetic
way if it only tried hard enough.  OK, so I wouldn't bottle the fragrance
and market it as perfume, but it's not something any of us need to feel
shame or disgust over, and I guess I think maybe our attitudes toward all
our bodily products and functions could use improving.

I can certainly live with the facts that not all mothers find each and every
feed to be a near-orgasmic experience, and that most mothers occasionally
wish they'd never embarked on the whole child-rearing project because it is
a lot of work and not all of it is terrifically glamorous. I can live with
mothers breastfeeding who find other things more akin to the pinnacle of
existence.

But if someone continues to breastfeed while truly disliking it, they will
be hard put not to communicate this to the child, and it could have
consequences for how that child will handle physical intimacy to others, or
the balance between acknowledging one's own needs and the needs of others,
or the feelings that accompany hunger and satiety.  It is not unthinkable to
me that being breastfed out of duty rather than desire or at least a
combination of duty and desire, could make it difficult to accept one's own
need for intimacy, or for satiety.  So I nurture the hope that every mother
will at some point be outright happy that she is breastfeeding, that she
will be privy to the awareness of the magnitude of this simple, necessary
act, both in the sense of what she is imparting to the child and of what she
is experiencing herself.  

I'm trying to get hold of what it is that makes me uneasy about accepting
mothers' not liking breastfeeding.  If they are hesitant at the idea of it
beforehand but can't figure out why, I can say, keep an open mind and wait
until you meet your child. If they are uncomfortable once they've started
feeding, I am open to exploring it with them.  It fascinates me to see the
transformation in women who didn't think they would like breastfeeding, when
they start to realize what they've done for themselves and their children by
giving it a go anyway. Their wonderment that they have come to enjoy
something they never thought they would, and their satisfaction at having
dared to try something that challenged their notion of who they were, are
quite moving.

When we say 'it's not just about the milk' we are acknowledging all the
other aspects of breastfeeding, including the challenge and the satisfaction
of being close to another person and nurturing them in a physical way that
goes far beyond transfer of calories, vitamins, minerals and all the other
things in milk.  It would concern me if I knew someone was going against her
own deepest feelings to achieve this nurturing, and I would want her to have
somewhere to air those feelings and be accepted and loved by the listener. 
I would want to ease her discomfort, in hopes that the whole situation would
be more enjoyable for her afterwards.  Maybe it's different where
breastfeeding is not the norm, but where I live it is so unacceptable to
admit you don't enjoy it that women just don't tell us, and I think there is
a lot of self-loathing hidden there. First, the self-loathing makes
breastfeeding repugnant, and then the self-loathing is reinforced because
the cultural dictum is that all *good* mothers breastfeed. 

If you loathe yourself, how can you communicate with any credibility to
those around you that they are loveable?  I do not belong to a self-worship
cult of one, but I do consider it to be part of my job as a midwife to
celebrate life in all its terrible complexity, and to do so in a way that
shows the families I work with that I really believe it's better to be alive
than dead, and this means that I am glad they are alive too. In actual fact
it is more difficult to rejoice over some people's presence than over
others, but that's getting down to the trivialities of our personal quirks,
and has nothing to do with the basic principle of human worth that I hope
underlies my life.

Rachel Myr
Feeling unbearably sanctimonious now, in Kristiansand, Norway

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