Breastfeeding Matters
I was sitting with my “littles” in the WIC office, and as always, everyone was commenting on my adorable chubby boy.
The receptionist asked how old he was, and was impressed at his size for nine months old. Just then R.T. happened to look up at me and grin, and I kissed him on the forehead.
She said, “You breastfeed him, don’t you?”
Oh, yes.
She said that she loves to see the bond between mothers and breastfed babies – and that she can always tell. She notices the way the baby will look up at you, or cuddle against your chest and smile, if you’re nursing.
This is someone who has hundreds upon hundreds of mothers and babies streaming through her office… And she is that firmly convicted.
“If only they could see what I see…” she says, then everyone would want to nurse. She tells me she could tell the breastfeeding moms just from whose kids don’t get sick as much, are brighter, more outgoing, the list goes on.
She’d been chatting with Jewel all through this, as well, and laughedwhen she found out Jewel was only three.
“You breastfed her, too, didn’t you?”
Oh, yes.
“For how long?”
I must have hesisted, but I was grinning…
She offered, “You’re still nursing her?”
Yeah…
She described how different things were when they went to visit the family in Cuba. You could just be sitting there at the bus stop, and a woman would lift her shirt and let her (older) child nurse… She mentioned one family member of her husband’s who had been nursed until he was six.
Truly, such things are normal in much of the world. Just not here. Just not among people who “want their body back,” and want to leave the baby with a sitter as soon as possible, and don’t want to hurt their income potential.
Why don’t more people know just how much it matters?
A once-and-future full-time RV family shares their adventures - homeschooling, home business, life in an RV, Christian living, interesting travel and dining experiences, you name it...
(MUST have the Extended Edition and Widescreen!)
(fried hot dogs! Mmmm)
