The relationship you describe with your newborn daughter is one of the biggest reasons that I miss having a man in my life and Maya’s. My cousin (closest to a sister I have) is due in weeks, and I believe her husband will do much of the same things you describe. He’s even the one who went breast-pump shopping so that (assuming she successfully establishes nursing) he can have that bonding time with their son. Me, I just can’t wait to hold a newborn again, this time minus the sleepless nights.

On the healthcare, since you decided to come by, I’ll be happy to start a new post — what we have here for the most part is, IMO, a misunderstanding. Perhaps I wasn’t clear in my comment at Hugo’s, so I’m pleased you’re willing to chat.

There was the feeling that she wasn’t doing it right, and the pain in her nipples and breasts (perhaps from being distended) and the simple fact that even with breast pads, milk leaked out, which created many problems at work (she went back to work four weeks after #1 was born).

So, we shifted to having her express and we also used formula.

That gave me plenty of opportunity to spend more time with the girls. Apart from feeding time (when I could also read a book and make sure that the feed-rate of the milk was not causing the child to get frustrated), there was also bath time. Bathing a new-born baby is magic, and that was my job (although, in reality, the baby-sitter also did it, so I could have let that one slide).

On another topic, if you want to discuss silly claims that (evil) men have been ignoring the differences between men and women when doing medical research for hundreds of years, perhaps you should start a post about that.

Anyhow, trying to NOT get all re-worked up about the issue. The first year of G’s life (aka the “breast is best” year) was extremely difficult for me along these lines, as you know. And always trying to justify with “I exclusively pumping for x months…”. Um, yeah, not sure why that would be anyone’s business. I wouldn’t wish that kind of pain/guilt on anyone. Instead, I now have the pleasantries of toddlerhood to deal w/

Thanks for the posts

Thanks for stopping by to comment.

I wrote about my personal struggle with breastfeeding and lactivism here. I am a very strong supporter of breastfeeding, but am disturbed by the hardcore lactivist line.

(I see from your next post that you already found my response to the NYT article - thanks for linking.)