On feeding

And, as a distraction from the serious task of sick baby fretting, a fun frivolous post I've had sitting in the edit queue for a long time.

Things I like about breastfeeding:

• the way RJ shakes his head back and forth like a terrier trying to snap the neck of a small prey animal when he's trying to latch on, while trying to latch on with the side of his mouth in a manner that reminds me every time of Ephiny eating a piece of chocolate (she also bites chocolate off with her side teeth in the back).
  
• an appreciative, excited audience for whipping my top off. RJ really likes to eat, as one would expect for a baby of such unusual size, so it's a very cute, pursed lip, wide-eyed, eyebrow-raised expression.
  
• crease around baby's lip after feeding looks like a very, very silly moustache.
  
• the fact that I don't have to worry if I am overfeeding my baby.
  
• the lack of having to defrost and warm milk for bottles.
  
• fewer dishes to wash by hand, or to entrust our crappy dishwasher with.
  
• Dolly Parton-type bosoms.
  
• weight loss or at least the ability to consume many more calories.
  

Things I dislike about breastfeeding:

• contrary to majestic bonding experience promoted by the breast feeding lobby, Handel's Messiah is not being broadcast out of my boobs every time I am breastfeeding. It's totally FINE, and not unpleasant or anything, but it's just not the hormonal Hallelujah Chorus I had been lead to expect.
  
• nudity.
  
• cold, exposed midriff.
  • partially remedied by finding the nursing tanks at Old Navy, which are totally crap as tank tops since they utterly fail to cover the breasts, but which makes them a good under-shirt layer since they just go under the boobs.
• inability to find underwire bras. (Seriously, I would really like an underwire to buttress things, see also point about Dolly Parton state of mammaries.)
  
• cannot be in same room as child without child fixing me with a beady-eyed stare and starting to make desultory smacking lip motions.
  • vaguely reminds me of that lecherous old man who made lip-smacking noises at me that one time. Obviously this time being viewed solely as a set of boobs is very non-sexual, but it is still a bit objectifying to be continually reduced to a food source.
• the fact that I have NO IDEA how much my child is eating drives me crazy.
  • Seriously, measuring eating in units of time is beyond stupid. It's like when my students would try to measure their studying in time spent, and it was totally useless without talking to them about it to get a sense of whether the student was simultaneously checking facebook, watching a tv show, eating a snack, and talking on the phone while they were "studying" for many hours each day, or whether the student spent a much shorter period of time actually concentrating on the damn material.
    
    • Only babies don't talk so the interview attempts are useless.
• takes for-freaking-ever. See above point about distracted student study skills.
  
• spraying of milk whenever baby is distracted by something exciting and whips off (and by something exciting we mean, a noise, light coming in the window, the ceiling, etc.)
  
• the fact that instead of clinging very adorably to my finger, my child clings adorably onto my shirt or far less adorably rakes his fingernails over my chest. Ow.
  
• boob largely obscures face and angle makes interacting with child during feeding much less fun.
  
• staring at baby's Spock ears during feedings sometimes leads to neck pain.
  
• most positions for feeding gargantuan baby involve using my arms (which fall asleep), rather than sensibly propping the baby up on one's lap or torso the way bottle feeding can.
  • OK, except for the position where your baby is collapsed onto your chest facedown like a drunk passed out in the gutter, whilst you are lying prone on your back, which actually is what I'm doing right now but which is rather hard to do in public or while doing anything other than typing very awkwardly on a laptop.
• inability of spouse to participate.
  • And yes, we do know that breast milk can be offered in containers other than my boobs, but RJ is currently not accepting those containers... at least not without a major struggle and requiring me to be nowhere within sight.
• inability of toddler to help.
  
• having to take it on faith (well, that and the spraying) that milk is exiting from my bosom and entering my baby. This is surprisingly hard, even after baby has been ratcheting up the growth charts like a runaway freight train.
  
• that "neglected dairy cow" feeling when your child is feeling poorly and sleeping more than usual.
  
• that "male marathon runner nipple" feeling when your child is feeling poorly and eating a great deal more often than usual. (Male marathon runners apparently sometimes put bandaids on their nipples to prevent chafing and rubbing to the point of being raw and sore.) This only rarely happens though.
  

The fact that the dislike list is long is counterbalanced by the fact that I'm very GOOD at it (and so is RJ). As my mother-in-law said, in another time I would have been a career wet nurse: not only am I able to make our gargantuan baby ever more gargantuan (on Monday, at 2.5 months, RJ was 17 lbs and 2 oz in weight, 26 inches tall, and had a 44.5 cm head circumference -- and that one-pound-in-a-fortnight gain is during a period of severe illness with some forced fasting), but I'm also freezing 6-12 oz of milk a day beyond what he is eating (depending on RJ's consumption in the morning before my single pumping session).

In an ideal world where I had infinite time and not another child to care for, I would probably exclusively pump and bottle feed, since I find pumping to be GREAT FUN ACTUALLY (measurements! in sensible units! toddler thinks it is hilarious and loves to push buttons!) - I wish I could do it more without potentially disturbing my ability to breastfeed RJ, what with his desire to eat CONSTANTLY.

That said, laziness and a desire to be a good parent to my older child (breast pumping would probably not continue to be equally riveting to Jolly if it happened more often each day) is totally winning out on this, and thus, I am spending much of my day with a baby lamprey'd onto my breast while reading books aloud to my toddler or playing games with my free hand.