Breastfeeding comes with some responsibility other than watching what you eat and ensuring your baby is receiving all the essentials.
There comes the time when you have to leave home and your baby to go back to work. This on its own is difficult to stomach.
But since you don’t have a baby to pump out the milk throughout the day, you have to pump at work to keep up the flow – after all, breastfeeding is all about supply and demand.
Unfortunately, being a breastfeeding/pumping working mama comes with so much judgement and criticism.
Just in my short amount of time being back to work, I have already received so much crap about having to pump, the amount of time I spend pumping and issues with where I pump.
It’s a never ending stressful situation that you pray doesn’t stress you out so much to have an effect on your milk production.
Instead of co-workers being supportive of you and your breastfeeding journey, some tend to place criticism and make you feel as if what your are doing is wrong.
I never breastfed Alina so this is a whole new experience for me and I am so sick of other people trying to judge and making me feel bad for having to pump.
The judgements I’ve heard thus far are they believe their precious tax dollars shouldn’t be spent on someone sitting in a room pumping. Or that I just want to pump all the time so I don’t have to work. 🙄
For those who think pumping is an inconvenience, here’s what happens if I don’t get to go and pump:
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My breasts get so full that it’s uncomfortable also placing me at risk of getting a clogged duct or mastitis.
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MOST IMPORTANTLY: my child does not get food! This is what she eats and if I am not able to pump it out, she doesn’t eat!
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Once again supply and demand – if I don’t pump, my milk flow will decrease dramatically to where I may not be able to breastfeed for long!
After becoming so upset about some of my co-workers making me feel as if I shouldn’t be pumping, I decided to really think about why they feel this way.
In reality, these individuals are uneducated or inexperienced with pumping or breastfeeding.
They may have never breastfed or pumped because they formula fed their babies.
Or maybe they were stay-at-home moms not having to worry about pumping at work.
They don’t know what it’s like having to lug around your pump and parts every single day.
They don’t understand the struggle of having to wash, dry and pack up the pump and parts every time you pump.
They don’t know how much you don’t want to pump either because it is so time consuming and you know people are judging you but it’s whats best for your baby.
They have no idea how much you want to just be at home with your baby instead of having to be at work pumping.
By all means people, believe me – I don’t want to have my nipples suctioned for 15-20 mins either making me feel like I’m being milked like a dairy cow.
I wish working moms were given much more respect and credit. Breastfeeding is so hard as it is, We don’t need everyone else judging and placing their inabilities or dislikes on us.
Fed is best, but I also believe that everyone needs to just respect others journeys rather than judging because they didn’t breastfeed.
To all the mamas that are breastfeeding and pumping at work, you are doing amazing and don’t let anyone make you feel like having to pump is a bad thing.
Ignore the rudeness and know that your baby is getting everything they need from those pump sessions!
Xo Renee