Jennifer O’Connell: A woman should have the right to choose about breastfeeding

Ireland is not an easy country in which to breastfeed, as mothers huddle in the middle of prudish rubberneckers on one side and the cultish fervour of some of the pro-breastfeeding lobby on the other

No one who has ever tried to breastfeed a baby in Ireland will have been surprised by the recent study that found we have the lowest rates in the world.

Between the stares of the prudish rubberneckers on the one hand, and the well-meaning but slightly cultish fervour of elements of the pro-breastfeeding lobby on the other, the wonder is not that so few women do; it is that anyone bothers at all. Huddled in the middle of these two camps, clinging to their tubes of Lansinoh and their cabbage leaves, are the embattled mothers who are just trying to get through the next four hours without being berated for their choices.

I have breastfed on three continents, so I know what I'm talking about. In Australia, where it is enthusiastically promoted in hospitals and where the attitude of the general public is relaxed and pragmatic, I fed my child freely, wherever and whenever I needed. In the US, where – even in liberal northern California – many women don apron-like contraptions to breastfeed, I still managed to feed in public without a second thought, or an apron. In fact, it was only in Ireland that I felt the need – to my ongoing regret – to scurry off to the nearest public toilet or the quietest bench in the farthest corner of a public park to feed my wailing newborn. This might go some way to explaining the statistics: in Australia, 48 per cent of babies are still exclusively breastfed at four to five months; in the US, one in three is still exclusively breastfed at three months. According to the Growing Up In Ireland report, only 56 per cent of babies born in Ireland are ever breastfed and just 6 per cent are still being nursed at six months.

We’ve come a long way as a society. We have children being raised by parents of the same gender as each other, or a different race to their children. We have single parents and step-parents and surrogate parents. We have a gay Government Minister. With luck, we will soon have same-sex marriage. But lactating breasts? We’re not quite ready to embrace those.

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The nudge-nudge, tut-tut attitude is not the only challenge facing mothers who decide to nurse their infants. In my experience, it is a cohort of those who are supposed to be promoting breastfeeding, with their blind adherence to the mantra that “breast is best”, who may actually be doing it the greatest disservice.

In perfect circumstances, breast is, of course, best. But life doesn’t always offer up perfect circumstances. Instead, life gives us blocked ducts and mastitis. Life gives us the needs of older children. Life gives us jobs and mortgages. Life gives us sniffy passersby. Yet, to some of those who promote breastfeeding, these aren’t obstacles so much as opportunities to flaunt your dedication. As far as this camp is concerned, when women choose not to breastfeed, or decide to stop, it’s not because they’re sentient, autonomous adults capable of making an informed and private decision. Oh no. It’s because they’re ignorant. They haven’t tried hard enough, or they need to be better educated. For “better educated”, of course, read “better educated on the positive attributes of breastfeeding”.

Don’t expect any straight talking on the less lovely aspects: the fact that your baby is likely to nurse more often and that there will be nights where one feed just rolls blearily into the next; the fact that it can be toe-curlingly painful; the fact that your breasts will leak, throb and maybe even bleed.

I’m not anti-breastfeeding. On the contrary, I’m very glad I recovered sufficiently from the initial pain, bewilderment and overwhelming suspicion that I’d been duped, to keep at it for a few more months. Equally, when I’d had enough of the frequent bouts of mastitis and the exhaustion and the feeling that my baby was never really satisfied, I was perfectly at ease with my decision to stop.

If we really want Irish women to embrace breastfeeding, then I have a suggestion. It isn’t how we usually do things, but bear with me. Let’s allow that women have a right to decide what to do with their own bodies. Let’s stop nagging and cajoling and staring. Let’s agree that how they feed their children is a private matter. Let’s give them all the information, positive and negative, and our wholehearted support. And then let’s mind our own business.

Be careful where you tread in San Francisco

If you’re a squeamish sort, and you made it past the bleeding nipples and the cabbage leaves, you might want to look away now.

San Francisco, the city in whose warm and sometimes less than fragrant shadow I have made my new home, has a faeces problem. The large numbers of homeless people (somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000) and the dearth of public toilets has led to what the local media has been jovially calling “the poop problem”. The city plans to install more portable facilities, and, this being Silicon Valley, it is turning to data to find out where they should go. Yes, we’re talking about a map of human excrement. If you’re planning a trip to the city and want to know which areas to steer clear of, just google the phrase “(human) wasteland”.

And you thought O’Connell Street on a Sunday morning was to be avoided.