Last month, we attended a small gathering of some of my mom’s closest friends to celebrate the life of my late grandma, Miss Bunny. It was surprisingly so healing in all the ways. For one, all in attendance, minus our children, were vaccinated. Seeing people laugh, eat, drink, and share stories of Miss Bunny without worrying about the health of others or what the social implications might be of wearing or not wearing a mask was incredible. I wore a beautiful green dress and this hot pink lipstick (oh, how I have missed pretty lipstick!) and relished in the compliments, both directed at me and my baby. No shame in my game; compliments give me life. Not having that love and attention thrown at me after Patrick was born was by no means devastating, but I did miss it. (Pandemic births are, in a word, weird.)

And then, Patrick got sad. Like screaming, cry, barely breathing sad. He was tired but unlike my first child, he doesn’t just fall asleep. He needs to lay down with me and my boob. I went into the host’s bedroom and got ready to get in position when it occurred to me. The dress.

This dress took two people to put on because I couldn’t reach the zipper. To feed him, I would have to take it off entirely. I texted my husband, Joey.

“Joey. Come in here in, like, 10 minutes so you can fix me up.”

It was made of a thin material and I didn’t have a pad to soak up the other nipple that would inevitably leak.

“Actually, can you come bring me some toilet paper, like, right now?”

I couldn’t lay right for fear of getting make-up on her pillow. Suddenly, I was face to face with the consequences of breastfeeding a baby born during a pandemic and having no idea how to leave the house without wearing an oversized cardigan and a black nursing tank top.

As I laid feeding Patrick, anger, frustration, and shame crept up on me. Why did I wear such an unfunctional dress? Why wasn’t I more prepared? Why didn’t we just bring a bottle!?

And then, naturally, guilt. Why am I complaining about feeding my perfectly healthy, happy baby with my own body? So many women only wish they could breastfeed, or have children at all! I’m stressed about ruining my make up? WTF IS WRONG WITH ME!?

At that moment, I knew it was time to start saying goodbye to breastfeeding. This moment didn’t exist in a vacuum. I wasn’t suddenly frustrated by this task I had been doing 200 hours a day for the past seven months. Slowly but surely, breastfeeding morphed from this sacred, beautiful form of bonding to becoming just another avenue for distraction. It had turned into clutter, in a way. Just another thing standing in the way of living a more functional, emotionally stable life.

Can you imagine how lucky he is to have a fully present, emotionally supported Mother to feed him bottles of quality formula and little slivers of blueberries?

So what does this have to do with art making? For me, everything. Even though I work from home and can essentially make time for breastfeeding whenever necessary, it takes a massive toll on my creative focus. I can be in a “zone” while painting, but if my nipples tingle at the cries of my 6 month old, I gotta drop everything and feed that baby. And what do I do? Probably get on my phone (I stopped trying to fight the urge a long time ago…) and lose all train of thought. Once fed, I re-enter my world with all intention of diving back in, but it almost never works that way. I always have an extremely difficult time finding my way back to whatever “zone” I was in before the feeding started.

I think there is a conventional expectation that once you start breastfeeding your baby, you should feed your baby as long as you can produce the milk, no matter the toll it may take on your life. So, to make the choice to stop simply because you (the mother, the whole person with dreams, aspirations, and goals) feel it doesn’t serve YOU anymore is somewhat controversial.

In addition, I don’t plan to pump. For me, hooking up to that cumbersome, noisy machine only exacerbates the original problem. Sure, my baby might prefer I stick to the boob, but he will live. He will live well. VERY well, in fact. Can you imagine how lucky he is to have a fully present, emotionally supported Mother to feed him bottles of quality formula and little slivers of blueberries?

Quite a lucky baby, indeed.

(Although, I am deeply sad to say goodbye to the breastfeeding boobs…c’est la vie!)