The Self-Conscious Public Nurser

I'm not one of those women who walk around naked in the gym locker room. (That statement makes it seem like I go to the gym, but I assure you, it's for illustrative purposes only. I have not stepped into a gym in years.) Generally, I would turn to face the locker/wall/other non-mirrored surface while temporarily topless and/or bottomless. As long as I had some kind of material on, whether it be a bra or underwear, I felt considerably more comfortable. But, that pure nakedness, even among fellow women, was to be avoided if at all possible.

When my daughter was born three years ago, nursing her in public was something I intended to do. I knew mothers did it all the time and, by golly, it was my right! It was natural, nothing to be ashamed of, and I was not about to be confined to the home just because I decided to breastfeed my daughter.

I bought nursing tops (those hideous paneled creations that scream UGLY NURSING WEAR!) and practiced deploying blankets and shawls as visual shields. No sweat, I thought to myself. I can do this.

My first chance at trying out my new skill set was during a shopping outing with my mother. My daughter was getting peevishly hungry, so I decided to take her into the dressing rooms to nurse her. Of course, this was Loehmann's, and all the private dressing rooms were occupied. Which meant sitting along the wall of the mirrored communal dressing room and feeding her. I felt the pull of needing to feed Jolie (crying! crabby!) and the pull of feeling self-conscious, amplified by my multiple mirrored reflections bouncing back at me. Baby won, and pretty soon, I was nursing her while trying to pretend that this was a perfectly normal, non stare-worthy thing to be doing. It went alright, although the dressing room attendant did shoot me some evil judgmental stares which didn't do anything for my already shaky public nursing self-esteem.

Even as my experience with public nursing grew, I never felt completely comfortable while out in the public eye.

Now that I'm breastfeeding my son, I've had to deal with those self-conscious feelings all over again. Just last weekend, I felt a little rise of panic as I arrived at the local playground to find it crowded with patrons. (But I was planning on nursing him! It's never this crowded!) I scanned the landscape for the least noticeable place I could situate myself. The benches were too...out there. I finally opted for a spot of grass set back about 20 feet from the perimeter: distanced from the mayhem but close enough to call out to my daughter and her friend if need be. As I sat there, trying to be as ho-hum as possible, I noticed that it was apparently Daddy Day at the playground. Multiple sets of Dad and child, and one set of tight-upper-lipped grandparents. GREAT!

It may have been just my imagination, but the dads kept glancing my way. Am I covered? Am I spectacle? Should I not be out here? At one point, one of the toddlers on the playground started walking towards me, staring. I guess I would be a sight to a small child: a woman with a pair of small baby legs sticking out from her side. The toddler's father called out (in a strained voice?), "That's a baby. C'mon back to the playground!" Oh boy, did I want to curl up in fetal position and roll away (if I didn't have a pair of baby legs sticking out from my side).

I survived. But I still wonder when this public nursing gig gets easy. Until then, maybe I should invest in some fatigues and wearable shrubbery.

KC (mainly) laughs her way through mothering and gives fake Medical Advice on her personal blog, Where's My Cape?

Original DC Metro Moms Blog Post.