On Friday morning, we had access to the hotel lounge for breakfast, so Chris insisted we all go downstairs to eat together and try to feed Kaia some solids while down there. I had to keep my pumping schedule in line as much as possible, so I went downstairs with my Spectra pump on and connected, just with a shawl covering it. Occasionally while sitting and eating, I would remove my shawl from one of my breasts to do a breast compression or check the flow. The other times I’ve pumped in the hotel hobby in Poughkeepsie or Philadelphia, no one really seemed to notice anything I was doing. But here, alas, someone finally noticed! Some white guy eating breakfast and on his phone looked over at me as I was doing breast compressions, initially had a confused look on his face, which then changed to a frown with a little disgust, lingered looking at our table, and eventually minded his own business. Regardless of what he was really thinking, I could really care less.

The way I feel about pumping in public is the same way I feel about breastfeeding directly/nursing in public: I am allowed to feed my child as I see fit, and if someone has a problem with it, they can go fuck off. If he had tried to come over and say anything, I would have already pre-prepared a very aggressive response, but I’m happy to say he kept to himself.

Other than home, these are all the places I can now say I have pumped milk:

Ever since Kaia started eating solids in June, I’ve been preparing all of her food. There’s a section of the fridge with little containers to store food I’ve either prepped, cut, or made specifically for her. Most of the food is just the same food Chris and I eat, just separately portioned out for her, cut a little differently for easier/safer consumption for her, and also with no added salt/sugar and less heat/chili. Originally when we started feeding her solids in the early weeks, I only gave her one or two things at a time, but I realized that it probably wasn’t enough variety for her because there are only so many meals she can eat in a day in addition to her breast milk, which will continue to make up the majority of her calories until she turns 1. So now, I try to give her anywhere from 5-8 different things for each of her two solid meals per day. Part of it is for exposure and familiarity so these things are just normal to her. The other part of it is that I want her to know what variety in food exists… because if she isn’t exposed to variety early on, then she will never be comfortable with it and may write off new foods as “foreign” or scary. I never expect her to eat everything I portion out for her, nor do I expect her to eat every single thing I present, but I want her to get used to different foods, textures, flavors, and to at least see it and feel it with her own eyes and hands.

My nanny thought I was a crazy woman when I first started putting her solids plates together. “This new mom is putting 6 things on her plate… is she crazy? Kaia is not going to eat all these things!” she thought to herself. She did imply a few times that she thought I was giving a bit much for variety, but I insisted to her that I wanted Kaia just to have the exposure, and if she didn’t eat it, I’d be okay with it. I didn’t want to force feed her because force feeding early on can lead to unhealthy associations with food as early as before the age of 1, which I obviously don’t want. But to my nanny’s surprise, Kaia has at least tried every single thing I’ve ever presented to her. Most things she has embraced. A few things took two or three tries, like plantains or eggs, but by the second or third time, Kaia has always willingly self-fed herself and eaten. And after the last two months, our nanny admitted to me that she was wrong. She watched Kaia self feed herself cut up buckwheat noodles today, and our nanny was so intrigued that she asked me if she could try some herself (our nanny didn’t know what buckwheat noodles were).

“I didn’t think she’d eat everything you gave her, but she does!” the nanny exclaimed. “She really does eat everything. I’m just used to moms only giving 2-3 things at most for solids meals. Some moms don’t give anything and expect me to whip up food for their children with their empty fridge with just condiments in it! Then, they come up at the end of the day, and the first question they ask me is what their son/daughter ate for lunch or dinner!”

I cannot guarantee that my baby will embrace all foods and not be a picky eater. But I think that the proactive steps we’re taking right now with finger foods, self feeding, and a wide variety of exposure to different foods will set the best possible foundation for her to be a good, confident eater who loves and appreciates foods from all cultures. It’s a huge time investment, as her self feeding meals takes about 45 minutes to an hour per meal on the weekends, but I love watching her explore food and hope this helps her future.

Given that my friend had to be hospitalized for postpartum hypertension about two weeks after giving birth, this meant she had to be separated from her baby. And when you have the intention/desire to breastfeed, this means that to keep your milk supply up, you will need to pump if baby is not physically there with you to nurse. Somehow, a nurse said that her blood pressure spiked a bit after each pumping session, so they suggested that she not pump for two days….

She said she felt fine, and I’m not 100 percent sure that not expressing milk for two straight days in the first two weeks postpartum is a good idea if a mom has explicitly said she wants to breastfeed her child. Where do people come up with these awful suggestions? Do they ever listen to mothers’ desires… EVER?

I went to the hospital today to visit my friend, who had recently given birth about two weeks ago, but had to get re-admitted to the hospital for postpartum hypertension. She realized something was wrong when this past weekend, she had a lingering, painful headache that just wouldn’t go away. She had a blood pressure monitor and used it, and the result was far higher than anyone would be comfortable with, so her doctor told her to go to the ER and get admitted. She is being monitored closely now and on medication, but she is unsure when she will get discharged. I also visited when my friend, her husband, was also there with the baby, so the added bonus I got was seeing their newborn for the very first time and holding her.

The scary thing that most people don’t realize is that child birth.. is VERY TRAUMATIC on the female body. It’s actually considered physical trauma. Most women tear to some degree in their vagina or even outside of that when having a vaginal birth. A caesarian section cuts through something like 8-9 layers of the human body to take the baby out. A lot of complications can happen, such as postpartum hypertension, which is one of the most common side effects after child birth. Hemorrhaging is extremely terrifying and common, and these conditions can result in seizures, strokes, and even heart attacks. A friend’s friend got a brain aneurysm as a result of the birth of her second child and was in the ICU for over four weeks. These conditions can happen as late as up to a year after the birth of a child. But no one talks about this. Women’s healthcare in this country is just beyond abysmal. No one proactively tells you this; you just have to Google search it all and figure it out yourself.

My nanny occasionally has mini rants about young moms of today, first time moms, and in general, moms of this generation. She likes to say every now and then that, “You moms don’t listen to us nannies who have 20+ years of experience. Instead, all you do is listen to your doctors and the Google.” I tried to explain to her that the Solid Starts website and app was based on research and study done on thousands of babies… while nannies certainly have experience caring for and feeding babies, no nanny on this planet has ever cared and fed thousands of babies. That just would not be possible. She rolled her eyes at me, indicating she didn’t really care for or believe what I was saying. She just thinks I’m being defensive. And that’s fine. But I’m still her boss. 😛

We do agree on some things with feeding the baby, though: it’s important to model chewing and spitting out in an exaggerated way so that babies understand what they do when they have different textures in their mouth. We need to give babies more credit for how much they absorb in watching us do everyday things, including handling, chewing, and swallowing food. They need to understand the “map of their mouth” to know how to safely digest food and not choke: food on the front of the tongue is for tasting; food further back on the tongue is getting ready to go down and get swallowed. Pureed food doesn’t teach babies to chew; it only has them swallow. Chewing is important for basic survival, and knowing how to chew and chew well opens up babies to an entire universe of foods that are not only nutritious but tasty. Oftentimes, babies and toddlers will develop aversions to different food textures, and it’s because they just weren’t exposed to it much or at all early on.

So my nanny can say what she wants about “the Google,” but all these points are not only backed by data, but logically, it just makes sense when you think about how human beings eat.

Contrary to popular belief, when babies begin solids, it’s better to expose and “test” to see how they react to common allergens earlier rather than later. On average, babies will show readiness for solids at around 6 months of age, so it’s a good idea to start gradually introducing common allergens like peanuts, tree nuts, and eggs at around this time. Kaia had already enjoyed peanut butter a number of times in June and enjoyed it. She fed herself the peanut butter right off the spoon and always seemed to want more. I breathed a huge sigh of relief at that. Today, I prepared a tiny omelet for her to eat both at her morning solids feed and afternoon solids feed. I cut the omelet into strips that had a width equivalent to two of my fingers held together (that was the Solid Starts preparation recommendation). When I placed the egg on her tray this morning, she immediately picked up a strip, put it to her mouth, and started biting on it. The nanny cut up a bunch of the egg and had it in tiny pieces for her to eat, and both ways, she seemed to enjoy it. At her afternoon feed, she fed herself egg strips. I also prepared a mix of toor and moong dal for her, which she happily gobbled up.

My tiny foodie is growing and growing. I’m so proud to see her embrace all this new food and hopefully continue to enjoy a diversified palate. She also ate a good amount of spinach today and more broccoli, so the nanny warned me that her poop may be extra, extra smelly soon.