Pumpin'

It's month 8 of new parenthood.  That means like month 6 of breast pumping.

The inconspicuous pumpin' bag, disguised as super huge purse.   

Morning starts with the rush to get to work, because I always sleep late - a side effect of co-sleeping, I think.  Babies are so freaking snuggly.  Get to school and in the 15 minute window between morning duty and my first class of the day, I sit in the faculty restroom and pump.  I wonder if the kids notice that I disappear into the bathroom next to their lockers for an inordinate amount of time every single day.  They are in junior high, which means they are a bit spacey and self involved, but then again I kind of remember discussing and speculating about my teachers ad nauseum when I was that age.  I don't think they can hear the strange rhythmic pulsing sound coming from the bathroom...

Paper towels on the ground in an attempt to be sanitary.

I emerge, boobs noticeably diminished in size, and a try to be discreet, making small talk with the random faculty sitting in the faculty lounge, deposit the precious cargo in the faculty fridge, and rush to my classroom.  Repeat the process for lunch, although sometimes if there's more time I vary it up and head to the backstage of the school's theater, where I lean with my back to the non-locking door and hope no student randomly tries to come in.

Carpet rather than bathroom tile in the theater! Yay!

I love my baby, and I love breastfeeding.  For real.  It came easy for us, and it's this amazing bonding experience.  Plus, it is sooooooo much easier at night.  Even though the precious one still wakes me up multiple times every night, I just roll to her and give her the tit.  And back to sleep she goes.  Minimal fuss.

I really hate pumping, though.  It isolates me from my fellow faculty because I can't eat lunch with them.  It ensures that I am not available to tutor students before school, at lunch, or after school.  And it just plain sucks.  Breastfeeding is such a primal, earth mama thing, and pumping is mechanized and just feels wrong...  Plus, sitting on the bathroom floor is nasty.

So, when I'm sitting there pumping, I'm googling things about weaning on the iPhone and crossing my fingers that I won't have a kid who wants to breastfeed forever.  But when I'm home, the kid and I are linked by this desire to nurse and I know I'll probably cry the day she actually rejects the boob.  So many different emotions, so many different directions to be pulled as a new parent...