the udder mother

Warning: lactating lesbians. Leave now if you don't want to hear more.




So I'm just going to throw this out to the world, since i don't know anyone else who's talking about it.

The extended breastfeeding/co-sleeping/attachment parenting types in this world are not often lesbians, and lesbian moms are not often passionate about breastfeeding. Which is not a specific comment about either group, just neither is extremely common, and having two rare characteristics is well, rare.

So how does the whole thing work when there are 4 boobs in the bed?

I haven't heard from anyone else on this topic, and am curious about how other people navigate it. I know (in an urban legend kind of way) that there are men who try to nurse, and even lactate, but the whole thing just seems so much more practical when there are two mommies.

when MamaM first got knocked up, we chatted for a few weeks about what we'd do if there were multiples (and for those of you who weren't closely following our TTC follies, the month that she peed the two blue lines was a month where she had four follicles ready to go, and indeed, LittleE started out as a twin pregnancy that ended up a singleton)

We decided that if there were more than one little blighter, i'd do the whole lactation induction thing and help out. But when there was only one mouth, four breasts seemed excessive.

but MamaM works on-call nights and weekends. Which means if she gets called to the hospital at 3am, it's just me and the little guy. During the day, he is flexible and rational, but when he's tired, it's nursey or nothing. He has soundly refused pacifiers for nearly every purpose except chewing on the hard plastic, and we don't even own any bottles or pumped breastmilk. So, when he's ready to sleep, i function as a human pacifier in a pinch. He's almost 2 now, and is in no way suffering from nipple confusion - he has a clear preference when MamaM is home. But when the choice is plastic or me, he'll nurse with me like it's some sort of common grieving for our beloved MamaM's absence.

And he goes back to sleep, and we are both mostly rested in the morning. and sleep+toddler=good.

Now i'm familiar with the extended nursing people, and their support for mothers who choose to nurse longer than strangers on the subway seem to think is right. And i'm in full agreement with the larger queer community who validate me as LittleE's "real" mother. But I am having some difficulty with being out about our backup nursing relationship.

That is, until i started *lactating*. Now i'm just a bit weirded out. And i keep checking to see if i can still squeeze out a few drops of milk, 'cuz the whole thing is just so darn cool! And my medstudent brain is thinking "brain tumor" or "homonal imbalance" or "sign of impending grave malady". And i can't help wondering if i'm really as much of a freak as i feel like right now.

thanks for letting me get that off my chest. ahem.

Urban family med

That fall went by fast! So this rotation is not quite over yet, but i already have lots to say about what i got to do and learn.

1. the breastfeeding clinic awed me. It felt great to work with people in medicine where i didn't have to be closeted about the rest of my life. Not the lesbian part, i don't bother hiding that anywhere, but the extended-nursing, co-sleeping, hippy parenting that we seem to have fallen into. That clinic and the people who run it are hugely improving health. But they do it all sneaky-like. When things improve for a breastfeeding couple, it improves because of the strength and skill of the mother and her family, not because of the doctors or lactation consultants. People leave there empowered and with tools for lasting change in their breastfeeding relationships.
plus it left me with big baby pangs.

2. Adolescent medicine: not so scary anymore. which is good. cuz i start a whole month of it on monday. Sex, drugs & suicide provide a good balance to hypertension, cholesterol and diabetes.

3. palliative care: it's nice when the patient is always right. There is room for creativity. It's like a "more marginal margin" when all the hotshots are so busy curing things, that they don't bother to notice what progressive, radical, revolutionary, healing things are happening in the parts of the world most people ignore.

4. lunch. also dinner. also daylight. peeing. adequate rest. and time to study.

5. public health. It is going to take force of will to keep myself from this field. Feel free to remind me that i would hate working in an office, i would hate the bureaucracy, i would hate how slow everything goes. And MamaM would leave me if i had to write another thesis for another masters in epidemiology. upstream medicine just makes so much more sense!

6. one way mirrors. not as creepy as i thought. and people don't fear them as much as i would if i were a patient. It's nice to get feedback on what i actually said, not just what i think i said.


I'm doing a presentation tomorrow about trans health. I feel kind of dumb, because i don't really know anything about it. but then, I tell myself that I wouldn't know much about ear infections either - and this is more interesting. I'll add more to my list when it's over for real. Now I'm going to go snuggle with the little one. He's stopped saying "bye-bye MamaE" in the mornings, and now just looks sad and says "see MamaE again?". mmrph. This is going to be my first whole, entire weekend off since before i left for Shawville. and i'm going to spend much of it kissing his little blond head.