DO IT!!!

Being Female

Our baby is 11 weeks old! We have been to visit the grandparents AGAIN this weekend, a flying visit but they were insistent and I know it will be quite a while before we can see them again. The visit did incorporate Miri's first swim however. I armed myself with waterproof nappies and mentally prepared for Miranda to scream the place down. But she didn't! She was very well behaved; a little unsure at first but certainly happy to try and she kicked her legs about enthusiastically enough that we took her again the next day. Actually I think she just liked the excuse to rid herself of her clothes and nappy, she does love being naked!

As usual, she got admired wherever she went but fortunately no-one thought she was a boy this time - possibly because she was wearing the little purple dress I got her in Guatemala. I was ranting on Facebook the other day about this and sparked a bit of a debate. It annoys me that people assume that Miri is a boy, not because I have any objection to her being masculine in character if that is the way she turns out, but because I know that assumption is based solely on my refusal to dress her in pink, and preference for comfy, practical baby trousers. The lack of pink isn't even a feminist statement, I just can't stand the colour. But people see her wearing baby jeans or black t-shirts and ask "how old is he?" This winds me up no end.

I have even been advised to put a ribbon in her hair "just so you know". Now, which is more infuriating, the fact that ribbons in hair must denote gender, or the idea that babies MUST be seen to be one gender or the other? She is 11 weeks old! Surely we shouldn't be inflicting constructed social dichotomies on her just yet? I don't think of her as being feminine yet, or masculine for that matter. She's just my baby, and she's beautiful. And until she can choose her own clothes, she can wear what I think is cute, which is predominantly purple and black. Her gender isn't really part of her personality yet. Of course, her name gives it away, but really that is a social norm that it would be too cruel to break. A little girl going off to school named Donald or Keith or something will be teased even more than if she were called Ophelia or Esperanza or any of the other names I loved but we decided were to weird to inflict on her.

A comfy baby, with pink socks on "just so you know"!

I don't wear pink, and I rarely wear dresses, I do wear giant boots though and I am very tall, and yet few mistake me for a bloke. (I did however once convince people I was a very passable transvestite, just so I could use the men's loo in a oub and avoid the queue...but that is a different story!!). Pre-pregnancy, I didn't even feel very female, although I have never been sure exactly what that is supposed to feel like anyway. I did a project for a gender studies class years ago about transexualism and gender identities. One friend in an interview put her views very succinctly: "I am Me, my body is female. That's about it.". I almost subscribe to that view myself although I am dimly aware that it is never that simple.

At the moment, I am feeling more female than I ever have, and it's all to do with being Mum. Ooo and now I can hear my more feminist friends howling in the background.... Miri's Uncle Ol already accuses me of being anti-feminist, I am never quite sure where he gets that impression from. I am not anti-feminist; most of the time I am just apathetic to the whole issue because it's never been an issue in my life. Selfish, I know, but there we go. Now, though, it throws up a whole new set of dillemmas. I am suddenly feeling Female, because I am a mother and I am breastfeeding my child, which is something you have to be a woman to do and really understand. And I really, really love it. According to some branches of feminist argument though, it is breastfeeding and child-rearing that 'holds women back' and is used as a justification of female oppression. Instead, I should be striving at least for equality (read: getting Carl to share half of the Miri-minding - which I have no problem with if it wasn't for more pragmatic things like the fact Carl has a job and I don't)  - if not matriarchal dominance. And feeding her would obviously have to be done with formula milk and a bottle, thus 'empowering' mother to go back to work, of course....

Caca del toro!

This is another idea that annoys me intensely. I can't think of anything more empowering than being indispensible to your child, able to provide her with everything she needs, adapting as she grows, for free and on demand, particularly when men are incapable of doing the same! If that does not fit in to the routine of the (male-dominated) workplace, then it is the workplace that needs changing. Or better still, I'll just invent myself a job that I can take Miranda along to!

"If a multnational company developed a product that was a nutritionally balanced and delicious food, a wonder drug that both prevented and treated disease, cost nothing to produce and could be delivered in quantities controlled by consumers' needs, the annoucement of this find would send its shares rocketing to the top of the stock market. The scientists who developed the product would win prizes and the wealth of everyone involved would increase dramatically. Women have been producing such a miraculous substance, breastmilk, since the beginning of human existence, yet they form the least wealthy and least powerful half of humanity."
(from "The Politics of Breastfeeding" by Gabrielle Palmer.)

Elah

We are slowly learning to speak Miri-language, that is, recognising her different cries. The noise that sounds like an indignant duck being sat on, for instance, roughly translates as "I am seriously pissed off now!" There is also the rhythmic, monotone and repetitive "A-yaar", which means "Give me attention!" or more often, "Why am I in this chair when you are doing something interesting?" The first word we learnt however, the one repeated most often is "Elah".

Elah means FOOD, or more precisely, Boob. At just under 3 weeks old, Miranda is having a growth spurt. She has put on nearly half a kilo in a week, and I swear her feet have got even bigger. This all means that she is eating constantly at the moment, demanding food every hour when she is awake, and disrupting our nights even more than "usual". (nothing as yet is usual or normal!). It is completely exhausting!

I am breastfeeding exclusively at the moment, which has earned whole-hearted approval from the midwife. It wasn't really a conscious decision as Miranda  found the milk bar and latched on within an hour of being born! However, I have no problem with this really. In purely practical terms, it is easier than faffing around with bottles and powder and mixing formula at 3am, I know it is all she needs, and I am never going to run out. And why pay for something when you can get it free?

It hurt like hell to begin with though. Rachel helpfully advised me: "It's fine once the first layer of skin has come off!". Seems to be true actually, it as actually a lot easier now than it was. Nevertheless, as if the episiotomy wasn't bad enough, getting blisters on your nipples is quite high up my list of Things You Should Never Have To Endure. Miranda's suction power is astonishing for one so small! At the moment it is only sore for the first few sucks - and Miri has a habit of lunging at me from a distance. Unfortunately that few seconds of intense pain is enough to render me wide awake meaning it is impossible to sleep through middle-of-the-night feeds. Also, she needs extra fluids at the moment because of the hot weather, so coupled with the growth spurt, she is feeding little but often and my nipples never get the chance to recover!

The hormones associated with breastfeeding are highly weird too. It is very bonding, which I suppose is a survival technique from baby's point of view as Mums wouldn't put up with it otherwise! Carl actually gets a bit jealous so I've started expressing milk so he can have a go at bottlefeeding her. It took a few days for the amount of milk to settle down though, and at first my boobs just swelled up enormously to the point of looking fake and cartoonish, and then promptly leaked everywhere. They have settled now though, leaving me having to panic-buy nursing bras in a ridiculous size 36J!

Sometimes I am quite proud of being able to breastfeed, I do love the time with her and it makes me feel 'capable' somehow, especially since parenthood is so new and there are so many things we need to learn and get used to. I don't have a problem with feeding Miri in public either, most of the time, and I've not had any discouraging comments yet either, not that I should nowadays anyway. I am sure our local pub has seen plenty of women get their boobs out in it in far less respectable circumstances.

At other times, however, I get frustrated with it all. I don't like just being The Milk Bar. Whenever I hold her, she smells food and immediately demands some. This means I don't get cuddles in the way Carl does, I can't just sit and talk to her or play with her like he can because she just hunts for Elah. More annoyingly I can't settle her to sleep in the middle of the night because the food supply is so distracting. When I am really tired, I feel completely useless; sometimes she has actually drained me dry, I can't give her what she really wants, and I can't cuddle her and calm her down either. Aaargh!

I do know this will pass and when she is older I will get to be Mummy properly rather than just Provider of Sustinance. I also know that it is not always going to hurt - though I am dreading when she gets teeth. The benefits of Elah outweigh its annoyances, so I will persevere. And I do love the newfound enormity. To Boobs! *chinks glass*