World’s breast mom

Last week’s TIME magazine cover caused quite a stir. How a scientist and a bare breast brought the subject of attachment parenting to the forefront where everybody’s got an opinion and a boob jokes.

May 14, 2012; 6:47 AM • by The Checkout Girl

“You know you have to write about it,” my conscience whispered one week when I sat down to write my regular RVANews column.¹

“I know”, I said, “But not right now. I have Led Zeppelins to discuss.”

“Come on, child,” she said the next week, “It’s time.”

“Okay, okay,” I told her, “but there are Molly Ringwalds to talk about!”

Then, I saw the cover of last week’s TIME magazine and knew it wouldn’t wait. You see, it all started with Alicia Silverstone and Mayim Bialik–as things often do.

First, Mayim Bialik, the actress most frequently associated with her role in the 90’s television show Blossom, but whom I’ll always think of as Young Bette Midler from the estrogen-tastic movie Beaches (Beaches, you guys. Seriously. Beaches.), released a book, Beyond the Sling. The book, written by the neuroscience Ph.D-holding Bialik is a parenting guide that extols the virtues of what is known as “attachment parenting”,² the key tenets of which include natural childbirth, co-sleeping, wearing the baby in a sling and breast-feeding for longer than average. “The core principle is that a child’s voice matters,” says Bialik.

In the book, Mayim Bialik discusses the fact that she still breastfeeds her 3 1/2 year old son, Frederick, which caused quite a stir. Double the stir when she posted a picture on the internet of her breastfeeding the child on the subway. Lord, did people have opinions. Blossom’s tits had the internet water cooler bubbling with snark.

Not long after the Bialik situation got the parenting pot boiling, Alicia Silverstone, of Clueless fame and another advocate of attachment parenting, posted a video on her personal blog of her son, Bear, and she engaging in the activity of premastication. Premastication is just what it sounds like: a person chewing food for another person.

From the Wikipedia article on the subject:

This is often done by the mother or relatives of a baby to produce baby food capable of being consumed by the child during the weaning process. The chewed food in the form of a bolus is transferred from the mouth of one individual to another, either directly mouth-to-mouth, via utensils, hands, or is further cooked or processed prior to feeding. Many modern societies have strong aversions toward premastication, which have been compared to the aversion towards breastfeeding found in those societies during previous generations.

“Strong aversions”? You aren’t kidding, Wiki. “Modern society” was very vocal about being straight up grossed out. Straight up and mean.

Clearly these women are nuts, right? Surely, this is not how “normal” mothers care for their “normal” children. The internet had a good laugh, dismissed these ladies, and moved on to more important things, like guessing who was next to be booted off of Dancing with the Stars.

Then, this week, TIME went and did it, bearing the headline “Are You Mom Enough? Why attachment parenting drives some mothers to extremes — and how Dr. Bill Sears became their guru.” The cover features a picture of 26-year-old mother Jamie Lynne Grumet, standing next to a chair. On that chair stands her nearly 4-year-old son, Aram, latched on to Jamie’s exposed breast, nursing. Both Jamie (who was breastfed by her own mother until the age of six) and Aram are looking sideways directly into the camera.

The internet exploded. A bare-breasted woman! A child, fully two-thirds her size, using that breast! Now the nuts are taking over mainstream media!

Again, the opposition to the idea of breastfeeding an older child was much more vocal (or, in some cases, much more interesting to feature in commentaries on the subject) than the support. Cries of, at the very best, “weird” or “gross” to, disturbingly frequently, “child abuse”.

I’ll admit, I was as surprised as the next girl by the TIME cover photo, which was very clearly not intended to present a beautiful image of a loving act but to titillate and sell magazines. Shock and outrage equal dollars. Always.

The American Academy of Pediatrics states that breast-feeding should continue “as long as mutually desired by mother and child.” They also say “there is no upper limit to the duration of breastfeeding and no evidence of psychologic or developmental harm from breastfeeding into the third year of life or longer.”

As for premastication, in the Journal of Maternal & Child Nutrition, experts said the practice helps boost a child’s immunity. “Its abandonment, particularly in poor communities, has placed children at increased risk of inadequate nutrition and decreased ability to confront infections.”³

So, while the extremes of attachment parenting might be alien to us, and cause some uncomfortable feelings, and are certainly not for everyone, they are likely not child abuse. Besides, if you truly believed they were, would you not somehow be obligated to contact the authorities rather than making shitty comments on the internet?

How about we all go ahead and get busy raising our own children, rather than each other’s? How about we support those who make decisions which differ from our own but, nevertheless, seem loving and concerned with the best interests of their child? If we find ourselves unable to do that, how about we just mind our own damn business? Parenting is a difficult enough venture, without having to fend off second-guessers.⁴

Now, go tell your mom you love her and thank her for weaning you before prom. Moms love that kind of stuff.

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Photo by: Monika Thorpe

May 14, 2012 6:47 AM 6