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In the Public’s Eye
Last weekend at church a child in the back made a peep. And I mean a peep. All the women in the church turned around and looked at the child and the child’s mother. The next thing you know, that child is being nursed. Oooo, I’ll have to remember that. My goodness!
The last time we went to church Asher got fussy and, yes, everyone looked at me as I escorted myself out of the church and into our (borrowed) vehicle to nurse him. Last weekend though we took a taxi to church because we had no other way to get there. We got through church just fine but then Asher woke up when we were visiting with Mama Imanueli’s family. They invited us to have lunch with them and we gladly accepted.
So we’re in the living room all facing each other. There are her teenage children and her husband in the room and I knew I’d have to feed Asher. Hmmm… Leaving the room is totally bizarre and so is covering up in some way. (If I am surrounded by Europeans or Americans though I leave the room.) And even if covering up was okay Asher’s not used to it so the few times I’ve tried that with him he has shown quite clearly that he doesn’t like it.
I had only one choice. Nurse him right there. I had seen a couple ladies in church do it so that emboldened me a bit. And it was quite natural and beautiful actually. Obviously exposing that part of your body means absolutely nothing in this culture. Oh but showing the tummy (and knees) does so I had prepared by wearing a tank top under my shirt so I would, in no way, show anything I shouldn’t. I also kept my shirt kind of down on me where it wasn’t so “in your face” (so to speak).
And there was nothing to it. Everyone went right on with their conversations. The kids went in and out of the room not paying me any attention at all. They weren’t purposefully avoiding me out of embarrassment. It is just such a common sight to them that it was nothing to take notice of. I found this all very amazing and felt good about my choice to nurse him there. We were done in no time and began eating our lunch.
What a different culture! It makes nursing children so much easier since it’s so much more common and acceptable (well, even expected). I am reminded of my favorite nursing book. I have never read it. It’s my favorite based on the title only. “So That’s What Those are For”. Classic.
4 Responses to “In the Public’s Eye”
June 20th, 2008 at 10:43 pm
i feel exactly the same! good work on learning to roll with the culture you’re in!
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:37 am
Oh YAY for you!!! I’m so glad you felt more comfortable about it this time. I suppose by the time you’re back in the US you might not be nursing Asher any more (then again, you might???), but it’d be so wonderful if you felt empowered enough to be able to nurse in “public” back there too. And the reason I say that is because it’s only taboo because we as a society have made it so. So the more women do it, the less of an issue it is until one day, one day MAYBE, our cultural hangups about breasts will be resolved and nursing will be seen for the amazing, beautiful, NATURAL, wonderful thing it is! Mwah!
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:33 am
Yes, that’s true. Hmmm…but does it have to start with ME? Heehee… I know, I know. If we all say that then it will continue. The thing is that it really is so much more comfortable breastfeeding here because it’s so much more common. I love that women in general treat breastfeeding as the most natural thing in the world here.
June 23rd, 2008 at 4:07 pm
I still haven’t gotten the hang of covering my tummy instead of my boob when I nurse here. And I still find the church thing confusing. Usually it’s normal to nurse in church, but this week we were doing a homestay with a pastor and I asked his daugter before church if I should nurse inside or outside and she said outside…but maybe she didn’t actually mean it wasn’t okay inside, I really don’t know. The big cultural difference here for me is not so much BFIP, because I could do that in Norway easily too. The thing is, like in the story you told from church, nursing isn’t shocking, but a baby crying is. Any time Daniel cries, if there are Tanzanians around, they feel the need to tell me “The baby is crying!”, and if it continues they are so concerned. Daniel is now at an age where he needs to sleep through the night and sometimes we have to let him cry so he will learn, and occasionally I have to let him cry himself to sleep for a nap. Doing our homestay this was a complete non-option, even for ten minutes when everyone else is still awake. Even if he’s crying out of anger (he knows what he wants these days) people feel sympathy for the child, not the mother, and as far as I can tell they think I’m being a horrible mother if I don’t find a way to calm him down immediately. Twice during our orientation in a hotel in Dar I needed to let him cry for a while because I was out of options, and after a bit a maid came into the room (swiped her card in the locked door) and picked him up out of his crib to comfort him. (Sorry, really long comment. I think I’m venting.)