Our culture’s growing breastpump addiction
Posted on 02/20/2009 04:50 pm by kagranju
While breastpumps are a necessary part of life for working mothers who must be separated from their babies, and while for some mothers, full time breastpumping is the only way they can provide breastmilk at all (I am in awe of those women. God bless you, because I don’t know if I could do it.), I agree with this blogger, who says we are headed down a slippery slope with our growing cultural dependence on the breastpump:
…a pumping friendly workplace, while a step in the right direction, is not necessarily a breastfeeding mom-friendly workplace. Giving lower wage women the ability to pump at work is a short-term fix to a much bigger problem. On a meta level, institutionalizing pumping for all women in America is a dangerous, ill-conceived solution to the problem of maternity leave and childcare…
Bigger, better breastpumps, and more luxurious workplace pumping rooms (not that too many companies have those, anyway) are a poor substitute for what American families really need, which is meaningful family leave so that one parent can stay home for at least the first six months without risking poverty (or worse poverty).
02/21/2009 at 10:26 pm
American mothers who want to stay home for six months may (and should) save up enough money to do so prior to the baby’s arrival, say, during the 40 wks of pregnancy. It shouldn’t be up to other Americans to pay for that choice.
02/22/2009 at 5:06 pm
I am not sure about the legalities, but our secretary at work thinks that she is legally entitled to take a twenty minute pump break every two hours on our employer’s dime. She has mentioned several times that she can because it is the law. This doesn’t count her lunch hour. I am all for mothers doing what is best, but this isn’t fair to the office either.
02/22/2009 at 6:07 pm
It’s not just about saving up the money for x number of months. It’s about having a job when your time at home is over and you are ready to go back to work. If we were a family-friendly society, we would ALL benefit, even people without kids like me. Acting like people’s home lives are just their personal lives ignores the fact that we’re all in this together. I would love for new parents to get time off. I’d also like to have that privilege if I needed 6 months to care for, or make long-term arrangesment for care, for a parent or a sick spouse, brother or sister. The cruel, impersonal model of working life just doesn’t cut it anymore. People are stressed on a daily basis, and destroyed by a family emergency.
02/25/2009 at 9:05 am
At a bare minimum we should protect (and *really* protect) jobs for a six month leave. My employer does do that, and knowing I had those crucial months to be with and, yes, nurse my daughter made my and her eventual transition to work and daycare pretty seamless. We were both ready.
I agree with LouAnn. We are all too close to the brink on a daily basis. Our society is paying the price.
02/25/2009 at 11:28 am
Our society would REALLY pay the price when businesses have to hold a job open for six months, waiting for someone who may or may not come back, having no ability to fill that job with an experienced, permanent employee. It’s absurd. No one ever thinks about that price. It’s only about what’s good for ME.
03/06/2009 at 6:42 pm
The USA and Australia are the only countries in the world that don’t have some guaranteed paid leave. Wikipedia has a good chart under “parental leave around the world.” If almost everyone else can prioritize this, why can’t the US?
These countries manage, and in fact, are often more likely to have the employee come back. I lived in Scotland for a while, and it’s common there to have people come in on a temporary basis to cover maternity leave. Job shares are also very common.