When my daughter was born, my parents—as befitting dutiful Chinese grandparents—made the peremptory trek across the country, squeezing into our tiny one-bedroom apartment, to offer their help. The second night after we returned home from the hospital, I was roused from sleep by the sudden stab of pain from what might as well have been sacks of rocks swinging from my chest. Yet despite the fact that my breasts felt full to bursting, crisscrossed by an angry network of veins that had seemingly appeared overnight, and were hot and tender to the touch, no milk was coming out. I was convinced something was seriously amiss.
The walls separating the bedroom from the living room, where my parents were encamped, were thin, and my frustration and their granddaughter’s shrill cries did not go unnoticed. My mother plucked a two-ounce bottle of formula from the box we brought home from the hospital and pressed it into my hands. “You should just feed her,” she said, a note of accusation in her voice. “She’s hungry and formula’s very healthy.” I had activated one of two obsessions of Asian mothers: that children are adequately fed and that they are sufficiently warm.
So instead of taking the formula, I retrieved my breast pump from the kitchen and retreated behind the closed bedroom door, where I could pump in peace and beyond my mother’s disapproving gaze.
Moreover, I knew my mother was skeptical of breastfeeding. She, like many women in the ’70s, proudly and exclusively formula-fed both my brother and me. And despite the resurgence of breastfeeding in the decades since my birth as well as the recognition of its importance to both maternal and infant health, among the Asian American community it’s still stigmatized for a variety of reasons—from a persistent belief that formula offers more complete nutrition than breast milk to misplaced modesty concerns.
But I was determined to breastfeed. All my late-night Google sleuthing, my discussions with friends who’d already had children, and my interrogations of my OB-GYN had convinced me that breastfeeding (when it’s possible) yields countless benefits for both mom and baby. So instead of taking the formula, I retrieved my breast pump from the kitchen and retreated behind the closed bedroom door, where I could pump in peace and beyond my mother’s disapproving gaze. Still, her admonishment lingered. Even armed with my obsessive research, it’s hard to discount her conviction. I handed our daughter, her tiny face red, to my husband and asked that he feed her an ounce of formula while I wrestled with the pump and hot compresses the lactation nurse had recommended to stimulate milk flow.
Eventually, I was able to feed her. And soon, that almost painful burning that preceded let down and my daughter’s contented suckling became as familiar as they were welcome. But that didn’t stop my mother’s second-guessing—the suggestions to supplement breast milk with formula (“the best of both worlds!”), the worry that I must be overtaxing myself because my complexion looked so sallow and green. She began to brew pot after pot of soup made from the bones of black-skinned chickens, specimens procured from the local Chinatown markets and prized for their purported healing properties.
When I was pregnant, every Skype conversation with them ended with an assessment of my girth—along with a comparison of how my mother had appeared at similar stages.
Meanwhile, any time I nursed or pumped, I’d scurry to the safety of the bedroom and its locked door, ashamed by the disapproval and disgust I imagined were being levied my way.
In many Asian American families, shame and stigma are attached to the developing female body—especially if it doesn’t adhere to perceived willowy and slender norms. Growing up, my thicker waist and athletic build was remarked on constantly by my parents—the implication being that the state of my body reflected a moral as well as physical failing. When I was pregnant, every Skype conversation with them ended with an assessment of my girth—along with a comparison of how my mother had appeared at similar stages. Post-pregnancy, my mother eagerly shared her thoughts on the breast-sagging effects of breastfeeding.
After a month of what felt like near-constant surveillance, we dropped my parents off at the airport, waving cheerfully as they slowly disappeared from view behind the security gates. The relief (and guilt for feeling it) was almost palpable.
It was around then, with my daughter in tow, that I ventured outside the four walls of our apartment for the first time to meet a group of fellow mothers of newborns from the local mothers’ group. Sitting among them, munching on tacos and sipping virgin margaritas, I recognized myself in their dead-eyed stares, the exhaustion telegraphed in their unkempt appearance.
As an Asian American, among the several cultural tenets I followed (mostly unconsciously) were 1) listen to your parents and 2) the body is something to be covered up.
Then suddenly, as if responding to some hidden cue, several of the babies began fussing. To my surprise, their mothers remained at the table, pulling out brightly patterned nursing covers from diaper bags with one hand and tucking their babies discreetly under them with the other. One woman, who had left her cover at home or perhaps didn’t own one in the first place, started nursing her son immediately and without ceremony—his head blocking most of the view. My eyes darted around for a safe place to land.
As an Asian American, among the several cultural tenets I followed (mostly unconsciously) were 1) listen to your parents and 2) the body is something to be covered up, not spoken about, and not subjugated. While I’d never be completely at ease breastfeeding with an audience (that first meeting, I quickly excused myself when my daughter started indicating her intention to eat), slowly, I learned to be more comfortable with the idea. Part of it was practical—nothing soothed my daughter more, in those early months, than suckling at the breast—and part of it intellectual—there wasn’t anything wrong, after all, with feeding a hungry baby even if you happen to be in public.
My parents, too, eventually became acclimated to my determination to breastfeed. When my daughter was nine months old, they visited us again but didn’t bat an eye when the nursing cover came out in their presence. Perhaps they were tired when their suggestions were consistently met with silence, or perhaps they worried they’d wear out their welcome. There was no more talk of supplementing with formula and a studied avoidance of the volatile topic of postpartum changes to my shape, though the black-chicken soup made an unwelcome reappearance.
Instead, they started asking when I planned on weaning.
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