Breast Feeding in Public

Since arriving in NYC, I've been trying to gauge the level of acceptance of public breastfeeding (under my "modesty sheet" of course. Very Victorian.) And I've noticed that I now, a month in, feel a lot less comfortable with it than I did in Canada.

I've been pulling out the sheet at a number of different places, mostly on the subway. This is probably naive of me. But when the baby's screaming and I have a 35 minutes train ride ahead, and the car's practically empty and there's a large piece of fabric in my bag to drape over anything that might offend, I figured there's no harm.

The first time I did it, the two African-American men sitting in front of me, both my age, started to fidget until one of them nudged the other. They stood up and moved to the other side of the car. "It was out of respect, to give you privacy," my husband suggested later. Fair enough. 

The second time, a man across the aisle from me stared, wide-eyed and mouth partly gaped, as if I'd just stood up and done the shimy-shake. The time after that, a woman leaned over and in a hushed tone said "Good for you."

A week later, we were returning from Ikea and it was a little late in the evening. Alice was crying, the subway was almost full and there was a two-person bench at the end of the car. It was semi-, sort of private. I could turn and face the wall. It was occupied by a man in yellow pants and a well-cut suit jacket. He said "of course" when I asked him to switch seats with me. The middle aged woman across from me smiled when I sat down with Alice. But once I pulled out my Sheet of Shame, her smile disappeared and she closed her eyes. She kept them closed for most of the ride, I imagine giving me my privacy in her own way, and eventually fell asleep. 

We even received a few stares while sitting under a tree in my park in Brooklyn. Restaurants are a big no. A few times now I've thought of Hollie McNish while sitting on a lidless toilet seat, balancing Alice on my shin, staring at the sanitary napkin dispenser, choking on the smell. 

I'm torn. On the one hand, I want to help normalize public breastfeeding by doing it. Why should I have to look at a four story tall, 15-year-old model having a feathery pillow fight in her barely-there bra and panties in Times Square when I can't even pull out one sore, stretched-out breast, protected under a shame sheet? No one can even see it. It's just the fact that it's there, flopped out over my shirt, sharing the subway air, that makes people uncomfortable. 

On the other hand, I don't want to feel as though I'm doing something illicit when I feed my daughter.

I think it in part has to do with the intimacy of the act of feeding, and doing it in such a public space. There's something hushed and moist and sacred about breast feeding, and it's jarring to see it all out in the open (under a sheet) on a dirty subway. I can understand that. But it's also a highly practical act. Baby's hungry, baby needs to be fed. Why waste the time pumping when she can go right to the source?

I'm still trying to figure out what I feel comfortable with, and how much I should let other's discomfort sway my actions. And while I do, I watch Orange is the New Black. It's so good! Way better than Weeds.