Breastfeeding, for me, has summed up in microcosm my whole faith as it is both sacred and mundane; a spiritual experience and yet completely of the flesh. For me, this is the essence of my beliefs – they are at once higher than myself and totally of myself.
Before the birth of my eldest child I had never thought about the spirituality of breastfeeding. It was something I wanted to do, as I knew it was best for my baby both nutritionally and from a bonding point of view. I had thought about the sacred nature of conception, pregnancy and birth, but fertility problems, an awful pregnancy and traumatic and brutal birth experience had taken these thoughts from me. Nothing that awful could be spiritual, although looking back I suppose they were a learning experience.
Breastfeeding healed me and let me experience anew the miracle of birth and the wonder of my newborn child. My daughter looked up at me with old, old eyes in her baby face and coolly assessed me and her surroundings. Finally, she nodded her gracious assent that everything was in order and lunged at me with wide-open mouth.
I had never seen anyone breastfeed in real life before. Despite the books I had read in preparation I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to do it. Everything else in the whole motherhood pantheon had gone wrong or been a struggle for me up and so I expected nothing more.
But my daughter latched on and fed. Maybe she sensed my fear and wanted to help. We had both been traumatised by the birth and this was balm to both our souls. She fed and she looked up at me until her eyes became milk-drugged and drowsy and fluttered closed. And I was amazed. In the weeks that followed until she learned to feed lying down in our bed, I got up with her at night at the first hint of a whimper. Other mothers complained of night feeds and exhaustion – and it was tiring – but I also rejoiced in those watches in the small hours of the night.
Just me and my daughter in the dimly lit living room, no sign outside the window that anyone else was awake in the whole world. Her little snuffles and snorts and gulps and burps of contentment warmed me. It was a miracle – I could make the perfect food for her in my body and she was thriving. I could provide all she needed. What an amazing thought. How perfect is Mother Nature?
I sat there, my feet up, my daughter propped comfortably in the crook of my arm and thought about all those millions of women who had done what I was doing in years gone by, in other circumstances and in other countries. We were all linked. I felt part of a historical whole, a kinship.
Later, as my daughter began to walk and talk, feeding became a more mundane and everyday experience. A quick pitstop for a drink and reassurance before she was off again, but I never forgot those early magical days and later relived them with the birth of my son. Much less traumatic this time, but a completely different feeding experience due to his sleepiness and tongue-tie. And now here he is, still feeding at the age of almost three years. And once again, feeding has become more of a gymnastic than a spiritual experience and yet that link is still there to the women of other times and places, and to their children. I would not have missed this for the world.