I'm not sure I've ever been so happy for a Friday. Being a working mom is, well, WORK. I'm still trying to figure out how to combine my new life with my old job and find a balance between home and work. I'm sure that this is something I will be trying to do until the day I retire. The biggest challenge for me so far? Finding the time and space to pump. When I'm at the office, it's not a big deal since I have a private office and can just lock the door and put up my "please do not disturb" sign. I wanted it to read "if the pump's a rockin', don't come a knockin'," but I have some co-workers that might not find the humour in that. The problem is, 80% of my job is being in meetings (I know, totally ridiculous). When the meetings are at my office, I have to figure out a way to excuse myself for ten minutes without disrupting everyone else. When the meetings are outside of my office (probably 50% of them), it's a whole other story.
Let me share such a story with you. Every other month I have one BIG meeting, that includes government officials and executive directors from various agencies. Despite the fact that everyone is really nice, I still get a bit overwhelmed with the fact that I'm sitting at the table with some of my city's most powerful people. I play a pretty big role in organizing these meetings, so once a month I'm usually pretty stressed out. I work by butt off this week to prepare and after wrapping up at 8pm last night, I was feeling pretty good about things. Then this morning as I was running around like a mad woman getting ready, the person who was to facilitate a 2 hour portion of the meeting called to say her daughter was sick and she couldn't make it.
Here's the thing. Eight months ago I would have found this super annoying. Now I just totally understand.
So I had about 40 minutes to prepare since yours truly was going to have to fill in.
An hour into the meeting I excuse myself to go pump. I get into the washroom (I normally would never pump in the washroom, but our City Hall is pretty posh and I felt comfortable/clean) only to realize the batteries in my pump are DEAD. So now I have two options. (1) don't pump and risk leaking in front of my member of parliament (and 30 others), or (2) ask a random city employee for a place to pump.
Thankfully the Human Resources office was really helpful and helped me settle into the first aid room and the crisis was diverted. Still - I couldn't help but sit there as a I pumped and wonder how this became my life. After the meeting (which went fine), I pumped in my ward's councillors office.
I have breastfed in ALOT of different places. Now I guess I get to pump in weird places.
I can't decide if that's awesome or not.
You are a very dedicated woman!! My pumping and bfing days came to an end about a month ago :(
ReplyDeleteDefinitely awesome! I'm reading in admiration!! Keep it up and when Kale turns out to be super genius, you can tell him why.
ReplyDeleteI just got a pump this week! I have no idea how it's supposed to work, or breast feeding though I've read a little. I'm sort of exhausted from reading, and want to have the baby here to practice with! But that's besides the point... I plan on going back to work after 12 weeks (the longest amount of maternity leave I can take), and Nathan will keep the babes. I also plan on pumping at work. eek. I hope that it all works out because ideally I'd like to nurse for at least 6 months (longer if we can). It's so much harder for working moms to keep up those sorts of things.
ReplyDeleteAny stories or advice you have as your going on this adventure now is awesome though! It will definitely help me to relate when it's my turn that's for sure.
A co-worker mentioned that it was easier for her to manual pump while at work. Do you do both manual and electronic?
-Carey@yellowsquarelove.com
It's tough!! I pumped for a whole year and it was always difficult to find a place to do it. People freak out when they see a breast-pump (I totally did the first time I saw one... and the noise? I died) so it is hard to explain to someone what you need to do (it's worse when they have no kids!). One the bright side, Canada is a pretty good place to have these kinds of "problems". It was so much more difficult to find someone who was understanding about this when I was in Colombia. People were kind of offended which made me SO angry, I don't even want to go there right now.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I admire your determination!! Keep up fighting for the right to pump! ;) Leaking boobs in front of members of parliament? Not good (but would be really funny).