Over-exposed

If there’s anything I’ve learned breastfeeding, it’s that modesty goes out the window.

Here’s how the evolution occurred… Day 1 at the hospital and my parents come to visit – I make my dad stand in the entryway while I get the small one to latch on and serve as my nursing cover.  By day 3, I no longer care about nursing in front of my father.  By week 2, I even nurse in front of my little brother, although I believe this proves to be more awkward for him than it was for me. By week 4, I’m nursing at a pre-Thanksgiving get together that a male co-worker of mine is also attending, vaguely covered by a receiving blanket while we discus everything I’ve been missing at the office as of late.

And today… not that I need to be modest in front of my own husband, but today I did the one thing I swore I would never do – I pumped in front of him.  That’s right folks, those sexy fleshy orbs he used to paw at have officially been seen in their most udder-like state.

Of course, there’s context to the story… the small one slept eight straight hours last night (8 PM to 4 AM), which is pretty much the best thing ever.  That being said, no one warned me that despite his sleeping soundly, the child would forgot to let my breasts know, as they were up and ready for the usual 2 AM meet up for drinks and got stood up.  And by ready I mean completely engorged.  So I got up and used my manual pump to drain the worst off side, leaving the other side good and full in case the small one awoke the moment I put the pump down, desperately in need of a milk cocktail.  And two hours later, when he did decide to take a late second dinner, he fed like a champ.  Unfortunately not quite champ enough for my poor left boob (something I was too tired to notice at the time, being that time was 4 freakin’ AM).  So when I got up this morning, said breast was throbbing at the top, where one milk duct managed to clog itself.  This, as you can imagine, is no fun.  I mean hard lump that is visible from across the room that even the manual pump won’t drain no fun.

And so, after I hit breakdown mode this afternoon (the point at which even moving my left arm caused shooting pain, despite having nursed on that side repeatedly), my husband (who is amazing, I might add now) created a one man bucket brigade for hot compresses, dampening a wash cloth with scalding water and running it to me, only to run back and repeat with another so as to try and warm the milk out of my boob from the outside, all while I attempted to pump.  Let me explain this in all it’s gory details – the pump cones I stick over my breasts are a clear plastic, which means you can watch in all its nature channel style authenticity, the milk being sucked from my nipples and collect in what is basically a small ziplock freezer bag.  It was just about the least sexy thing a couple of heterosexual kids could do to a boob shy of performing a dissection.

The good news is it worked and the girls appear to be back in good working order (although slightly worse for the wear and rather sore).  The bad news is that, shy of taking a dump in front of him (there’s one upside of not having given birth vaginally), I don’t think I have any modesty left when it comes to my relationship with my husband.

And I may have to start buying lingerie after today when I someday allow him to get within groping distance again.