"... of aggressive feedings and the mess of midnight cleanups. The disconnect can leave first-time parents underprepared during a transitional period often described as the fourth trimester...."
Here's the 30-second ad that aired during the Golden Globes.
Frida worked with the network on a 30-second edit that blurs or covers nipples that are visible in the original 75-second ad — a “fairly robust editing process at NBCU’s insistence,” said Chelsea Hirschhorn, the company’s chief executive, in a statement. She added that the point of the ad remained intact — “that the physical and emotional breastfeeding journey puts an unrivaled pressure on women to ‘perform,’ and no longer should women be expected to prioritize making milk over their own physical discomfort.” On YouTube, the original ad, which was posted on Feb. 24, already has more than 1.4 million views.
Here's that 75-second ad, where you will see nipples. You'll also see women in the shower trying to massage their clogged lactating breasts with the handle end of an electric toothbrush and the front end of dildo vibrator.
By the way, do you know what the NYT meant by "aggressive feedings"? I'm presuming the aggression is on the part of the baby.
And do you like that term "fourth trimester"? I can see that it's been around for a while, but this is the first time I've noticed it. The message — as I hear it — is that the mother's body and the baby's body are still a single unit. Your body is not yet all yours again. The baby is still sharing it.
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There is nothing so pleasant and meaningful as breastfeeding one's baby. I feel sorry for any woman who is unable to appreciate this experience.
More agitprop to get people to stop having babies.
Apparently, there are women out there who are so stupid that they don’t know you have to wipe shit off a baby’s butt.
Not surprising that they read the NYT.
Now that they've won they seem so lost...
I suppose it's progress we're discussing the commercials during the Golden Globes and not the Golden Globes...
Frida should be careful. The ad makes breast feeding look so unpleasant it might make expectant mothers turn immediately to bottle feeding, thus shrinking their market.
nd no longer should women be expected to prioritize making milk over their own physical discomfort.”
no longer should women be expected to? What does that mean?
Some things that are worth doing are really really hard. Babies are hard. If you have one, you have no choice but to persevere.
There are all kinds of things about loving other people that are hard. Taking care of a loved one with cancer is really really hard, too. Exhausting and physically taxing. Nobody said life is going to be easy or that when you take care of others, you won't sometimes experience physical discomfort.
I don't think it's a good message to send out: Hey people! No longer should you be expected to prioritize taking care of someone over your own physical discomfort!
https://twitter.com/stillgray/status/1366240037076017157
"4th trimester" was a fairly common term when my daughter was born almost 13 years ago. The thought is that due to the need to pass through the hips, the baby is born while it's still a fetus and is completely helpless--it can't even hold up it's own head yet.
Anyway, this language, "no longer should women be expected to prioritize making milk over their own physical discomfort" just strikes me as another push for selfishness on the part of hip Times-reading liberals, suggesting some sort of equivalence between the parent's needs and the baby's needs. Sorry, being a parent means you set aside your needs for a few years. Don't worry, though, you get it back. You start to matter again as your baby grows up.
And sacrificing your needs for a few years gifts a lifetime of benefits to your baby.
Yes, let's do this. On the first day of Women's History Month, let's discuss the misery of breastfeeding, sorry, chestfeeding and how womyn are forced to feed the kids while Dad and others are sitting there watching football or golf or some such shit. I don't know how they've managed to do it for...oh let's say longer than Smith College has been around, but now...now that we're so smart, we can stand up and say that it hurts, it's a pain, it's inconvenient, and fuck the kids. They can drink out of a bottle.
They don't have to talk young womyn into not having babies. We're already well below replacement rate. We're so smart, we're soloing ourselves out of existence. America's only hope is that Mexicans keep making babies at the healthy level they currently do. America will need them to fill in the empty slots in Manhattan apartments, and the NY Times.
I've had no regrets with formula feeding my 5yo daughter and 2yo son. There was so much pressure on my wife to breastfeed that when she couldn't produce she felt like a failure, but we switched and life was much happier. Both children are quite smart and robust, and feeding was easy.
And do you like that term "fourth trimester"?
It's fine unless used in this context, where its purpose is to mislead.
ngram shows the phrase "fourth trimester" became a fad around 1960, and before that it was typically used in reference to diseases, especially smallpox in the Philippines.
When my kids were infants, "aggressive feeding" was associated with a very hungry kid, trying to get more milk as a result. I could understand how that would detract from the experience, but having a super-sleepy baby (falling asleep mid-feeding, so not getting enough milk) has its own set of problems.
The sense I got from other uses of "fourth trimester" -- so perhaps intended differently than in this article -- was more about the postpartum effects: growing a baby in nine months takes a huge amount of energy and both hormonal and physiological changes, and those do not go away immediately when the baby comes out. There is a recovery period, and it's not necessarily just three months.
I had an extremely hard time with breast feeding. It made me feel like a failure of a new mother. At the time my children were born (2006, 2009), breast feeding was presented as not only the best option, but the morally superior option. I talked to lactation consultants, nurses, went online to the La Leche league website (I refer to them in conversation as the milk Nazi’s), read the books. But it never went the way I thought it was supposed to. I don’t know if I was influenced by advertising, or just the basic fact that that’s how women fed their babies for millenia, so what the hell was wrong with me?! I cried, night after night, while my son screamed every time I held him to me and attempted to get him to latch on and eat.
I gave in and switched to formula at eight weeks with him, six weeks with my daughter. At first, I felt an overwhelming sense of guilt, especially the first time. But that went away very quickly as I was now no longer grappling with the difficulty of trying all the different ways to position the baby, with the let down wait, with the latch. I snuggled my baby to me, and we looked in each other’s eyes. I kissed the tops of their heads. There was no more screaming in frustration from my babies.
I’m not normally accustomed to seeing naked breasts and dildos in motherhood commercials (which you see if you watch the long ad), but this ad definitely resonated with me and connected to some of my own experience. I wonder if perhaps this is the result of years of vigorous pushing of breast feeding as the best, and by some groups, only true viable option for feeding, but without the honesty of how difficult it can be. I’ll also note that you never see formula advertised on tv, and haven’t for years. Perhaps it is still somewhat vilified? I would agree that if viable, it’s a good idea for all new mothers to at least attempt to breast feed (heck, if nothing else, it’s free!), but maybe the stigma that comes with lack of breast feeding success will start to go away.
You know what helps mothers with a newborn baby? A present husband.
You know what helps make feedings more regular? A mom at home with her baby.
Please note, I am not advocating for any of these things. Mother Nature is.
Breasts are meant to be a fashion accessory.
I forgot to add that other people can also feed the baby when you bottle feed! I still did most of the feeding, especially at night because my husband worked the next day, but he also liked to feed the baby, as did grandparents.
It reminds me of the stories about realistic baby simulators which were supposed to discourage teen pregnancy instead may actually encourage it. It turns out that the girls liked motherhood even with all the hard work, or perhaps because of it.
If you know anything about any of the 12 step programs, you know that one of the steps to getting out of your own head is being of service to others. You have a baby, you need to be of service to that baby. It's going to get you through a lot more than wallowing in how physically uncomfortable it is. Sure, yes, there are discomforts and its perfectly reasonable to talk about them. But there's a good reason the primary focus is on the bonding that takes place when taking care of your baby (or anybody or any creature) and not veering into the self-pity and hardship of the conditions.
The message — as I hear it — is that the mother's body and the baby's body are still a single unit.
The message I hear is that you can still abort that fetus if you want to.
I've never heard "fourth trimester". I don't like it. No matter how much my body was not my own after birth, it was still in the process of resetting. Weight was going down, hips were getting narrower, coordination was returning.
Society has always been dishonest about breastfeeding, but that might be a feature. It's such a personal experience you just have to live it for yourself.
The old hag dykes at the NYT want to keep all the fresh meat to themselves.
It is no surprise that all of this is so scary and upsetting to new mothers. It isn't like there are thousands of centuries of experience for women to fall back on for child birth or the early months after that "event". It is all so new for everyone!
I just THANK the LORD that the NYT is on the job explaining this all to those women [and men I suppose - these days] that are about to go through this completely unheard of event!
"The message I hear is that you can still abort that fetus if you want to."
Me Too
Hi, mom of two kids one of whom is currently two weeks old.
Breastfeeding is exhausting, not intuitive and if like my first born refuses to cooperate can been demoralizing. I’m constantly thirsty, hungry and hunched over. I both love and hate it. I look longingly at formula and hate the price point of it. 4th trimester is real- still shedding 9 month build up of hormones, blood, and other fluids. I survived Officer Candidate School w the Marine Corps and that was easier than the first three months of newborn hood. I handled that sleep deprivation better than this kind of deprivation.
So why do women do this over and over again? Seems nature blocks this period out for you so that in a year you think oh let’s do it again! That’s parenthood: selective memory. Besides, they don’t stay little like this long.
Every mother has her own journey during this period. I’d advise just survive it, it gets better and no, stretch marks won’t go away. These ppl who mom shame, how do you have time or energy for that??
The message — as I hear it — is that the mother's body and the baby's body are still a single unit. Your body is not yet all yours again. The baby is still sharing it.
Mammalian Biology....so out of fashion, oppressive and not woke. We must get rid of it. Or..just get rid of the babies. That'll solve the problem.
Lol at the “milk nazis” term. They’re real and I hated them. Still do.
"Mammalian Biology....so out of fashion, oppressive and not woke. We must get rid of it. "
From the Party of Science. Transhumanism anyone.
I work in healthcare and my wife turned into a Doula after our first child because of some of the negatives of the experience.
This type of article is so tone-deaf and ignorant. Child birth and breastfeeding are literally natural body functions that have been medicalized, which is a term I use callously to refer to how the modern medical community structures things for their convenience and ignores what happens when the patient(s) go home. A few examples:
- Lying on your back for childbirth is possibly the worst position for the mothers comfort and for a smooth less painful delivery. And the more painful the delivery, the more likely the woman is to have longer term side effects with pelvic floor issues, tears, etc.....but it's convenient for the hospital staff to affix measuring devices and keep the woman in one position for delivery. So they encourage it and say they need it.
- Giving a newborn a bottle/artificial nipple is PROVEN to lead to more breastfeeding issues. Yet it's encouraged right away so the mother can get some rest or have "options". Let me tell you something. Nothing feels like less of an option or less restful than 3 nights after delivery when your newborn is struggling to feed.
I could go on. Just a few examples.
There are true cases of complicated birth and cases of real problems breastfeeding. They are rare considering, again, this is literally a natural body function. If you support it right, it tends to go smoothly. Ya know, since the entire existence of the species depends on it.
Ok. Seriously
Not every woman can easily breastfeed. It can be a painful and frustrating experience for both mother and baby. Fortunately...there is an alternative and there is no shame in using it.
Bottle feeding, formula feeding is NOT a crime against nature. Starving your baby, underfeeding because you aren't able to produce enough milk, no one getting any rest, babies always hungry, mother hallucinating from lack of sleep ....those are things ARE NOT GOOD and are not natural.
Screw the peer pressure and breast feeding fanatics. You do what is best for YOU and YOUR child and the sanity of everyone in your family.
If a woman is trying to combine breastfeeding a newborn with a full time career she may have misplaced her priorities. Unfortunately, the two-income family is the norm today, not the exception and even women who have an hourly job rather than a career are forced to relinquish the incomparable joy [yes, joy!!!] of motherhood.
Is childbirth painful? Damned right it is! Is motherhood inconvenient? Of course. Does it interfere with your 'me' time? Most certainly. But there is a good reason for the pain and inconvenience: It imputes a high value to the result.
I've made this shocking suggestion before: Women should marry and have children while young, then pursue careers when they and their children are older.
And there is NO shame in bottle feeding. The important thing is closeness with your baby.
People shame other people about how to raise their own children all the time. If someone is trying to shame you for bottle feeding, just ignore them. It will be good practice for when they try to shame you for something else they don't approve of.
Once you add a “4th” trimester, it makes a late term “3rd” trimester seem so much more reasonable.
But wouldn’t it actually be a quadmester?
Now for the push to legalize abortion in the fourth trimester.
@TreeJoe Well said.
Way back when I had my babies, my mother in law had a lot of questions about nursing because she had her children in an era when formula was scientific and better than mother's milk, when bottle feeding was better because you could monitor how much the baby had taken in at any feeding, and bottle feeding was the thing of the future.
Things go in waves. I just answered her questions and did what I felt was right.
Babies really do take over all of you for a little while. And I would question anyone telling me that they have the solution for that.
If you cannot feel love for your baby while they are so demanding, talk to someone and get help. That isn't the way it should be.
You ladies are spoiled rotten. Now at least thanks to men's structural systematic genius, you no longer face a fifty-fifty chance of dying in childbirth. Thanks to us, you have the luxury of a doula, midwife, lamaze coach and la leche league and you still pitch a fit. We do all this for you, plus we gave you girls indoor plumbing, the vacuum cleaner, washer/dryers, valium, the automatic transmission, etc and you still can't be satisfied.
@ Howard
It's a Man's World!
But it would be nothing without a woman or a girl 😁
We do all this for you, plus we gave you girls indoor plumbing, the vacuum cleaner, washer/dryers, valium, the automatic transmission, etc and you still can't be satisfied.
Mouse in pocket, marital troubles Howard?
"The message — as I hear it — is that the mother's body and the baby's body are still a single unit. Your body is not yet all yours again. The baby is still sharing it."
To progressives, mother and baby are never a single unit.
If they were, mothers would abort their babies via suicide.
They don't do that.
My great-great grandfather noted in his diary that on their covered wagon journey to Colorado my great-great grandmother, who had recently given birth to my great grandfather, contracted typhoid fever and was unable to supply milk. My great-great grandfather used clean rags to supply cow's milk to the baby. Today, cow's milk is not considered safe for a newborn but my great grandfather lived to form a small empire and died at 96.
When our daughter was small we alternated between calling her “the Lactivore” and “Remora.” It all worked out.
Mrs. Scott and I invested in a good quality breast pump. That helped immensely with our oldest child, who was a large and hungry baby and the fact that Mrs. Scott wasn’t producing enough milk to feed the ever hungry boy when he was was latched on. We had to supplement with formula, which wasn’t cheap a quarter of a century ago. Our youngest child was much smaller and didn’t drink as much. Plus, we bought maybe 1 can of formula powder for the second child. In both cases, the pump more than paid for itself. My wife would do the breastfeeding and I would do the bottle feeding of milk and formula for both children. Ah, good memories of bonding with my sons from a couple of decades-plus ago...
My 1st chewed me up and spit me out- which has made her a woman for this world. I’d slap my thigh every time the baby barracuda latched on. My 2nd was a little t*tman- such a joy to nourish him. I don’t really remember the next two- lol. By then i was an old hand.
I don’t mind the commercial at all- it reminds me off the Organic Valley commercial about women getting ready for their day. Real and humorous and difficult. I DO wonder how this will set w/constructed women- w/construct breasts- who cannot nurse due to lack of natural mammary systems... one would think truth will out, but not if the social construct crowd is riled up, I’ll wager.
Don't pretty much all babies born today get, at a minimum, some bottle feeding? I have known many mothers now in my life, and I know that none of them relied on breast....er.....chestfeeding exclusively, and most appeared to not rely on it even for a majority of the feeding.
I read these comments and cry because my daughter felt like such a failure as a mother when she couldn’t breast feed because her baby had some medical issues within his mouth. It took a long time to find even the right kind of nipple for him to bottle feed. Thank goodness things have settled down and she is a more confident mother now 6 months in.
Is this "ad" for real or just social engineering to denigrate normal biological functioning of women? How could you tell?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bh19YxASA-4
I had to breastfeed my second daughter, who was bigger and hungrier than the first, every two hours for a few days. This stimulated my milk production to the point where she slept through the night after only a couple of weeks. The more often you feed, the more milk you produce. Nature is smart that way.
I had friends that pumped and filled their freezers w/so much milk... also, the intrinsic value of hormones- the constructed women will never know.
My first had issues with latching on and breastfeeding her was a disaster. I felt awful, yet relieved when we made the decision to bottle feed. The next three had no issues and it was a great experience, even with the occasional milk let down and leaks even when hearing some other woman’s baby cry. Those hormones are powerful.
Kid#2 was an aggressive, voracious feeder at the breast. It was exhausting for my wife. She decided to wean early. Everyone was happier.
'Fourth Trimester' is one of those nonsense phrases designed to make everyone feel better. "I'm a new mother" is a lot more descriptive than "I'm in my 4th trimester"
Bottle fed the first three, nursed exclusively the last two.
You know why it finally clicked? Because I stopped listening to advice on how to nurse and just nursed. Trying to time everything and get in the right position and hold? Recipe for disaster.
But aside from the expense and inconvenience of formula, it was fine. No difference among the kids.
“Don't pretty much all babies born today get, at a minimum, some bottle feeding? I have known many mothers now in my life, and I know that none of them relied on breast....er.....chestfeeding exclusively, and most appeared to not rely on it even for a majority of the feeding.”
Not nowadays. Back in my baby days, 40 years ago, we didn’t breast feed for as long or exclusively, but my daughters breastfed their children exclusively for the first 6 months. They froze their milk for when dad fed the baby or grandparents were babysitting.
"no longer should women be expected to prioritize making milk over their own physical discomfort.”
1: How trans hostile! They're not "women", they're "people who lactate!" /sarc
2: Yes, mothers SHOULD prioritize feeding their children over their own comfort.
If you're not willing to do that, don't become a parent
Exactly, DBQ.
Some advantages of breastfeeding for the mother include:
1. Promotes contraction of the uterus.
2. Burns an extra 500 kcal/day.
3. Ease of preparation.
My wife got heavy, heavy pressure to breastfeed exclusively from the hospital's 'lactation coach' for out first son, c. 1989. (And a good dose of misandry: "Boys are so lazy!") Eventually, I started referring to her as the 'Lactation Nazi.'
When my wife was pregnant with our first in 1979 it was asserted in some of the earth-mother birthing books that were circulating then that the nine months in the womb were only the first half of gestation, because of head size, and the next nine months were the second half.
"went online to the La Leche league website (I refer to them in conversation as the milk Nazi’s)"
My mild-mannered polite husband ended up calling them the Titty Police.
Some husbands, I suspect, consider the 'titties' to be their own private property and are not overly supportive of breastfeeding.
Contracts the uterus-
Those were fun times, eh? As bad as the birthing was- those afterpangs were so much worse- I can’t imagine how my Memere felt after her 10th child- and those who had more! Those were women!
“Titty Police” is a good one too!!
I DO wonder how this will set w/constructed women- w/construct breasts- who cannot nurse due to lack of natural mammary systems... one would think truth will out, but not if the social construct crowd is riled up, I’ll wager.
Hmmm? To a first approximation, all human beings (indeed, all mammals, female and male) have natural mammary systems. In men, the breast tissue and mammary glands remain small and inactive, just like they are in prepubescent girls, because the right hormones aren't present, but they exist (men can and do get breast cancer, though it's rare).
This means that if you make the right hormones present, men's breast tissue and mammary glands respond the same way a woman's do. Taking estrogen and progesterone will cause a man's breast tissue to grow; there's no need for most transsexuals to get "construct breasts", because the artificial hormones they take cause them to grow their own. And enough of the hormone prolactin will cause men's (or for that matter, a stallion's) mammary glands to produce milk.
Some of us remember seeing [because it's one of those things one can't un-see] a video of murderer Richard Speck in prison with his 'boobs', compliments of the taxpayer's funding of hormones for his 'sex change'.
Glad I don’t have to I see that. With much much manipulation of hormones and possibly breast augmentation, lactation in men can be done. How healthy is that for the infant? How do those artificial hormones work w/in the growth of the baby? Just because something can be done- doesn’t mean it should be done. I’m not judging- ppl can do their thing, but when the repercussions down the road aren’t thought thoroughly through because the focus is: I want what I want when I want it... I guess no matter how I put this last part it sounds judgy. So- manipulate away.
I exclusively breastfed all three kids, for over a year each - weaning began at six months. It was hard to get started with the first one, but luckily I had excellent support from a well-trained and practical lactation consultant. Second and third were a snap. I know I was lucky. But...
... yes, that first three months is a b*tch, no matter what. And the oldest is 23 now and every minute of each of my children's lives, including the parts that were a b*tch, has been a gift from a gracious God. Quite aside from the sheer blessing of their existence, I am who I am because of the totality of my experiences, including the hard ones.
You eliminate hard things from your life at your ultimate peril, you silly, pampered Instagram children.
farmgirl wisely observes: Just because something can be done- doesn’t mean it should be done.
Truer words were never spoken.
Jamie, I think I was lucky, too. My babies 'latched on' immediately even when there was only colostrum.
How do those artificial hormones work w/in the growth of the baby?
Well, artificial prolactin isn't available legally for inducing lactation in humans (though it is available for veterinary use). And the other two are in the birth control pills used by a not-inconsiiderable number of breastfeeding mothers with no apparent negative effect.
The usual means to induce lactation in someone other than a gestational mother (usually an adoptive mother) is simulation of breastfeeding (for example, by an electric breast pump); this stimulates the pituitary gland into naturally producing prolactin. This has even been done successfully in normal men. The resulting level of milk production is usually insufficient to fully feed an infant.
Kinda makes you wonder about the casting process. These moms ain't exactly Kate Moss figures. Though really..a helluva lot fitter and more nicely made up than a typical "4th trimester" mum at wits end.
TreeJoe said...- Lying on your back for childbirth is possibly the worst position for the mothers comfort and for a smooth less painful delivery.
--
Increased C-sections?
Fwiw, filmed a conference about jaw alignment issues (TMJ etc) where they went into great detail about the facial structure benefits of breastfeeding.
I began breast-feeding my daughter in the intensive-care nursery, as soon as the respirator was disconnected, when she was six days old. (She had an oxygen hood, but didn't need it all the time.) I had to be careful not to disconnect the remaining wires and tubes. I ignored the doctors, nurses, other parents and people looking in through the picture windows. It was wonderful.
When I wasn't there, she was bottle fed. I tried to bring in breast milk, but I couldn't pump very much with the electric breast pump. (It had a huge bottle suitable for a cow.)
She came home at two weeks, completely healthy. To be able to hold her and feed her and rock her was a joy. I liked 3 am, because it was quiet, just the two of us. No wires, no nurses or doctors. It was our special time.
She was happy with breast milk from a breast, breast milk from a bottle or formula.
I agree with everyone who said that people who have problems with breast feeding should bottle feed. Do what works for you and your child. Driving yourself crazy is not doing your kid any favors.
If you have a healthy child, you are blessed.
"unrivaled pressure on women to ‘perform,’ and no longer should women be expected to prioritize making milk over their own physical discomfort.”
OMG. OMG. OMFG.
Anyway, here we have, once again, an instance of real feminism: women are special, so special that they should only prioritize themselves.
Breast or bottle fed, babies are a blessing and it hurts my heart to hear some women speak as though they resent their offspring for what they've had to endure on their behalf. They probably shouldn't have had children. :-(
The greatest "burden" you will ever carry. The hardest job you will ever love.
I got other things to do.
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