The Closest I've Come

I've always wondered what breastfeeding was like. The sensation, the satisfaction, the frustration, the nurturing, the bond.

I felt robbed of my inability to breastfeed. My breast became engorged, full and ready to feed. They became hard and knotty. They were round and large. The nurses and everything I read online urged me against rubbing them, against stimulating the nipple, against letting the overly warm soothing water hit them. I did all of these things I was urged not to do. I wanted to feel what it was like. In a way, it was curiosity but it was also a form of punishment.

I asked my mother and my mother-in-law what it was like. My MIL said it "feels like someone is sucking on your nipple" and my mother said it felt "like an orgasm". Maybe to them that's what it was like, but to me it'll be something different.

Today after I lay LD down for his nap, I tried to put down his brother too. He wasn't fussy, but he wasn't exactly happy either. He needed to sleep. He tried to get there and I rocked and swayed, I sat and stood. I walked and hummed. My usual method of holding him on my left shoulder, placing my right arm underneath his bum and folding my left arm across his back and cupping his head wasn't working.

I finally sat down, propped up with pillows behind me and folded my right leg over my left knee. I held him across my belly and his head rested in the crevice of my elbow. I rocked him softly, admired the curves of his sweet face, and listened to his sighs. His eyes fluttered until they were completely still. His cheek grazed up against my breast and he began to suckle.

I provided him a place of comfort.

It's the closest I've come to knowing what it's like.