Fuck Sensitivity.

Recently, I fed my baby in full public view in a Starbucks outlet, and Mister clicked a picture of us. I loved how we looked in the photo, so I posted it on my real-life (for want of a better word) Facebook account. In fact, it is now my profile picture.

My newly-addicted-to-Facebook-but-not-that-savvy mom was quick to comment that I shouldn’t have posted the picture, which was expected because in her fifty something years, she hasn’t ever seen anyone do this. I politely (I hope) explained that there was a need to normalize breastfeeding so people get used to women nursing in public.  I think my exact words were – Breasts are meant to feed babies, not to sell cement and chips and cold drinks.

So far, life was good.

And then, I got “advice” from several people, which was basically smooth talk asking me to take the photo down because “it’s in bad taste” and because “feeding in public can make some men uncomfortable” and “can’t believe you fed him in a coffee shop where even kids go”.

Seriously?

You think you need to protect children from boobs?! The first fucking human contact that a child has is with breasts – there’s nothing sexual about that contact and your kid knows it. It’s you adults that have it all wrong.

Boobs are meant to nourish, not to lure/entice men OR sell lousy merchandise. The reason why you cringe at the sight of a breastfeeding mother is that you see women and breasts as inherently sexual objects.

Why else would you know so many (a) women with smaller breasts always looking for “push-up” and “maximizer” bras and (b) women with larger breasts forever trying to cover up?

Why else would you be ok with a man going shirtless, nipples showing and all, but recoil at the thought of a woman’s nipples becoming visible (nipslip) even by accident?

And pray, how do you intend to raise awareness about larger issues like breast cancer when you’re so embarrassed by breasts? By posting bra colors in a group restricted to women?

Fuck your sensitivity. My photo’s staying.

Okay, I went and changed the image. I’m supposed to be a woman without a face, remember?

So, worth it?

You know how most mothers gush and swoon when they talk about their children and how they insist that motherhood is so worth it?

Yeah – I don’t fucking get it.

Seriously. I’ve been a mom for twenty-five days, and every single day has been a fucking nightmare. And I’m not even talking about the delivery. That’s the easy part, despite the episiotomy (and the fact that you went through all this trouble and he doesn’t even look like either of you).

Every time Z gets hungry or has peed or pooped, he cries. All of 3 kilos, and he has more lung power than Arnab Goswami on steroids. And he eats/pees/poops in 15 minute cycles.

It’s not surprising then, that the last twenty-five days have seen only four changes of clothes (unless you exclude the hospital gown, which I wore for the two days I was in there – which makes it three changes of clothes over 23 days. So basically I have worn each pair of pajamas-and-tee for about 7.67 days).

The clothes I’m wearing now have safely absorbed six pee puddles and two vomit showers, which is more than I can say for most diapers I’ve tried (if I hear a word about how I should be using cloth nappies, I’m going to scratch your eyes right out). I’m pretty sure these pajamas are going to last me another three days, unless poop gets on it. Maybe not even then.

When your husband asks you if you want to shower, you want to scratch his face with your longish fingernails that have dried poop under them. (Unless your baby just peed, in which case the poop isn’t dry anymore.) If I had fifteen fucking minutes to spare, don’t you think I’d be spending it on something that I actually fucking need to do? Like eat? Or sleep?

The answer is NO. The moment you pick up that cup of tea or lie down on the bed, the Arnabesque wailing will begin. By the time you get back, it’s cold (speaking of both the tea and the bed) and you just can’t, anymore.

Then there’s the breastfeeding, which is (f)actually beast-feeding, but you don’t realize it until those pretty pink lips you were just admiring suck on your tits like a vampire. Yes, there’s blood involved, and no, you never get used to it (at least not for the first 25 days).

All of this leaves you so exhausted and emotionally volatile, you find yourself weeping uncontrollably and thinking dark thoughts, much like the ones in this post. You’re not blind; you know you’re probably depressed, but if the husband even remotely suggests post-partum depression, you get mad and basically prove him right by flailing your arms and screaming at him until he hugs you. Then you’re still mad, but at least you’ve got some physical contact with a human being other than your son.

Speaking of human beings – most days, you don’t feel like you’re one.

Motherhood is so worth it my ass.

You know what I think? I think experienced mothers just really want other women to suffer – just like when you watch a really disastrous movie and you come back and tell all your friends they should go watch it coz it’s so “worth it”. Why drown alone when you can take down the rest of the world with you?

Advice to women without children: stay that way unless you have a lot of patience. At twenty-five days the tunnel seems too long and the light at the end, if there’s one, is too far away.