No one would ever criticize a man for making the same “poor decisions.”

Unfortunately men don’t get pregnant, men don’t breastfeed, and men don’t demand that everyone else bend over backwards to make their lives easier because they have a baby. (And actually, if a man pulled the same “gimme-gimme” nonsense that Currier is pulling, I damn well would criticize.) Let me ask you this: would you be as supportive of Currier’s demands if she weren’t playing the “sacred mommyhood” card? If, for example, she claimed she needed the extra break time (on top of what she already gets) to prevent test-induced panic attacks? Or to meditate or pray, because her religion commands it? Or because marathon test-taking is just so exhausting that she needs extra break time to recover? At what point in time do we say to women like this, “Enough. Life isn’t fair. Put on your big-girl panties and deal, because you’re making the rest of us look bad”? Lots of other breastfeeding women have taken the boards and done just fine with the time allotted; for Currier to demand one accommodation on top of another and then use her baby as a bargaining chip is a slap in the face to all those women who have worked so hard to make it without special help.

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People in my office FREAKED that I might use the refrigerator at work to hold the bottles of EBM that were IN a bag. They freaked out that I used the BATHROOM sink to rinse out the pump parts. The local daycares ALL refused to take EBM. It’s a bodily fluid, doncha know.

You know, you’re really not an expert on breastfeeding and feeding schedules. Neither am I, but I’d put my multiple years of breastfeeding and LLL attendance up against your experience and Mommy and Me classes. Some babies do have a physical need to feed every 2 hours or so. I wouldn’t have gone to my pedi for a written report of that because 1) I rarely went to the pedi and 2) my pedi was pretty ignorant about feeding babies in general (he recommended cereal at 8 weeks and suggested I should go ahead and wean to formula at 10 weeks, mainly because when he asked about feeding schedule I said “every couple of hours or so”).

These kinds of marathon tests are not supposed to be fun. Having taken a number of them, and as someone with a bad bladder, it’s a marathon, not a day at the beach. Making accomodations for pregnancy and breastfeeding is reasonable, but creating an unfair playing field with the other toiling kids isn’t. People make sacrifices to take these exams. A friend of mine with a worse bladder than mine who had a pot of coffee before the Bar exam actually wore, and used, a Depends during the exam.

(Yes, it actually was “a friend” and not me — I was single when I took the Bar and much too concerned about how my ass looked to try a diaper.)

Eating? Going to the toilet? Variations between women in pump response?

Colour me also as gobsmacked that commenters on a feminist blog are whining that:

(a) this woman should have made a choice between career and reproduction, just because other women are cornered into that choice by a misogynist society,

and (b) only women without disability accessibility needs should have access to workplace pumping accommodations. To deny pumping accommodations _on the basis of disability accommodations being already in place_ is outright bigotry.

If a medical career is incompatible with breastfeeding bodies, the problem is with medicine, not with women. I for one am very glad that this particular woman is challenging that broken outlook.

And the board whining that they don’t have the staff or resources to supervise an hour of pumping breaks, but they can go to court several times over it? Uh, right. Whatever.

Eating? Going to the toilet? Variations between women in pump response?

Colour me also as gobsmacked that commenters on a feminist blog are whining that:

(a) this woman should have made a choice between career and reproduction, just because other women are cornered into that choice by a misogynist society,

and (b) only women without disability accessibility needs should have access to workplace pumping accommodations. To deny pumping accommodations _on the basis of disability accommodations being already in place_ is outright bigotry.

If a medical career is incompatible with breastfeeding bodies, the problem is with medicine, not with women. I for one am very glad that this particular woman is challenging that broken outlook.

And the school whining that they don’t have the staff or resources to supervise an hour of pumping breaks, but they can go to court several times over it? Uh, right. Whatever.

That said, two hours is pretty unusual as babies go, esp for a large baby. While YMMV, most moms I know who feed every two hours are responding to signals other than hunger.

But the bottom line is, “breast is best” gets a lot of respect these days, and if there were backup from her pedi as to her nursing schedule, I daresay that appropriate breaks would be accorded.

You went to Mommy and Me groups? Then you must be the expert.

I went to LLL groups and this was a common concern/complaint. Plugged ducts are extremely common and the leading cause is allowing yourself to become engorged. Which for those of us with babies who ate every 2-3 hours happened, not surprisingly, every 2-3 hours. Since pumping never drains the breast as well as nursing (at least for those of us who don’t pump exclusively) plugged ducts are more common and pumping needs to happen MORE often than nursing (either that or wean yourself from pumping totally and give formula during those times – which a lot of women do and is a valid option, just not for me and I don’t think for anyone for ONE day).

Maybe the difference between Mommy and Me and LLL is that LLL is set up to specifically discuss nursing and, by extension, pumping issues. So it came up there pretty much every meeting.

It is unfortunate that this issue is being raised by a woman who has already asked for, and received, other accomodations, because it allows people to ignore the greater issue and focus instead on her “greediness”. We, as a society, do not value nursing babies and, by extension, their mothers. As far as a lot of people are concerned, formula exists and therefore should be used if there are any roadblocks to nursing – nevermind that a few simple accomodations could make nursing MUCH easier than formula.

Currier is expecting the rest of the world to bend over backwards to accommodate her own poor decision-making. She had two babies in two years – not exactly the smartest thing to do when you’re in a demanding double-degree program.

No one would ever criticize a man for making the same “poor decisions.” And not all pregnancies are planned: just because she’s planning to be a doctor, does that mean we get to control her fertility? I think she’s done pretty well for herself, if she’s managed to get this far with the demands of motherhood, ADHD, and dyslexia.