Facebook, Banning, Breastfeeding

Okay, so recently there has been an "outbreak" of banning on Facebook. What are these people being banned for? Trashy pics? Showing nudity? Horrible cursing and nasty/hateful statuses? Guess again.

Breastfeeding pictures.

Moms are being banned, and groups being closed, because of breastfeeding photos. Now I am not talking about nipple showing photos...I am not talking about pictures of milk dripping everywhere....I am talking about pictures of a baby nursing. A baby doing what babies do. A mother doing what mothers do. And these women are being banned.

A mother in my FB mom group posted this picture:

Please leave her watermark if you repost this.

And she was banned. Someone on her friends list reported this photo. Someone at Facebook actually looked at this and thought the reporting was correct and needed and banned her. Can someone explain to me why?

Most people would not even realize she was nursing...even I, who nurses my son everyday, did not even notice until all this happened and I looked at it again. Yet someone felt the need to be so "offended" and report it. Now people can post pictures of their *almost* showing genitals, pictures of a girl standing with only her hands covering her breasts (with no nursing baby in site...in other words no reason to have your boobs out on Facebook), skimpy bathing suits, erotic pictures, lingerie pictures, etc...but breastfeeding pictures are not allowed?

Breastfeeding in America will never become normalized in public and the media if a place like Facebook does this. Did you know that by numbers Facebook is the 3rd largest country in the world? If the 3rd largest country in the world is saying that it is not normal and is scandalous, then what do we expect others to think? When social media is just a driving force in our lives, we need to take a stand for mothers and babies.

If someone can explain to me why nursing pictures are so offensive, please enlighten me.

Oh, and here is one of mine....shocking!

By the way, my mommy friend did get her account back. If you know someone who has been banned for a breastfeeding photo, please let me know, as well as pages like "The Leaky Boob".

A year of breastfeeding!

As of my son's birthday (yesterday) we made it to a year of breastfeeding. We are still going strong and I have no intention of weaning him any time soon, but our official goal was a year.

Through the tough early days, the many nights of nursing a wiggly baby, all the way to the toddler antics and gymnastics, I knew that we would make it to a year. We set a goal and reached it.

I would like to thank the midwife and supporting cast who made sure that he was nursing within minutes of being born. I would like to thank my husband in a huge way...he was there to encourage and tell me how proud he was (and tell other people too!). I would also like to thank every mom who breastfeeds, every mom I have seen nurse in public, and every wonderful comment I have gotten about it. It erases the bad comments/looks I have gotten from a few random people.

If anyone has questions about breastfeeding...please send them my way. I would love to help another mother reach her goal.

Can I have one please?



Fountain in Italy

 Santa, I would like one of these for my front yard. I would like one in every town, in the major shopping center, or in the middle of the mall. I would like for every mother to see this. I would like for every artist to take in the beauty and create more of it.

A nursing mother is a wonderful, beautiful image. The abundance that a woman creates is magic. Maybe if more mothers, girls, and families saw something like this, nursing rates would be better in the United States. Milk production, otherwise known as lactation, is not something to hide. It is not shameful. It should not be put in the category as the other excrement of the body. This is not "bathroom" material, this is food for babies. The natural, normal food for babies.

I posted this to my Facebook as well. I hope that it makes someone smile, giggle, blush, or even get mad. I want the world to see nursing, mommy milk, and lactation in general as normal and beautiful.

(And for the record, this picture did make me giggle. I love it.)