Thursday, October 6, 2011

Topless with Baby: Dedicated to the fight against Breast Cancer

Appearing on StyleSegment.com today

I love the name of maternity lines because a good majority of them remind me of porn, like HotMilk, Fierce Mama, and Boobs. At what feels like the most unattractive point in a woman’s journey into motherhood the retail world like to remind you of how you got there.

Truthfully, I need a sense of humor. After all I am currently pregnant with my third baby in four years. Maternity clothes are sort of like toddler clothes, they get worn and washed and still have snot stains on them. I have also had a bad habit of giving away my maternity clothes every time I get my figure back, only to lose it again to my husband’s commando sperm.

The irony is that being mommy, at least for me, is not at all sexy. Even though half of Kentucky may have seen my boobs when it came time to breastfeed I was embarrassed!

When I was a teenager growing up in Kentucky, I was what you might call a Catholic schoolgirl gone wild. There was little to do in Fern Creek accept bowling and lake rides on whomever’s boat was handy.

My best friend Beth would opt to flash her well-known derriere to the fishermen and I would join in with my assets that were definitely not my flat butt. The goal was to see how many old men we could get to fall out of their boats.

When my little girls became painfully hard with mother’s milk much to my husband’s delight they were like torture devices strapped to my chest that wouldn’t fit comfortable in any ‘boulder holder.’ When it came time to put them to use my daughter was so small and frail that she was suffocating when I tried to put to use what my crash course in parenthood and breastfeeding with toy dolls taught me.

My husband wanted to give our little girl Lyra nothing, but nature’s gift so he took to preaching to me about how to properly insert my huge raspberry nipple. Back then I could only get this to work when I could escape to the car to peacefully wrestle my boob into her mouth after squirting her in the eye numerous times.

Because she put up such a fight and screamed at the whole process, breastfeeding in public was not possible. I couldn’t manage to use a Hooter Hider either because I couldn’t see what I was doing and would end up trying to hide my entire head under it just to hide myself from the world.
I ended up spending most of my time hooked up to a milking machine that deflated my buxom bosom. After six months I was done after my daughter bit me and laughed. My boobs were so sore from being hooked up to a machine I bleeding into the suction cups.

A year later my son was came along and changed the whole boobie-exposing experience. His attachment to my chest quickly turned him into my personal bra. You wouldn’t have guessed he was born with a short little serpent tongue, sometimes called ‘tongue tied.’ I refused to cut any part of him and there was no need. He had such enthusiasm for the boob he easily learned to hold on via suction. Here is where my topless adventures began again.



My son Luca wouldn’t take a bottle unless it was my milk. He even slept using my boob as a pillow like a blanket or favorite toy. So when he was three-months old I took him with me to New York when I covered Spring Fashion Week 2011. He had been inside me the previous season in February when I attended the runway shows for the first time in my glorified Mama-Jamas. It was cold and I couldn’t fully button a single coat that I had brought with me. My belly stuck out as if I was trying to smuggle a watermelon into the shows.

This time I was hoping to have a drink of free champagne, didn’t I deserve it? I brought my sister with me as my nanny and booked a room at the Empire Hotel across from Lincoln Center, the new home for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. My enthusiasm for the trip got a little out of hand the night before the flight at Pittsburgh’s Fashion Story event. I woke with a gallon of tainted milk in my chest. I had to drain myself of the vodka-infused mixture before taking off with my little guy.

I would like to suggest to the retail maternity world to make more pockets in clothes. I have never needed pockets more than I need them now. I tend to stick every contraption I can into my bra including my son’s favorite pacifier that is shaped like a hotdog nipple. In my rush to the airport I lost the pacifier and forgot to put my garment bag into my suitcase with all my well planned clothes.



The result: I had to run through the airport with a baby stuck to my breasts. During the entire plan ride I remained exposed for fear my son’s high pitched screams would scare the pilot. In New York, we all endured the worst taxi ride of all our lives. They just don’t make cabs equipped for car seats in the back, but that wasn’t the problem. My son hated the noise and just wanted to nestle into my boobs for comfort and fear.

My sister spent most of the trip in our room away from the bustling parties and urban noises letting my son sleep on her boobs and listening to the whistling tunes of Brother Bones, a 1920s vaudeville singer.

During my breaks from shows she would bring my son over for his feedings and so I could expose my working mammary glands for the likes of Anna Wintour. When I was looking for a quiet place to sit I found her at Avery Hall tucked away enjoying tea or coffee. If I had a twitter account back them I should have sent out a message “Anna Wintour saw my boobies!”

Breastfeeding is liberating at the same time constraining. Because my son doesn’t put up a fuss about being my nipple cover I often even forget my boobs are even exposed until someone says “Umm, Miss you’re falling out.” Oops I did it again.

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