Mother. Feminist. Latter-day Saint. Lactivist.

Contradiction in terms? Less than you might think.

I first became involved in breastfeeding advocacy and the rights of mothers when a doctor refused to prescribe an antibiotic for a UTI because I was nursing, causing a kidney infection. After further research, I discovered how frequently doctors undermine breastfeeding mothers with misinformation and poor education. To learn more, I joined a group for breastfeeding support, and read a great deal about breastfeeding problems and solutions, being a lactation professional, and how to help other mothers who were facing the same lack of support from the medical profession and their communities. Most of all, I benefited from the support and camaraderie of other nursing mothers who were as dedicated to breastfeeding as I was.

I started attending La Leche League meetings and as I learned more about the lactivism movement, was eager to become involved. I attended the 2010 and 2011
Big Latch On events here in Utah. I went on to attend the Trolley Square Whole Foods nurse-in as well as the nationwide Target nurse-in. I participated in the Breastfeeding Promotion Act of 2011 put on by The United States Breastfeeding Committee to advocate for the rights of breastfeeding mothers in the workplace.

In 2010, I trained to become a doula and certified breastfeeding counselor, and am in the process of becoming a peer breastfeeding counselor for Women, Infants, and Children. I currently work as a postpartum doula to support women and their newborns, with an emphasis on lactation support.

In my years of experience as a nursing mother and advocate, I have encountered the significant public disapproval of nursing in public. It is my position that every mother should breastfeed in whatever manner she feels most comfortable. To nurse discreetly is no more modest than to nurse openly- because nursing is not immodest. To consider it an issue of modesty or discretion is to frame nursing as something it is not- as an intimate, private, or sexual act. A mother feeding her child is neither lewd, sensational, or shameful. It is a selfless act of devotion and maternal love.

What could be more tender, more dear than the suckling babe at the breast?

Early Dutch Painting, the Lucca Madonna
Artist: Jan van Eyck
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