The shame of breastfeeding

I am a breastfeeder. ‘Brilliant.’ ‘Yeah deadly.’ ‘It’s so good for them, isn’t it?’ ‘I don’t know how you do it.’ ‘You’re feeding him yourself? Fair play.’ Six months pass. ‘Wow! You’re still at it.’ ‘Good for you. Are you going to go much longer?’ ‘You must be wrecked.’ What a curiosity we are as we approach a year. ‘But he can eat proper food now can’t he?’ ‘Has he many teeth?’ ‘You’re not still doing that, are you?’ They shift in their seats and look away. Fourteen months. ‘Have you weaned him yet?’ ‘He’s not still… is he?’ Wide-eyed disbelief. ‘It’s unnatural,’ my mother says and she should know she’s a nurse. ‘Think of all the vitamins and minerals he’s missing out on in the follow on milk. It’s especially formulated for infants’ needs you know.’ Not like my lowly home brewed milk. My hooch. ‘You’re in a minority,’ says his father. He wants nothing to do with this in public. He open a newspaper pretending not to know us as we feed. ‘How long are you going to keep this craic up for?’ his godfather says. Even the public health nurse looks embarrassed at our 18 month check-up. Yet I defiant choose to fly in the face of convention. Every night of broken sleep his paternal grandmother blames on my unwillingness to comply, on my yielding to my sweet pea’s comfort. I breastfeed against the odds to make my pumpkin happy, he asks me to. Judge me if you will, he is almost two. My Babbin Tiny Boo