November 20, 2006

WEANING; and the Bitch

We're weaning, Olive and I, from our breastfeeding relationship. It started this weekend, when her face flared up with an evil rash - it was the dairy rash she had when she was a wee baby and before another mother suggested in yoga class that the dairy in my diet could be making her blotchy. (Our wholistic approach pediatrician had said nothing of dairy allergies.) After several weeks of laying off all dairy, Olive's skin was aglow. But for the past few weeks I've been sneaking in minute amounts of dairy into my diet. I cookie here, a pat of butter there on bread. At first it didn't seem to bother Olive and I got excited, thinking perhaps her system has matured to accept and digest cow milk stuff. But no, and it culminated this past Saturday with a rashy faced baby on the very same weekend we were supposed to have her x-mas card portrait taken. It's made me feel so very guilty - I'm poisoning her with my milk. So I fed her formula all weekend, except for just before sleeping, when she had a few sips from the breast. She guzzled that formula down, boy; we're learning to call it Duddu. It means milk in Urdu baby-talk, and is pronounced very differently from the English "doo doo."

Today is the first day at work I am not pumping. Instead I am sitting here dealing with a full and painful right breast.

Workwise, things are painful too. My suggested approach to SEBI, the Indian regulator, was like an "open kimono," says my boss. She's basically calling me a concubine. I'm thinking of ways to figure in "female dog" about her in our next conversation.