No, I am not making this up! I am watching 20/20 and just heard about a mom from Toad Suck, Arkansas (again, I am not making this up...that is really the town's name)... anyway, the mom was seen drinking alcoholic beverages and breastfeeding her 6 month old. At the same time.
There is a bit of confusion.... mom says she had 2 beers, an off duty waitress said she was drinking mixed drinks with hard liquor. Mom was arrested for endangering a child but the charges later dropped. She maintains she was "sober enough to be breastfeeding."
Really? Sober, maybe --- but breastfeeding while drinking?? I am no expert on drinking alcoholic beverages or breastfeeding but doesn't whatever the mom consumes cross over into the breast milk?
The waitress who called the police and turned the mom in? She lost her job. So, if you saw someone with a drink in one hand and a baby breastfeeding in the other what would you do?
I saw that on the news, but I missed the part about Toad Suck. I feel less judgmental now because living in a town called Toad Suck might make it easier to feel the need for alcohol.
ReplyDeleteI assume it would take some time for the alcohol to go through the mother's system, so maybe the immediate breast feeding was not so much of a problem, but what poor judgement in the long run. I don't know what I would do--depends on if I was feeling self-righteous or compassionate, I can go either way.
When my first was born, nursing mothers were told to drink a beer. I have forgotten the exact reason why. Times have changed. My son is extremely sensitive to alcohol and really needs to avoid it entirely. Had I been a beer drinker, it might have been a true disaster. Or, who knows, it might have desensitized him a bit.