Notice anything different here 👀?! Breast pumping in the office. Bet you wouldn’t have noticed unless I pointed it out? Honestly, innovation like this which truly changes lives. I’m not being dramatic - It’s allowed me to go back into the office one day a week. To not be chained to a wall socket feeling like a cow being milked. To multitask, to work and feed at the same time. But on a broader level, it makes the whole experience less weird / intrusive / restrictive / “should I hide this?” / “is someone going to be offended?” and all the feelings / opinions that still seem to surface any time breasts or breastfeeding enter the chat (let’s see how the LinkedIn algorithm handles that). That’s something I didn’t appreciate until it was me. Normalising this stuff shouldn’t be radical. But until it isn’t, I’ll keep talking about it.
Not forgetting that breastfeeding takes up 25% of the body’s energy, by comparison the brain takes 20% and yet we still do it all. We outperform. We run businesses. We have new ideas. We manage people problems, while putting our own on the sideline. We keep a tiny human alive and pour the last remaining ounce energy into emotional connection, baby sensory, being present and batch cooking. We do it on an average of four hours sleep if we’re lucky and this lasts every day for the best part of a year. I’m in awe of every woman building something while raising someone, especially those on the breastfeeding journey too.
This is why it’s so important to 👏 invest 👏 in 👏 women’s 👏 health. I saw an investment committee turn down a breastfeeding start-up because the LTV wasn’t good enough 😤 (women tend to breastfeed for 3-12 months). Traditional venture metrics need to change to ensure capital gets to these critical spaces! If you impress a mother, you have gained her trust for much longer (and the trust of her network!).
Love this so much! After the birth of my first daughter, I had the wall pump. After my second, I upgraded to the wearable one and it was so freeing. I used it in meetings, conferences, you name it. When I felt uncomfortable, I reminded myself that I was setting an example for the next postpartum woman.
I was grateful that with my firstborn, in the US, at 10 weeks post partum, I pumped in my own office 2-3 times a day.. first day back at work, I asked my bosses and glued paper to the glass parts of the wall from which one could look into… good old Medela… with the twins, I was a stay at home trailing spouse so nursing and pumping were interchangeable at home itself… the long term gains for mother-child-family-society from weight to antibodies are matchless. Good luck for the road ahead! It can be done, with the right supportive atmosphere in place!
I LOVE LOVE LOVE this. The dread of needing to pump in the office I felt 10yrs ago. Of someone asking, what’s that weird buzzing noise in the locked bathroom or corner office. The fact that if you go to a room to do it, for some reason your boobs just don’t play ball… but the minute you relax at your desk, you have a well meaning colleague quietly point out ‘you’re leaking…’ I may have had another if it had just been that little bit easier. Hurrah for tech. And Hurrah for you sharing this image too.
Love this! I was banned from pumping in my office years ago because it made someone (presumably my male boss) uncomfortable that he could hear my pump when I unmuted to speak on a call. This was before the covert pumps they have now, of course. Then, after that, I got in trouble because I wasn’t in my office enough (because I had to pump in another room). 🙄 Please keep talking about it until these types of things no longer happen to working moms!
When I was pumping 10 years ago, I worked at Estée Lauder in the enormous GM building in NY! There was 1 (1!!!!!) room the size of a cubicle to pump in. If you hadn’t signed up, you’d have to wait your turn! This is a company for women by women! I’m glad the narrative is changing!!! Scream from the rooftops and if someone is making you feel like it’s taboo! Taboo away!!!
I remember my keep in touch days, nearly 14 years ago. I was working for schneider electric at the time, obviously very male dominated. I needed to pump, so I'd locked myself in a meeting room, just as id finished there was a knock at the door and I knocked the bottle over! I was both devastated and mortified 🙈
This is amazing! I remember being “plugged to a wall” like a cow 15 years ago, juggling milk production, meetings, calls, and everything in between. It was exhausting! Technology has truly transformed the experience for working moms and are empowering women to continue achieving it all!
Female founders aren't just founders, are life-creators. Normalising that balance between growing a business and rising a baby is what makes us different in the way we lead, we aren't focused on just doing more, we are on what matters (and who needs it more each times). Love to see how this experience will shape further your feminine leadership 🌸