DailySusan Humor Blog

DAIRY QUEEN

I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.
-- 1 Corinthians 3:2

I visited recently with three young mothers who are breastfeeding for the first time. It reminded me of my four reigns as Dairy Queen.

It started off badly. Our oldest was a 10-pounder, and hungry. But early on, breastfeeding is far from fast food. It takes time to get production going.

Plus, I was clueless. I suddenly had these hot, hard dirigibles on my chest. But when I put the baby there, nothing happened. The nurses tried weird devices to train my dairies, including a plastic doughnut that reminded me of a petri dish out of the weird ‘60s movie Barbarella.

Didn’t work. In the middle of the night, a nurse brought the baby in to me literally hollering -- the baby, not the nurse. Our baby was waking up all the other babies in the nursery with her constant crying. I tried. No luck. I was a failure, and soooooo tired. I rang for the nurse to take her back.

She held her, and crooned, ’’Ohhhh, you’re so HUNGRY . . . so HOLLOW!!!’’

That KILLED me!

Next morning, I was determined. Two! Four! Six! Eight! Come on, dairies, let’s lactate!

They brought in The Mean Machine, an electric breast pump. They hooked my dairies up to two suction cups with long, clear hoses, and turned it on. There was an ominous whirring noise.

Suddenly, my dairies were being pulled three feet in front of me, rhythmically, first the left, then the right. It kind of hurt. I didn’t know whether to say ‘’Ow!’’ or ‘’Moo!’’

At least they pulled the curtains. But was I hallucinating, or was that ‘’Seventy-Six Trombones’’ on the hospital Muzak?

Suddenly, white liquid filled the tubes.

Brilliant scholar that I am, I asked, ‘’What’s that?!?’’

No one answered. Hoping to improve the decibel level at last, they’d already fled to the nursery to bring my squalling, starving baby to me.

Finally, success! Once I knew it was really milk in there -- nooooo! what’d you think? Jim Beam? -- I could relax, get a (excuse the expression) grip, and go with the flow.

Oh, I had my rough moments. You know how they say babies sleep 20 hours a day, and eat for four? Try the opposite.

I got up to speed fast on the soaps. I memorized the all-night song lineup on the radio. I stomped my feet in time to the music to get over the pain of those first few seconds of ‘’latch-on.’’ It seemed like they played a lot of songs like, “Baby, Baby, Don’t Get Hooked On Me.’’

I got what my husband delicately termed ‘’sore spouts.’’ Remedy: udder balm. You know, for mama cows and pigs. Smelly! And boy, did it work, along with tincture of benzoin, which smelled like root beer and caused the baby to make the funniest faces.

I had to wear weird bras with what my husband called ‘’bomb bay doors.’’ I got funny-looking spots on my blouses when the dairies ‘’jumped the gun.’’ I once shocked a restroom full of Husker fans at an away game. They were staring at the breast pump in my hand. I told them it was my ‘’sex toy.’’ They gasped! They would have called the cops if I hadn’t come back out of the stall with five ounces of the purest, most precious stuff in the world.

Because that’s what it is.

Straight from heaven. Proof of heaven, actually.

Breastfeeding is so miraculously complex and intricately interactive, it proves God’s design and provision better than anything else you can name.

It gave my children perfectly-balanced nutrition, vitamins and priceless immunities. It helped me lose weight, save money, and bond with my kids.

Most of all, it made me into a mother. There are other ways to get there, all good. But this was mine. Exactly as God planned.

I loved being a Dairy Queen. And for that, I thank my King . . . with a ‘’moo, moo’’ here, and an ‘’ow, ow’’ there. . . .

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Prayer request: Lord Jesus, bless those three young nursing mothers, Jana, Kerry and Jessie, and their darling babies, at this special time in their lives. Let their husbands see the beauty and majesty of Your plan for us women, and love and revere them even more. Keep them healthy, with a sense of humor, and appreciating Your provision more and more. We pray that Your Word will nurture and sustain all of us, like mother’s milk. (1 Peter 2:2)