Chris at the Waterford Breastfeeding Art Exhibition

One of the nice things about the Art Exhibitions was how the photos and the Friends of Breastfeeding idea drew people in. People were friendly and positive and eager to talk.

While manning the Friends of Breastfeeding Art Exhibition stand for National Breastfeeding Week in Waterford Regional Hospital, I was approached by a grey haired man. He marched over, put both hands flat on the table and announced

"My daughter lives in the UK, she has twins who are 18 months old and she’s still breastfeeding them." I could hear the pride shining through in his voice. "They should build a monument to her," he said. Lots of people stopped to share their experience of breastfeeding and they seemed pleased to have an opportunity to tell their story.

Sitting at the stand gives plenty of opportunity to watch the world go by. It’s a busy ole place with doctors, nurses, other hospital staff and a variety of visitors buzzing around. Without meaning to, I found myself guessing why people are there. Some walked quite briskly, maybe with an envelope in their hand, rather calm-looking, a routine appointment maybe? There were those in wheelchairs, and those with casts or slings, making it easy to guess why they were there. Some had rather worried expressions, conjuring the image of a poorly relative, maybe having surgery. You can spot the new dads on the way to pick up their new babies a mile off. They have an empty car seat in hand and generally at least one bag and they tend to speed through. This made me smile as I remember how exciting we found it to bring our baby home. There were also bumps, pregnant ladies who generally veer off to the left towards the Outpatients antenatal clinic.

I guess before the exhibition began, I would have assumed that the main visitors to the stand would be pregnant women looking for information on breastfeeding. While there were plenty of them, I was surprised at the range of other visitors we had. I was a little surprised when two young enough girls who were both clearly NOT pregnant almost bounced over, very enthusiastically asking if it was ok for them to take information packs. “We’re trainee GPs, we just LOVE this kind of information!” one said.

One pregnant woman arrived over, looking for an information pack and stopped to chat. She told me she has a very supportive family, most of whom have breastfed themselves. She suspects that her sisters are planning to pretty much arrange a rota to provide her with 24-7 breastfeeding support, although they have not told her that. She came across as very relaxed about the breastfeeding element of having her first baby and it really seems that good family support is one of the big reasons she is so relaxed.

One woman told me that she has been trying for a baby for years now, they are going for IVF shortly. She would love to breastfeed when her dream comes true.

Another lady was rather worried about the idea of breastfeeding in public At first I tried to reassure her that  should she slip and expose a boob, seeing breasts being used as nature intended is not that big a deal. Then I explained to her how easy it is to breastfeed discreetly, especially as coming into the winter, wearing layers is cosy and convenient for breastfeeding. This seemed to put her mind more at ease.


I heard many other stories that day and I was a little sad to take the exhibition down a few days later, but it was good to feel that we had made a difference by it being there. Even if we achieved nothing else, we gave these people a chance to tell their breastfeeding-related story.