Views While Nursing – Sacagawea-ing It

Sacagawea (Photo by MudflapDC)

I’ve been continuing to take an ongoing collection of views while nursing my second son. One of my favorite subset of photos are what I refer to “Sacagawea-ing It”. Sacagawea was an interpreter and guide for the Lewis and Clark Expedition. She gave birth to her first child, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, and continued her travels with her infant son. Whenever we are out on the trails with infant Dyson, I think of Sacagawea hiking with her son.

We hiked with my older son as well, but we’ve been getting significantly more mileage in with our second. I think part of this is we know we aren’t going to break him. But another factor is the breastfeeding. You don’t have to bring along a cooler and bottles and you don’t have to time your hike between visits to the breast pump. I’ve been really enjoying how easy family hikes are and I certainly don’t mind feeding the youngest… particularly when he decide he’s hungry at a glorious overlook. 🙂

We’re still only 4.5 months into our breastfeeding journey, but here are some new “Views While Nursing…While Hiking.”

Appalachian Trails’ Angel’s Rest, Pearisburg, Virginia

Fishing Pier, Leesylvania State Park, Virginia

Wetlands, Veterans Park, Woodbridge, Virginia

High Point Overlook, Bull Run Mountain, Virginia

Bald Eagle Nest, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Woodbridge, Virginia

P.S. Instagram allows me to upload photos directly to Tumblr, so more Views While Nursing can be found at http://viewswhilenursing.tumblr.com.

Views While Nursing – September 1st, 2013 – September 7th, 2013

My phone met its demise this past week, but I still managed to snag some more Views While Nursing… including shots from our very first Family Camping Trip. Enjoy.

September 1, 2013 – Playing with my Older Son

September 6, 2013 – Camping!!!

September 7, 2013 – Getting Ready to Leave Our Campsite

Anne Frank and Views While Nursing

For many of those early nursing sessions with my second son, my view was exactly the same. I would be sitting on the floor of our dimly lit bedroom. Next to me, there was small crack in the closed curtains which provided the slightest sliver of outside. During the daytime, I could see the my neighbor’s crepe myrtle blooming and above it, the blue sky. Often I would see clouds and sometimes a black vulture would silently glide through my view.

I was reminded of Anne Frank.

This is by no means to say that breastfeeding is as bad as the Holocaust. I find it to be quite the opposite, in fact.

In her diary, Anne Frank mentions a horse-chestnut tree (Fun fact– Horse-chestnuts are actually in the same family of trees as buckeyes and are not closely related to the American chestnuts) three separate times. One of those mentions:

Nearly every morning I go to the attic to blow the stuffy air out of my lungs, from my favorite spot on the floor I look up at the blue sky and the bare chestnut tree, on whose branches little raindrops shine, appearing like silver, and at the seagulls and other birds as they glide on the wind. As long as this exists, I thought, and I may live to see it, this sunshine, the cloudless skies, while this lasts I cannot be unhappy.

In those hectic first weeks with a newborn where days and nights blur together, used diapers accumulate in little piles by the bed, and your own body doesn’t even feel like its your own anymore, my fatigued eyes found that little sliver of nature to be particularly peaceful. I could appreciate how meaningful and powerful a view of the outside can be, even if it is just a small glimpse. And if it meant that much to me, I can only imagine how very precious it was to Anne Frank.

Now that my son is older, we are getting out and about more. We are happily continuing our breastfeeding relationship and taking in a variety of views along the way. Last week, I started collecting shots of the things I see while nursing.

Enjoy!

August 25, 2013 – Potomac River, Leesylvania Park

August 27, 2013 – Rockledge Mansion, Occoquan, Virginia

August 29, 2013 – In the Examination Room Waiting for the Pediatrician

August 30, 2013 – Eating Supper at Steak and Shake, Fredericksburg, VA

August 31, 2013 – At the Seashore, Virginia Beach, VA