by Melissa Willets posted in Parenting

Childbirth is hard. Anyone who has ever birthed a real, live human head, or had a living, breathing person cut out of their stomach doesn't need me to point out the obvious. You already know that childbirth is messy. And bloody, and scary, and humbling. It can push a woman to the brink emotionally and physically. It can make you question everything, make you want to give up, sometimes it even kills you.
And yet I contend after three childbirths, two completely unmedicated, with tearing and almost vomiting and forgetting how to speak from the pain: breastfeeding is still harder.
I felt a certain kinship with actress Molly Shannon when she made the assertion that breastfeeding is more difficult than childbirth during a recent interview. No, she wasn't kidding. And neither am I. I'll never forget how small I felt struggling to breastfeed after the birth of my first child. Unlike what everyone had told me about breastfeeding, it didn't come naturally at all. In fact, feeling my baby's lips clamping down on my nipples was the opposite. It felt foreign, strange, uncomfortable, scary. Where was that overwhelming bonding sensation that was supposed to encompass every cell of my body" When did it become easier, more natural" For me, that answer was never.

I endured several days of crying through every feeding -- I'm talking me and my baby -- dreading every breastfeeding session. Anguish overtook me as I obsessed over whether ...