Vent: BFing and Work!!!

MelVic

Ughhh I am so annoyed!! As most of you know I am a teacher and I have off until November 18th for Maternity Leave....However I have to work the teacher workdays for the week of Aug.16th (which I chose to do)....Well on one of the those days my principal has me scheduled to attend an off campus meeting for a program I am in charge of at the school. It is all day 8 hour training....Anyway it just dawned on me, that there is no way I can be at an all day meeting when I need to pump every 2 hours....So I emailed my principal to tell her the dilemma (who ps, does not have any children).......and her response to me was and I quote "I will see if the place has a private room for you"

Are you Fing kidding me!!!!!!!!!! There is a lot more involved with pumping then just a private room...not to mention she wants me to pump in a strange place where I know no one.....

At work it is easy, I just go to my room lock the door, pump and store my milk in my classroom fridge...but at some strange building with people I do not know.....Ummmm no!!!

Am I being ridiculous????

I want to email her and tell her all the reasons why this would not work, like for example- where will I store my 4 bottles of milk, and that I need an outlet to plug in my pump and I need to clean the pump parts after every usage and plus the fact that if I am not calm I will not get a let down therefore no milk will come out.....

To her all these will be excuses.....I do not know what to do!!!! I can not go to this meeting, and I have no idea why she will not send someone else in my place, so I can just stay at my home school and do the things I need to before I go on Maternity until November....

Can you girls give me other reasons why I can tell her I can not pump in this strange place!!!!!!! 

Sorry for rambling I am just so irrate about her response and I need a good one back to get out of this!!!!! 

lindeenwedding

Does your pump have a storage cooler with ice packs? That is what I store my milk in every day for about 12 hours and it still stays very cold. I clean my pump parts in the sink after I pump and I have to pump in a bathroom.  I understand that its less then ideal, but beyond not going I am not sure what they can offer you besides a private room?

I had to go to a seminar a month ago where I rode with someone else and then we got split apart so I couldn't get my pump out of her car, combined with just plain no time tp pump and it was about 15 hours before I got to pump and it was excruciating!!

I hope you can get something figured out! 

sillybiochemist

If it's truly a private room I hope you can make it work since you'll have your privacy.  It wouldn't be a bad idea to remind the principal what you will need the room to have (like an outlet) just in case its an odd room that doesn't have one and other things you might need to have available to you.  To keep the milk cold, I'd carry a cooler with me (even if it's one of those slightly larger igloo coolers that factory workers use) with plenty of blue ice.   Since you're in charge, do you have to literally run everything or can you start a program (by introducing someone) then go pump while everyone else is listening to what's going on?  Good luck and hopefully you can find a good compromise.

jebuell

Personally I would just mess with her and say "It takes a really long time to pump and I don't want to miss any of the meeting.  If it's OK I'll just pump during the meeting".  Haha!  Can you imagine that?  Someone just randomly pulling out a pump, hooking up, and pumping away?  I'd love it but I imagine a lot of jaws would drop especially if there were men in the room.

Sorry, other than my sarcastic comment I have no good advice.  I hope you can work it out where you don't have to do to this... sounds kind of boring! 

lindeenwedding

jebuell:

Personally I would just mess with her and say "It takes a really long time to pump and I don't want to miss any of the meeting.  If it's OK I'll just pump during the meeting".  Haha!  Can you imagine that?  Someone just randomly pulling out a pump, hooking up, and pumping away?  I'd love it but I imagine a lot of jaws would drop especially if there were men in the room.

Sorry, other than my sarcastic comment I have no good advice.  I hope you can work it out where you don't have to do to this... sounds kind of boring! 

My bosses sister-in-law would pump at her meetings sitting around a conference table like nothing was going on. Can you say awkward!?!

MmeBP

lindeenwedding:

jebuell:

Personally I would just mess with her and say "It takes a really long time to pump and I don't want to miss any of the meeting.  If it's OK I'll just pump during the meeting".  Haha!  Can you imagine that?  Someone just randomly pulling out a pump, hooking up, and pumping away?  I'd love it but I imagine a lot of jaws would drop especially if there were men in the room.

Sorry, other than my sarcastic comment I have no good advice.  I hope you can work it out where you don't have to do to this... sounds kind of boring! 

My bosses sister-in-law would pump at her meetings sitting around a conference table like nothing was going on. Can you say awkward!?!

oh wow! 

jebuell

lindeenwedding:

jebuell:

Personally I would just mess with her and say "It takes a really long time to pump and I don't want to miss any of the meeting.  If it's OK I'll just pump during the meeting".  Haha!  Can you imagine that?  Someone just randomly pulling out a pump, hooking up, and pumping away?  I'd love it but I imagine a lot of jaws would drop especially if there were men in the room.

Sorry, other than my sarcastic comment I have no good advice.  I hope you can work it out where you don't have to do to this... sounds kind of boring! 

My bosses sister-in-law would pump at her meetings sitting around a conference table like nothing was going on. Can you say awkward!?!

Wow, really?!  That's insane, I could never do that.  I'm very pro breastmilk feeding and pumping and whatnot but that just sounds a little too awkward.  I support feeding in public, but babies don't make any noise when they drink.  Most pumps I've seen make a fair amount of noise and are quite a bit more awkward than a baby.  Even my SIL who is a NIP champ will go into the other room to pump.