Speaking as a woman who never had children, much less breastfed…
Over time the boobie will sag anyway
How much time would be fair to expect the employer to give her?
Ah, ye olde boobie feeding debate… gotta love it.
Our friends are starting to sprog, and so it comes up on and off. I am one who believes breast is best, sure, like the peds would like us to believe. Fair enough. I was raised on formula and did perfectly fine, thanks 
Half of our friends-with-kiddos have gone one way, the other half the other. When the time comes, I’ve no choice but go the formula route. Some boob-nazis get horrified when I say that and I get the odd “how could you put a child at risk like that!” comment, but then I point out that it’s a matter of medication I’m on. Can’t breastfeed with those in my system. I’ve had one suggest I go off said meds and breastfeed when I have kids… better for the child, all that, and I can survive for a few years, right?
She changed her mind when I said it’d probably best for the child to go on formula than risk being in his/her mother’s arms as mom fell and had a seizure or three…
Anti-convulsants and breastmilk don’t mix, I’m afraid…
The IQ issue has been debunked.
Women with higher IQs are more likely to breastfeed; breastfeeding does not CAUSE higher IQs in children.
As much time as is required for the biological function. Not having breastfed, I can’t answer how much time that would be but it was clear that 20 minutes twice over 8 hours (and that’s just for working, not including commuting time) was insufficient.
There were two other staff people trained as backups for her, to cover for breaks and absences - there no question that additional time could be granted for this, for the 6-12 months that would have been required.
Well, it is kind of hard to discuss whether your view has merit until we know ho long we are talking about. If 40 minutes per day is definitely not enough, are we talking about twice that, 80 minutes per day the employer is expected to pay two people to do the same job? Or could it be more? At what point is it unfair to the employer and the other employees? Or do you really mean “as much time as is required”, no matter what the financial impact on the employer, or the resentment from the other employees it might engender?
Well, going back to my story, “as much time as required,” for me, would have been every hour for 15 - 20 minutes. At least for a while. Which I wouldn’t have expected an employer to tolerate.
Having done the pumping thing, I have an opinion, but of course every woman is different. You’re supposed to pump for 20 minutes each session. Add on 5 minutes for walking to the breakroom, taking out the pump, putting the bits and pieces together, plugging it in, etc. and 5 minutes at the end for labeling the milk (unless you WANT unlabeled medical “waste” in your company fridge), cleaning the horns and putting away the machine in its box (unless you want me to just leave it out for the later use and pay the insurance on the $2500 portable machine in your breakroom if someone knocks it off the table or steals it.)
Once the milk supply is well established, most women can go every four hours between pumps - meaning if I nurse at 7:00 before I leave home at 7:30, I need to pump at 11 and again at 3. However some women, especially if they go back to work early, do need to pump every three hours or they are in pain or their milk supply drops.
And yes, as breastfeeding is a medical condition, and a temporary one at that, I think that the company should make reasonable accommodation* for it, just as they would a diabetic who needs insulin shots. A diabetic could opt for other, less-disruptive treatment strategies, in some cases (a pump, longer term insulin, increased exercise, etc.) but that’s not his boss’s business - it’s between his doctor and him what treatment is best for him. It’s between a woman and her child’s doctor what feeding system is best for her baby.
*“Reasonable accommodation” is a legal term in the ADA act, I believe. That’s the limit I’d set.
So…your grandmother fed her children bodily fluids that came out of the udders of actual filthy beasts? Ewww!
The provisions of the ADA are not applicable: breastfeeding is not a “disability.” However, I assume you are simply trying to use a similar concept.
Exactly. More specifically, I’d use the same definition and limitation of “reasonable accommodation” to determine just how far one would have to bend over for a pumping mom. I don’t know exactly what those are, but Fear Itself wanted a number or a rubric. I don’t see the need to create a new one, the one in ADA should work just fine. If that says that “reasonable accommodation” means the person who can do 78% of the job should remain employed, then the same ought to apply to a pumping mother, IMHO.
(My goodness, this thread is all over the place, isn’t it? 
)
Going by WhyNot’s statement, it appears that two 30 minute breaks for breastfeeding would have been adequate for most people. Given that a 60 minutes of break over the course of a working day (lunch, potty, etc.) are considered fair by most this doesn’t seem unreasonable. “Paying two people to do the same job”? Nonsense - do you think this woman is given no breaks at all during the day? Someone must cover for her for lunch, potty, for trips to other locations in the office when her job requires it…
Speaking as one of the two people who had to cover her position during this period no, I would NOT have resented giving an extra 20 minutes or half an hour to help a new mother maintain her breastmilk for her child for the limited time required. No different, really, than covering for someone with an extended illness, recovering from surgery or injury. She was gone 12 weeks on maternity leave - did you think we left her position empty then?
And certainly she needed time not only to pump but to maintain the equipment. Penalizing her for doing so is like punishing someone for taking the time to wash their hands before eating or after using the toilet.
It was particularly galling because other women at this same company are routinely given 30 minute breaks, even 40 minutes, in which to accomplish this activity. Yes, that might mean they alter their schedules during this time period, perhaps spending an extra 30 minutes at the office to make sure their work gets done.
It was clear (at least to me) that part of it was vindictiveness on the part of the manager, who publically expressed the opinion that she should have married the father (without giving details, this was definitely a situation where the women and her child was better off without the asshole) or had an abortion. Yes, indeed, manager bitch stated that the woman should have had abortion. Also the same bitch who’d penalize pregnant women (not just this gal but others) for going to the bathroom for morning sickness. I guess they should just puke into the trash can at their desk. :rolleyes:
No, pregnancy and childbirth are not an illness or disability, but it’s just plain stupid to pretend there are no physical effects to the process.
So long as you are not one of the people she said needed 3 breaks per day. Or, like **Jess ** who required as much as 15 to 20 minutes per hour, so clearly the clearly the average is somewhere between the two.
If it only requires 60 minutes per day, including lunch and breaks, I don’t think that is unreasonable. But if it is closer to three hours every day, that is not reasonable, and the employer has every reason to be upset. Sorry about your bad luck, but getting paid for not working is welfare, which is the responsibility of the government, not your employer.
You might try reading my posts more carefully
I am NOT the person in question here - in fact, I plainly stated that I have never had children at all, much less breastfed.
She wasn’t asking for 3 hours per day. She was asking for 80 minutes, tops - 10 more minutes than the standard 60 minutes total. That’s hardly unreasonable.
(She was, in fact, supposed to have 60 minutes of break time over the course of a day. The manager in question was later disciplined for restricting her to 30. So even the company recognized something wasn’t kosher here, although by that time her milk had dried up.)
Basically, it was a case of “pregnancy/childbirth isn’t an illness” taken to a ridiculous extreme. Yes, there are some professions completely incompatible with breastfeeding. Working as a secretary in corporate America isn’t one of them.
Good advice; you should do the same with my posts. I said 60 minutes was not unreasonable; but that is clearly not the average, judging by the responses here.
I was not addressing you personally, but “you” in the collective sense in reference to any and all mothers in this position. Sorry if that was unclear.
Check your math.
Are you my ex-boss? Spoilered for grossness:
During one of my jobs I had diarrhea several times. My boss didn’t consider this reason enough to skip work or work from home (the tasks I happened to have were perfectly tele-doable). Then he yelled at me for going to the bathroom too often…
While I won’t ding you on the ‘gross’ factor (many many things biologics do is gross anyway, God knows) I’ve got to agree with others on the ‘Management’ angle. Lady Chance breastfed our first and pumped often at the office. However she was Program Manager at the time and anyone who could say ‘boo’ to her wasn’t on-site and truly just cared that the quarterly checks were coming in. She did her job and things moved along. It’s got to be much harder for those further down the ladder whose job responsibilities are more customer contact and such.
And I have to ding people who use the ‘refusing to offer the best chance’ bit. There are many women who will proselytize about breast feeding and such while remaining in an area with high particulate concentrates (such as most cities) and other environmental factors that pose risks to the development of newborns. Hell, there are a zillion potential ways that each mother/father places their children at higher risk than could be acheived. We drive cars with babies in them. We expose the kids to the aforementioned environmental factors. We expose the kids to cigarette smoke. We give the kids television, radio and other forms of mass media. We don’t pay enough attention to them. We have two parents working outside the home. All of these things could be avoided if we cared to do so. To point out refusing to breast feed as some grave sin when all the others are out there is nothing short of hypocrisy. It’s just, right now, trendy hypocrisy.
Well, at one of my US Navy shore commands overseas, my computer trouble call desk was next to our secretary’s desk. She ran into a similar situation with not having enough break-time to pump breast milk, so I volunteered to cover her for two extra breaks each day. It wasn’t like I had to do much extra work, and I got some really cool Christmas gifts every year as long as I worked there. Oh, and it pissed off our immediate supervisor (but not our boss, who thought it was cool), which was an added plus.
Isn’t it strange, though, that the means by which many employers pay for maternity leave is through disability insurance.
Mr. Chance, thank you, that was so well put.