At the end of the day...

I went out with my husband last night for the first time sans baby, he went to my MIL's for some Babushka time. It wasn't anything fancy, I just met hubby in Tel Aviv after his work and we walked around the beach, had some ice cream and then met up with some friends to watch the Final game of the World Cup. Now the original plan was to meet at a beach cafe and watch the game from the beach, however anyone who has spent time with Israeli's knows that in doing so you pretty much throw plans out the window.

After finding a nice beach cafe with a huge screen and settling down into our beach chairs, hubby and I get a call (about 5 mins before the game starts) from his friend telling us that there is a better place blah blah the usual. So we leave our nice little cafe on the beach with the huge screen that we can see perfectly and our comfy beach chairs and wait for our friend to pick us up to go to the new "better" place. 5 mins, 10 mins. The game has started, I am annoyed. Finally we get picked up, drive around, and find the new place which turns out to be a very swanky rooftop bar next to the David Intercontinental Hotel. I immediately feel out of place. This bar was host to a ton of tiny, perfectly made up early 20 something girls in tiny dresses and sky high heels. They perched delicately on the laps of suave Israeli men with their shirts half unbuttoned and their hair perfectly gelled into that "just jumped up from a really hot session in bed" look that actually took them 20 minutes in front of a mirror and not a second in bed. I stuck out like a sore thumb. My mini dresses wont even go down over my boobs at this point and I can't even get my toes into a pair of my old heels, and the last time I jumped out of bed hot and sweaty with my hair a mess was when the AC wasn't working and I'd been trying to find the cool side of the pillow all night.

In the interest of being a good sport I sucked it up and tried to enjoy the game, which was difficult because we were at a bar that catered more to the Champagne sipping crowd than the sit down and watch Football crowd. A normal game lasts 90 minutes with about a 10 minute break at halftime. This game ran long due to overtime and by the time it finished I was in agony. I had been away from the baby for about 6 hours at that point and had already had 3 or 4 separate letdowns. My boobs were like rocks and I was desperate to get home to nurse. Unfortunately it was going to be at least an hour possibly 2 until I could get to the baby for some relief. I was desperate so I decided to take matters into my own hands (literally) in order to take some of the pressure off.

I snuck down to the bathrooms with the intention of expressing a bit by hand so that I wouldn't explode, or more realistically, leak through my dress. For any of you that have not been to an Israeli club, many of the bathrooms are unisex, just a row of dimly lit stalls and a trough sink. I'm not sure if it is for speed or for more discreet sexual encounters, but thats how it is. Unfortunately for me, this was one of those clubs. Oh well, what can you do. I grabbed a handful of paper towels and waited for my turn at a stall. All of a sudden the bathroom attendant, a 40 something Ethiopian man, taps me on the arm, blocks my way, and demands to know why I took so many paper towels, (let me clarify that "so many" was like 5, not 50, but apparently this was a criminal offense). The rest of the conversation went like this:

Me: "I'm sorry, What??" (I MUST have misheard him)

Ethiopian Bathroom Man blocking my way to the stalls: "Why you have all those towels??"

Me: "Um, do you really need to know??"

EBM (for now, EBM will stand for Ethiopian Bathroom Man,not Expressed Breast Milk): "Yes! You must not take so many towels, why you take all those??"

Me: (I figured what the hell, I'll be honest and maybe that will shut him up) "If you MUST know, I breastfeed and I need to express some milk and I need the towels to catch the milk."

EBM: "I do not understand."

Me: (at this point I am getting a bit annoyed at the hubbub and am noticing the stares from the 20 something other unisex bathroom goers milling around) "I just had a baby. The baby drinks milk. The baby is not here. The milk is. It needs to come out. The towels are to catch the milk."

I tried to move past the EBM and enter a stall but he again blocked my path.

EBM: "You need the stall for that??"

Me: (?!?!?!?!?!?) "Well unless you want me to do it HERE, YES I NEED A STALL FOR THAT!!! DO YOU WANT ME TO DO IT HERE??"

EBM: "um er um er.."

Me: (Unrepeatable Hebrew that translates basically to F-off get out of my way)

I finally got fed up and pushed past him into the stalls with my wad of towels, red with frustration and anger. As I close the door behind me I hear several giggles and comments of "icksss", and "ewww", and "Disgusting". I stood in that bathroom, milk spraying into the controversial towels, tears hitting the floor.

Now I should have marched out there and squirted those uppity little bitches and their man candy right in the eyes. I should have told them exactly where they could put their "Icksss" and their "eww" and that what I was doing in that stall was a heck of a lot less disgusting then what they were planning on doing in that same stall with the random stranger they were wrapped around. I should have told them that I had every right to have a night out every now and then and how dare they look down their perfectly powdered noses! I should have said that I am doing what is best for my baby and that there is nothing disgusting about that. I should have demanded they apologize for their ignorance. I should have stood there with my head held high and fight for my dignity as a breastfeeding mother.

What I really did was wipe off the milk, wipe off the tears and quickly duck past the giggles and the stares, head down, feet not moving fast enough.

Two years ago I was one of those girls in the mini dresses and high heels. The kind of girl who got "all dressed up with her tittys on" and went out on the town for a night of dancing and drinking and being lusted over. I was the kind of girl who knew what the boys were looking at, and liked that they were looking. The kind of girl who only used a bathroom to pee, or to check the fabulousness of my perky perfect boobs in the mirror. And yes, once upon a time they were perky AND fabulous...

Now I have the post Csection 70 year old fat man body with the giant scar across my once flat tummy and the stretch marks and rock hard torpedo boobies that sometimes spray milk that I cover in long loose dresses and sometimes need to empty in swanky bar bathrooms. Apparently that makes me disgusting.

But at the end of the day, they go home to their apartments alone, or with the man of the hour for a quick meaningless tumble, to wake up in the morning smelling of alcohol, cheap cologne, and cigarettes. And at the end of my day I also go home to my apartment. To my loving husband, who despite my 70 year old fat man body with the giant scar across my once flat tummy and the stretch marks and the rock hard torpedo boobies that sometimes spray milk, still somehow thinks I'm beautiful. And together we climb into our not quite big enough bed with our perfect fat little breastfed baby, who grins and squeals in delight at the sight of my torpedo boobies. And at the end of the day, they are alone, and I am fabulous.