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Secrets and lies: Breastfeeding and professional paid work

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  • Gatrell, Caroline Jane

Abstract

This paper explores the conflict between health advice and organisational practice regarding breastfeeding. It focuses on the group of mothers with the highest rates of both breastfeeding initiation and of continuous employment following maternity leave: specifically, educated mothers in managerial and/or professional occupations. In this context, the paper investigates, through in-depth interviews, the embodied experiences of 20 heterosexual UK mothers, qualified to degree level, who returned to professional employment within 1 year of childbirth. The paper observes that mothers who attempted to combine breastfeeding with paid work did so with difficulty because the material activity of breastfeeding was 'taboo' within the workplace. Thus, the requirement to conform to organisational expectations regarding 'suitable' embodied behaviour contradicted health advice about what was 'best' for infant children. In order to comply with workplace requirements, mothers in the study were obliged either to cease breastfeeding or to conceal breastfeeding activities. In the light of mothers' experiences, the paper suggests that breastfeeding duration rates among professionally employed mothers can only be improved if negative attitudes about maternal bodies and employment are challenged and if employers, as well as mothers, are the focus of health initiatives aimed at promoting breastfeeding.

Suggested Citation

  • Gatrell, Caroline Jane, 2007. "Secrets and lies: Breastfeeding and professional paid work," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 393-404, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:65:y:2007:i:2:p:393-404
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Wajcman, Judy, 2005. "The Politics of Working Life," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199271917 edited by Edwards, Paul.
    2. Lawrence M. Berger & Jennifer Hill & Jane Waldfogel, 2005. "Maternity leave, early maternal employment and child health and development in the US," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(501), pages 29-47, February.
    3. Judith Galtry, 1997. "Suckling and Silence in the USA: The Costs and Benefits of Breastfeeding," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(3), pages 1-24.
    4. Shirley Dex & Heather Joshi & Susan Macran & Andrew McCulloch, 1998. "Women's Employment Transitions Around Childbearing," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 60(1), pages 79-98, February.
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    Cited by:

    1. Eliot L. Sherman, 2020. "Discretionary Remote Working Helps Mothers Without Harming Non-mothers: Evidence from a Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(3), pages 1351-1374, March.
    2. Miki Kobayashi & Emiko Usui, 2017. "Breastfeeding practices and parental employment in Japan," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 579-596, June.
    3. Gina Gaio Santos, 2015. "Narratives about Work and Family Life among Portuguese Academics," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 1-15, January.
    4. Ayesha Masood & Muhammad Azfar Nisar, 2020. "Crushed between two stones: Competing institutional logics in the implementation of maternity leave policies in Pakistan," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(6), pages 1103-1126, November.
    5. Johnson, Sally & Williamson, Iain & Lyttle, Steven & Leeming, Dawn, 2009. "Expressing yourself: A feminist analysis of talk around expressing breast milk," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 69(6), pages 900-907, September.
    6. Leiter, Valerie & Agiliga, Alexis & Kennedy, Evangeline & Mecham, Emma, 2022. "Pay at the pump?: Problems with electric breast pumps," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 292(C).
    7. Robyn Lee, 2018. "Breastfeeding Bodies: Intimacies at Work," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(1), pages 77-90, January.

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