Great Pump Story

As you all know, I breastfeed Will. When I am at work, I have to pump. There are three places I pump at. I go into the conference room. This is by far the best place to pump at because it's private and I get to look out at Times Square. The second place I pump at is in the executive bathroom. I'm allowed twice a day to go in there (I need a key). The bathroom is great because it is also private. The third place I could pump in is the public bathroom at work. I hate it. It's my last resort.

I'll tell you why I hate it. There isn't a lounge area where I could sit and comfortably pump. I have to go into the stall. I end up sitting on top of the toilet with very little room for my equipment. I have to use the battery powered plug, which uses eight batteries. Last but not least, there's no privacy. As you can imagine, not an ideal relaxing spot.

Since my pump is electric, it obviously makes noise. I've gotten "What is that noise?" to "Someone must be playing video games." None of those take the cake like what happened the other day. The stall that I went into doesn't lock, which isn't a big deal in this bathroom because you could see if someone's in a stall or not. I normally choose this stall because the toilet is not automatic and I don't have to deal with the toilet constantly flushing.

I'm pumping away and I'm almost done. The bathroom was relatively quiet for the exception of only a few women coming in and out. The last woman that was in the bathroom before I was done managed to ruin what was almost an entirely relaxing pumping experience. This woman pushes my door open. I have the pump on a shelf that comes down (so that you could place your purse on). That's the only thing that kept the door from opening wide. She almost knocked over my very expensive pump (I didn't pay for it because it was given to me, but I know how much it cost). Now mind you, I'm attached to this pump.

As I grab on to the pump to stop it from falling, she realizes that I'm there. She apologizes profusely. She had been in the bathroom and heard a "noise" that she wanted to investigate. Investigate???? How about asking if everything is ok instead of trying to open the freakin door? I very rudely told her that the noise was my breast pump.

Of course now I'm pissed off and had to stop pumping (can't pump mad milk). Can you imagine just opening the stall to investigate a noise? What is wrong with people? At what point did this woman think it was a good idea to do this? Why didn't she look under to see my feet? Even if she didn't decide to look under (which I guess she didn't), the door was closed. These doors stay open unless there's someone in there.

People always seem to amaze me.