I just left visiting a friend with a new baby who is hooked up to one of the cruelest inventions of ALL time.  The breast pump.  When my pals were born they were in the NICU for too long to ever breastfeed so it was something I never did (the giant baby was another story) but that pump became a part of me for several months.  A part of me that I loathed. If I had not rented that damn thing I would have taken it out back, used it as a toilet and then backed over it several times with my monster truck.

As I watched my friend deal with the breast pump from hell I was reminded of the time that I ended up in the ER when my pals were a couple months old.  Nothing serious but I went to my regular OB follow-up and had a spell with terrible high blood pressure so my OB sent me straight to the ER.  I got there and waited and waited and waited only to have to sheepishly tell a nurse that I needed to borrow a breast pump because my boobs resembled two of those giant balls that weird pregnant people roll around on when they are in labor.  I think some people use them for exercise too, you know the kind – they are ginormous.  Don’t let me forget that my boobs were leaking to add to this lovely picture.  I was a sight.

Long story short, they decided that I needed to have a stress test.  Wait, what?  A stress test?  What does that entail you ask?  It entails running on a tread mill while hooked up to wires and monitors.  Oh goody.  Since I went straight to the hospital from my Doctors office I was wearing a sundress and flip flops.  How was I going to run on a treadmill in flip flops?  No worries, one of the kind nurses gave me her size 10 dirty Reebok’s to wear.  I am a size 8 so we were already off to a great start.

Of course the two tech’s monitoring the test were in their late 20’s and male.  I couldn’t get two old ladies to do the test, it had to be two relatively good looking guys who had no idea what they were in for.  I had to take my gigantic nursing bra off while they put those sticky things on.  One guy lifted ONE boob with both hands while the other one put the things under, on the side and all over my chest.  At this point I was a shade of red that resembled a pomegranate.  I don’t get embarrassed easily but this was sure doing it.  There I stood wearing size 10 dirty Reeboks, a giant pair of maternity underwear and a hospital gown open down the front with the world’s largest boobs getting ready to go through something that boobs should never have to endure.  The only good part about my boobs being so big was that when I looked down I could not see the Reeboks.

So I stepped on the treadmill having no idea what to expect.  The hotter of the two techs (who were both behind me, Thank God, so I could not see their faces that I am sure were holding the world’s largest grins) told me it would start out slow and eventually I would get up to a nice steady jog.  Ok, I can handle this.  I had not worked out in about 2 years but what was 20 minutes?  That’s nothing.  I got this.

It started out as a nice brisk walk…uh oh, I thought, this is not going to be good.  These boobs are really bouncing and we haven’t even started.  Then the pace picked up and so did the boobs.  Literally.  As I started trotting on this machine from hell, they took off.  They both had minds of their own.  This was the problem.  As I ran like a giant hippo wearing shoes made to fit an elephant, off the boobs went.  I will never forget it.  The right one just slammed up and down over and over while the left one for some unknown reason decided to spin counterclockwise, like a giant propeller.  So as one was going up and down, one decided to rebel, show off if you will and go round and round.  But wait, it gets better.  Keep in mind I am heaving like  Nell Carter right now and then it happened.  The milk.  It started coming out of the propeller boob.  It was very rhythmic.  Now there was milk on the treadmill and I ran the risk of slipping in the damn stuff.  Was this really happening?  Yes, the answer is yes.  There was breast milk on the monitor, on the treadmill, in my eyes and no doubt the ceiling but I was concentrating too damn hard not to slip in the stuff.  I held onto that bar on the treadmill for dear life and ran my heart out.  I did it.  I finished.  It has to go down as the worst 20 minutes of my life to date and I know for a fact that those poor guys are still telling this story to their friends when they go out to bars.

I sheepishly cleaned the breast milk off of the dirty Reeboks, returned them to the nurse, put my head down in shame and promised never to show my face at Northwestern Hospital.  For the record, I had Abbott at Advocate Hospital.  Now you all know the real reason why.

So the next time you see a woman with a breast pump or breastfeeding, keep in mind you never know what she may have just been through.  Or the next time you see a pair of size 10 dirty Reeboks you can wonder if those are the infamous shoes.   I will never look at a pair of Reeboks the same, now neither will you.