Adele’s Righteous Potty Mouth

During her concert at London’s O2 Arena last week, an audience member asked Adele about “breastfeeding mummies”. Adele said chef Jamie Oliver could go F himself!  Oliver, whose wife is pregnant with their fifth child, is making it his mission to get new Moms to breastfeed their infants. He’s planning to launch an awareness campaign about the benefits of breastfeeding. On behalf of women who have tried to breastfeed and can’t do it, I hope more high-profile females like Adele speak out on their behalf.

Many new Moms want to breastfeed their babies. It’s healthy and it bonds them. But they find they simply can’t do it. I remember the struggle a friend of mine went through 25 years ago when a public health nurse visited her house for a tutorial and then put pressure on my friend when she was unable to extract milk. The implication was clear: breastfeed or you’re a bad mother. I had hoped that kind of criticism was a thing of the past, but it’s not. Adele says she breastfed her now-three-year-old son for the first nine weeks of his life and then it just wouldn’t work anymore. On stage she went on to say, “Do you know what? The pressure on us is f****** ridiculous and all those people who put pressure on us can go f*** yourselves. Right.”

Oliver means well. He knows about nutrition and ideally, breastfeeding is best. But it’s just not possible for everyone. And I can’t imagine that new Moms aren’t aware of it. Frankly, formulas have come a long way and there are millions of healthy formula-fed babies to prove it.

While he’s at it, perhaps Oliver could tell bald men that their lives would be better if they tried harder to grow hair?

Speaking of which, my brilliant friend Dr. Shannon Sampert wrote a wonderful piece about breastfeeding in public, that’s become a little viral sensation. As a society, we really need to grow up!