In what might be the classiest response to a testy tweet, former First Daughter Chelsea Clinton responded with aplomb to a Twitter user whose post seemed to cast doubt on Clinton's challenges with breastfeeding.
In an essay for Well and Good about erasing the stigma of both breastfeeding and menstruation worldwide Clinton, who is of the Clinton Foundation , and an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, talked about the issues she faced when her kids were born:
"After I gave birth to both my children, I spent a lot of time thinking about and planning how to breastfeed and how to pump once I went back to work. I know I’m very lucky. I could afford to buy a pump and have some control over my schedule of work at the Foundation, my writing, and teaching at Columbia (and advocating on behalf of my mom in her campaign last year when I took Aidan with me starting when he was five weeks old).
I have my own office at the Foundation and there’s a dedicated breastfeeding/pumping room at Columbia near the classroom where I lecture. I’ve also breastfed just about everywhere you could imagine and I’ve pumped in countless airport bathrooms, Amtrak train bathrooms, in quasi-public areas with my husband standing guard, and outdoors hidden behind a building when there were no other options."
Shortly after her piece was posted, Clear Voter co-founder and mother of four Michelle Ray posted that she'd be happy to talk to Clinton "about the actual challenges of breastfeeding."
To which Clinton responded, "As a mom who just finished pumping for my 10 month old son, always open to hearing from nursing & non-nursing moms, now & after Aidan weans."
Here's a bit of their exchange:
Things ended amicably enough, and a virtual spectator summed things up pretty well, posting: "Twitter is so weird."
