Hilary Duff Gets Real About Breastfeeding Her Newborn Baby And How Emotional, Painful And Hard It Has Been

Hilary Duff Gets Real About Breastfeeding Her Newborn Baby And How Emotional, Painful And Hard It Has Been

As much as we wax eloquent about motherhood being this beautiful experience for women that ‘makes them complete’ *rolls eyes*, we are silent about the not-so-beautiful problems that come with it—Postpartum weight gain, Postpartum depression and grief, breastfeeding hassles, hormonal issues, and the long-term effects on a woman’s health and body due to pregnancy. What’s more, if women do try to talk about it, they’re termed as bad mothers, or sharing too much information on things that should be kept private. You know, just like their breasts when breastfeeding in public, which we have seen enough celebrities and activists talk about as a rather ridiculous way to shame mothers for feeding their newborns. It’s a good thing then that celebrities like Hilary Duff are openly talking about their struggles, because it normalises discussions on them.

The Lizzie McGuire actor gave birth to her third child, daughter Mae James on March 24, 2021, with musician husband Matthew Koma, with whom she has another daughter, 2-year-old Banks. Her eldest son, 8-year-old Luca, is from her earlier marriage to Mike Comrie.

 

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A post shared by Hilary Duff (@hilaryduff)

Speaking about motherhood the third time around, on Dr. Berlin’s Informed Pregnancy Podcast, Hilary Duff got real about the struggles of breastfeeding, and how it has always been a little difficult for her.

“I’d say it was the easiest with Luca. All of the babies latch really great, I’m just not a huge milk-producer, so it’s emotional for me. In fact, this is the first baby that I haven’t supplemented with yet, so I’ve just exclusively been breastfeeding her. I’m going to keep trying that for a couple of weeks.”

She further explained that apart from breastfeeding being painful and hard for her, it also takes up a lot of her time, making her feel sad for not being able to give time to her other two children, who are also quite young.

“Just still painful and it’s hard, and it’s even harder having the other two that I know need me so much, and this takes up such a huge portion of the day. It seems like every 20 minutes I’m feeding the baby, and I have to be sitting in one place, and Banks is still not quite old enough to understand, even though she has been amazing with the baby. It’s just hard.”

 

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Also Read: Blake Lively Spoke Up About Her Postpartum Body And Called Out Brands For Not Being Inclusive With Sizes

To top it all, the actress and singer is also suffering from anxiety over her breastfeeding because she isn’t sure for how long she’s going to be able to produce enough breastmilk to feed little Mae.

“Right now, I don’t know that I’m not producing as much as I need, but I think since I haven’t in the past, I have tons of anxiety that I’m not, and that she’s not getting enough, and then I’m in my head, and then I don’t feel like enough, and then the spiral continues from there. I’m not even at week three yet, so I need to just sit back and chill and trust that my body is doing the right thing. And she’s gaining weight.”

The thing about mothers is, even though they know everything is fine and they are doing the best they can for their babies, it is hard to not get anxious and worry about the ‘what ifs’. People think that celebrities have all the help that money can buy for raising their kids, but the truth is that even they are sometimes battling the same issues that any other new mothers might be dealing with.

We love that Hilary Duff chose to openly share her emotions, because it is bound to help other new mothers dealing with similar emotions over breastfeeding feel a tad less alone and a tad more relaxed.

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Jinal Bhatt

A Barbie girl with Oppenheimer humour. Sharp-tongue feminist and pop culture nerd with opinions on movies, shows, books, patriarchy, your boyfriend, everything.

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