It’s Sunday, around 4 PM, when my phone begins dancing inside of my pocket. Buzz, buzz, buzz. I get texts from Delta, Navan, and Brex. My upcoming flight to Chicago has been flat-out canceled. I’m sitting in the spinny seat at the hair salon, getting my hair blown out for the first time in over six months. As my stylist pulls my head this way and that way, manipulating my locks with her bristly round brush, my energy shifts from mellow to frantic. That following morning, I am supposed to leave for a big work trip, my first since giving birth to Joseph, but apparently, the weather has other plans. There isn’t a cloud in the sky from my current vantage point inside the chair though. What gives?
I spend a few hours trying to find alternate accommodations for myself, but everything is smack-dab-sold-out, down to the 2-stop flights that go from New York to Chicago by way of California. While I’m frustrated and annoyed, I’m not terribly disappointed, because tomorrow my sun, my son will be 6 months old.
This unplanned delay means that I will get to hold him gingerly on the morning of his half-birthday. Revel in his smiles, savor in his scent, marvel in his splendor. Relish in the weight of his little body resting in the sling of my arms.
On the other hand, I’ve made all of the arrangements to leave tomorrow, and I was looking forward to seeing my team, to traveling alone, to eating a room-service burger and fries from the comfort of 600-thread count hotel sheets.
The only semi-palatable flight I can find departs the following morning, Tuesday, at six in the morning. And so begins the process of doing reverse mathematics to figure it all out. Boarding at 5:30, check-in by 5:00, get in an Uber by 4:15, wake up at 3:30 to nurse the baby, get dressed, take my medicine. Ouch. The only teeny, tiny, silver lining: the flight is first class. It was the only ticket available. It doesn’t mean much on a two-hour flight, but hey, I’ll take it.
I further delay all of my (already) last-minute packing to the next day, but thanks to a slew of should-be-in-person-but-now-virtual meetings, I don’t get home until after 8:00 PM. I walk into the apartment to see Brandon and Reva playing a spelling game in the living room. Despite the fact that nine out of ten nights I am there to meet my child at the park, to make her dinner, to sit with her while she eats, the one night that I am not, brings me physical discomfort. I step over the wooden letter blocks to get to the bathroom, feeling like a teenager doing the walk of shame. I sit down, unpacking my Thai takeout, knowing that my time to unwind will be short-lived.
Brandon and Reva join me at the table, and we chat about our respective days for a few minutes. I try to explain to my curious four-year-old what it means that I will be leaving on a trip to Chicago tomorrow. As expected, she is not happy with this piece of information. She tells me that she wants to go with me, that she will miss me, and that she is “going to dream about me.” I close down the neural pathways that want to internalize these messages and would most certainly bring tears to my eyes if I let them. I give her the requested bedtime snack of strawberries and cucumbers (is she dehydrated?) and finally begin the packing process.
An indestructible little black dress, a pair of dark-wash indigo jeans that I can barely squeeze into postpartum, a pair of my favorite red Chanel flats, versatile gold hoops, and a white tank that borders on being too sheer for work get rolled into my duffel bag. Naturally, I forgot to borrow a suitcase from anyone and we don’t have one in the apartment.
After the #OOTDs are rolled and ready to go, I begin to pack my pump parts, easily the most complicated part about traveling for work these days. When I open my cabinet to reach for the special U-shape bags that my pump requires, I realize that I have a mere six bags left. Each pumping session requires two bags, and I will need to pump at least five times a day on this trip. So, elementary math skills tell me that by the time I have lunch in Chicago, I’ll have already run out of bags. My heart drops down deep into the gut of my stomach, where not long ago, a new life began. You know that feeling I had, like the carnival ride that brings you all the way up really fast, and then relinquishes you into the center of the earth even faster. Swoosh.
I begin to open up every single cabinet in the kitchen, frantically searching for more bags, despite knowing that I have none. Past experience has already taught me that these bags are not “primeable” and not easy to find. They cannot be bought in any old store, and I cannot ask my neighbor to borrow some. My flight leaves in 9 hours, and there is almost no way I will find more bags in time. I don’t know anyone in Chicago to ask. I attempt pickup at buybuybaby but they’ve gone bankrupt. Target can deliver in a week. Walmart in two. What am I going to do?
Eventually, I find a set of reusable pump containers that seem similar enough to the bags that I regularly use and order them to be express shipped to my hotel in Chicago, where there is already a Fed Ex box from Milk Stork waiting to overnight my frozen milk back home to my baby. I cannot believe the amount of logistics that are required to do this.
I take a break and eat some ice cream, feeling a little sorry for myself. Then I shower, slap on some moisturizer, and crawl into bed with my Kindle. By this point, it’s 10:10 PM, and the countdown till take-off is already on. I manage to read a few pages when I hear a shriek. Reva runs out of her room, hysterically crying. Brandon takes her into the bathroom and closes the door to mute the noise from Joseph. I overhear that she’s had an accident. He strips her down and puts her into the bath to remove “all the ick” while I roll up my sleeves and go into her room to strip the bed.
I pull the soaking wet sheet off the crib mattress which is busted from many a joyous jump. I stretch on a clean sheet and slip the pillow and comforter out of their respective shells. They look completely naked without their decorative dressing: too white, too clean, too stark. I fluff up the comforter and fold it in half to fit inside the bed. How much easier it is to feel accomplished when completing a task such as this one. A mental line scribbles through this task in my head. Check.
I lay back down to sleep for what feels like fifteen and a half minutes. When the alarm dings at three and change, I wake up to the immediate, stark realization that the random pump part I ordered is definitely not going to work. It’s for a completely different model. Why didn’t I check that sooner? I have no idea what I was thinking, but the clock is ticking and I still need to nurse Joseph and be out the door in the next hour. I need a plan B.
I lift up my wee bairn, he rests his head in the nook of my neck. There are no words in any language that can express this feeling. Quietly, I slip into the warmth between the sheets of our bed to give Joseph breakfast. I start to ruminate on a potential plan, but our bedroom is the perfect environment for promoting sleep, as is the fact that it is three in the morning. Before I know it, the alarm is ringing again. The sound startles me as I realize that I’ve unintentionally fallen asleep.
I try my best to keep my eyes open as I finish feeding him, then hug him tightly into my body and breathe in his scent one more time. I get up, give him a kiss, and then lay him back in his crib. I stand still for a moment, paralyzed by a momentary lack of thought, then stretch my arms up in the dark, savoring the stretch. What am I going to do?
From the bowels of the “spacious closets” in my on-the-market apartment, I dig out the giant box from the traditional Spectra pump I bought when Joseph was first born. I used this pump once and then stored it far out of physical and mental reach, much preferring the comfort of my portable one. I have no idea if I have all the wires and screw tops and flanges but I begin to pack it, quickly realizing that I only have one bottle. I can still use the pump, but I won’t be able to double pump, which means everything will take twice as long.
I log back onto Amazon, bombarded by the realization that it’s Prime Day. Will this made-up dystopian holiday cause delays to my very unrealistic 2023 expectations that I receive anything and everything in a jiffy? I forge on, ordering the Spectra bottles that should match the pump and allow me double time. Then, I also pack my hand-pump and my Haaka, for the plane and in case all else fails. I am now traveling for a three-day work trip with four different types of pumps, each working at 60% efficiency because of the various bits and bobs I’ve dropped along the way.
I pack my daughter’s lunchbox with two slim purple ice packs and pack it in my hand luggage. Laptop, makeup bag, water bottle, empty lunch box. I pack the hand pump in the last remaining free section of the bag. Should I look forward to using my hand pump in the first-class bathroom of this Delta flight? Will it be exactly as uncomfortable as pumping in the economy-class bathroom of a Delta flight?
I kiss my husband and sneak out, sliding the “impeccably quiet French pocket doors” of our bedroom shut. I step into my white and gold Chloé loafers that make me feel prepared for my fancy seat and run out into the depth of the night. Or is it technically the morning? According to all of the articles on sleep training that I’ve recently memorized through constant review, anything before 6:00 AM is in fact, considered a nighttime wake.
My bags are ridiculously heavy and completely overstuffed. I toddle down the lobby. Each one digs into the skin between my shoulder blade and my clavicle, pulling me closer to the ground, shrinking me down by an inch or two.
It is now 4:32 in the morning. When I sit down in the Uber, my driver is on the phone with someone. I wondered, “Who could he be talking to at this hour?” I immediately realize (why does this always happen at the last possible second) that I only have my driver’s license with me. Normally, I like to travel with my license and my passport, just in case, as my super-organized husband has taught me to do. I shrug, hoping that it will be enough. I give my driver the verbal equivalent of a double pat on the hood of the car and we drive away towards takeoff.
When we arrive at the airport, I breeze through security because of the first-class ticket. At security, the lady working asks me whether I’d like to stand in the pre-check line, or the Sky Priority line. This feels like the first time I’ve been given a choice in matters of airport security. Oh, the dignity of choice.
Once at security, they separate my tote bag to inspect the various pumping mechanisms they’ve identified inside. First, the lady examining, who looks like she too needs a coffee, pulls out the Spectra and swipes it for residue. Then, she fishes out the Willow and asks me what it is. “A breast pump,” I say blankly. It is 5:17 in the morning and I don’t have it in me to embellish. “Isn’t the other one a breast pump?” the agent asks me. “Yes.” I wait for further interrogation. She looks at me, looks at the pumps, looks at me again, and finally puts the pumps back in the duffel. She sends me on my way.
I haul the bag up with what little bit of strength I have left and place it back on my shoulder, again losing height to the weight of it all. I stack the gray airport bin back on the conveyor belt to my left and turn to walk to my gate. “Mam, your ID.” I hear some distant sounds, but my brain doesn’t register the words. “Mam, your ID!” A young man in a yarmulke runs after me and hands me my driver’s license, the only piece of identification that I have with me on this journey. I thank him, tiny tears forming in my eyes from the realization of how screwed I could have been. I take a deep breath and head towards my gate. Man, what a journey it’s already been.
The feeding journey....welp....it’s a long one! You got this 👊🏻 btw I have broken up with my breast pump 😂 we are NO longer on speaking terms