Why I wanted Breastfeeding Portraits | Boise Breastfeeding Photographer

As a new breastfeeding mother, I remember looking down at my 8 week old baby as I nursed him, and mourning, thinking “Oh my goodness, he’s going to be a toddler soon!” Not that I was worried about having a toddler, but more that he was changing too fast. I was worried that I wasn’t going to remember his precious newborn baby face. I could already see his face getting older. As breastfeeding mothers, we spend hundreds, if not thousands of hours looking down at our babies as we nurse them. Those moments, that perspective of looking down at my perfect child who was so completely dependent on and connected to me, was what I wanted to visually capture for myself. Of course, I couldn’t do it myself, so I hired the very talented photographer Paige from Glean and Co.

Photo Credit: Glean and Co

While I was breastfeeding my son, I felt more beautiful and important than I had ever felt in my entire life. Of course I was exhausted and run down, but I felt beautiful and magnificent. After having a baby in the NICU, missing out on the “Golden Hour” and facing the possibility that I might not ever have the chance to breastfeed, I celebrated my good fortune to even be on the breastfeeding journey, as difficult as it may be at times.

Photo Credit: Glean and Co

I had asked and begged my husband so many times to take photos of me with my newborn son. But, he never got his camera out. So, I got out my own camera and took self portraits with a remote trigger. But I wanted something more, because I couldn’t easily take breastfeeding self-portraits from the angle that I wanted to capture. So, I found a professional photographer and asked her to take breastfeeding portraits of me and my son, who by the time we had our picture taken was 8 months old. Those photos are so special to me, because they are the only non-phone photos I have of myself that were taken by someone else, during early motherhood. Having another photographer take my portrait allowed me to just be in the moment and enjoy the time with my son, resulting in photos that show authentic emotion and connection between mother and child. These photos are priceless to me.

Photo Credit: Glean and Co

While the breastfeeding hours may seem endless, they will pass. In the moment, you may feel like you could never forget what your baby looks like or the other highs and lows of the breastfeeding journey. But time has a canny ability to dull our memories. This is why photography is such a priceless gift, why photos of special people and special times in life are such treasured keepsakes. Photography helps to cement those memories and keep them alive.