Breastfeeding During a Heatwave

April 02, 2025 at 12:54AM

“How does one perform their ‘natural’ function when humans pervert and destroy nature all around us?” In this personal essay for The Margins, Nina Li Coomes writes about the climate crisis from the perspective of a nursing mother. Coomes calls breast milk nutritionally perfect for her daughter—and the process of breastfeeding environmentally responsible—but she also knows that her milk is not made in isolation. Nursing parents must be healthy and hydrated, and must have the time and physical space, to feed their children this way. In an increasingly warming climate, breastfeeding mothers face even more barriers. Coomes’ piece is part of a column, A Taste of Climate, which considers the intersection of food and climate.

My milk-drinker, my baby, my darling girl. In my arms, at my breasts, in your name, I thrum with the desire that you will grow and flourish alongside your human and nonhuman kin. To be your mother, your food source, to obliterate my sense of self in the name of milk-making, is to hold on to a treacherous hope for a better future not just for you, but for every and all. I name you with the fervent wish not just that you will live, but that the earth will live alongside you.

When formula-using parents and breastfeeding parents are pitted against each other in the realm of the environment, I yearn to point to the hands that build the arena of our conflict to begin with. Is it the fault of parents feeding their children that the environment has collapsed, continues to crumble? Or is it perhaps factors beyond their control?

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Breastfeeding During a Heatwave