Time Magazine caused a stir this morning when it posted its latest cover on Twitter. The cover shows a mother breast feeding her nearly 4-year-old son.
The shocking cover photograph depicts Los Angeles mom Jamie Lynne Grumet, 26, who is an advocate of what is called “attachment parenting.” In the cover shot, Grumet wears a pair of jeans and a blue tank top, which she has pulled down to nurse her son. Rather than sitting down, both the mom and son are standing — the son with the help of a small wooden chair to reach his mother’s chest. The cover reads, “Are You Mom Enough?”
The cover references a story in the magazine about attachment parenting, which was espoused in the 1992 tome “The Baby Book” by Dr. Bill and Martha Sears. Attachment parenting practices include breast feeding for far longer than the six months to a year that most experts recommend, as well as parents sleeping in the same bed as their babies and children. Attachment parenting recently gained a celebrity face with “Blossom” actress Mayim Bialik supporting the method. While Bialik is quoted in the article, she was not photographed.
Inside the issue, several other mothers are shown breast feeding older children. Mother Dionna Ford is shown breast feeding her 5-year-old daughter, who she rests on her knee as she stands. Meanwhile, mother Jessica Cary breast feeds two children at the same time — her 3-year-old daughter on one breast and a baby on the other.
Well many are expressing shock at these mothers breast feeding older children, others are criticizing the magazine for creating sensational images. Photographer Martin Schoeller has explained the shots on Time’s website.
“When you think of breast-feeding, you think of mothers holding their children, which was impossible with some of these older kids,” Schoeller said. “I liked the idea of having the kids standing up to underline the point that this was an uncommon situation.”