...she is not exactly in a situation where she NEEDS aid.

My father is a physician who is retiring soon from a specialty that generally involves patients who are chronically ill (and frequently critically ill). My father has never taken an afternoon off for golf in his life - he is way too involved with his patients who require that he is involved in their care. It's part of being a doctor, since people don't become ill on a M-F, 9-5 basis.

My father and his partners brought a new partner into his practice last year to replace him after his departure. She is an early 40-something with two toddlers; her husband is the day-to-day parent since his job is more flexible. During the interview process, she seemed committed to medicine and being the type of rigorous doctor that would keep up the quality of their practice.

Now, however, it has become obvious that this woman thought that when she went into private practice, then she would be more "flexible" and could become more of a full-time parent. She is incredulous that as a more junior partner, she is expected to work a slightly larger share of weekends (something my father and his partners all went through and she was made aware of during her interview). She complains about the long hours. And she is complaining that she is expected to work holidays (those are evenly distributed among the partners). And it's not "fair" that the other doctors take time off for any reason (like, say, when one of the partners had an oft-delayed and very necessary medical procedure and was out of commission for 6 weeks...and took personal vacation time to do it).

It's not as if she entered a "boy's club" - a female partner retired about 5 years ago, and she raised her children while practicing medicine and never skipped a beat or complained she wasn't getting her "Mommy-time". Trust me - all the partners are parents and are well aware that they missed a good chunk of "Daddy-time" in the name of their profession.

So to all prospective female doctors, let me clue you into something: being a doctor means personal sacrifice. Other people are relying on you to keep them and their loved ones healthy - this means that you occasionally have long hours or leave home in the middle of the night...or frequently the middle of dinner. It's part of the life.

So if Ms. Currier can't hack one day (excuse me, two) because she is so overwhelmed by her children, then perhaps she doesn't belong in the medical profession at all.

I think that's why people aren't necessarily jumping to her defense. It's not as if she is a struggling single mother/widow who is trying to breast feed in between her two subsistence level jobs. She is an educated woman who has already received concessions for ADHD (something that doesn't inspire confidence in your health care professional), going into a profession where emergency and disruption is a fact of life. In a few years, is she going to tell her patients that she can't see them when there's an emergency because her child needs to have his lunch fixed? Or she needs to nurse a small cold of her own? It doesn't work that way.

I do get the point of the article - stand up for breast feeding rights - but honestly, I'm tired of hearing about the rights of mothers with young children in the workplace (and I am a woman who is going to try and have a baby soon). We need to be fighting for family rights of all individuals - people who have to care for elderly relatives need those type of workplace rights just as much as breast feeding mothers. Perhaps even more so - a debilitating illness can last longer than the few years (and minutes) it takes to breast feed a child.

You hit the nail right on the head. Women have been struggling for years to be taken seriously in the work force, and all that hard work is ruined when somebody like Currier comes along demanding special treatment because she's a "mommy".

It's about time someone fights for the right of a woman to be what she wants to be: a mother, a wife, a real woman!!!

And feminists should protect that choice, not attack it!!

Excellent response. It also applies to women in demanding fields other than medicine. The point about universal family rights (or just universal rights) was extremely well-taken. I am tired of reading articles about upper-middle-class working women who act as if they are the only people who deserve accommodation. The New York Times has been rightly criticized for this kind of trend story.

There was another comment on this board by a childless (possibly single) woman in the military who said she'd noticed that certain people consistently requested special treatment which she thought was unfair and that this breastfeeding case seemed to present a similar issue. She was told she didn't have a right to an opinion because she's never breastfed!

There was another comment by a medical student who seemed to have a detailed understanding of this story. If s/he was correct about all the accommodations granted to this woman for her licensing exam, in addition to the help she received in college, I perfectly understand why no one wants to go to bat for her.

I like the idea of supporting individuals and families collectively. But it seems the way we do that is to slowly build case law or change legislation or social policies. It wasn't Sophie's job to go out and fix everything for everyone. However, she has done a service for all breastfeeding mothers by highlighting the barriers that women face in the workplace (and the need for legislation to fix the problem). It's going to be hard to implement the kinds of policies you're interested in (like those related to care of elderly relatives) if people can't have a little compassion for the people who are different from them and have different needs.