I never got used to working while a breast pump tugged at my nipples

Ava Ava was a remote knowledge worker at a law firm in New York .

She returned to work 22 weeks after giving birth, still in elastic-waist pants and nursing bras.

Ava learned that my body expressed less when I expressed milk when I wasn’t pumping enough.

A study found that an emphasis on making it to the one-year mark without introducing breast milk alternatives resulted in constant monitoring and assessment of production’ levels and the stash in the fridge.

The new generation of wireless “wearable” pumps can be slipped inside a bra, controlled from an app, and used without unseemly flanges and tubing.

In recent years , we have seen a spate of new protections for lactating employees passed at the state and federal level, including a little-known provision of the Affordable Care Act that requires insurance companies to cover breast pumps.

Though we have come a long way, lactation accommodation laws still place the onus on individual employees to negotiate awkwardly with our bosses.