- A group of moms protested outside of a local public pool in Texas City, Texas, after a breastfeeding mother was asked to leave.
- When breastfeeding her 10-month-old son, Misty Daugereaux was approached by the pool manager and lifeguard to ask her to cover up according to the pool’s policy.
- A police officer then arrived in response to a disturbance call by the pool manager and asked Misty to leave the pool.
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More than a dozen moms gathered outside a Texas public pool on Monday in support of a mother who was asked to leave because she was breastfeeding her child.
Misty Daugereaux said she was breastfeeding her 10-month-old son Maxx at the Nessler Family Aquatic Center in Texas City, Texas, when a lifeguard told her she could not breastfeed there, and then a manager approached her asking her to cover up.
A police officer was then called to ask her to leave the pool.
Daugereaux posted on the center’s Facebook page to express her discontent with the situation.
Jennifer Warman, who attended the nurse-in, said the mothers organized it through a Facebook group of breastfeeding moms in Galveston County, Texas in response to Daugereaux's post.
"We're not mad about them asking her to leave; we're just upset that the whole issue happened," she told INSIDER. "The police were called for a disturbance call, but there wouldn't have been a disturbance call if they would have just let her feed her baby."
"She wasn't being indecent, she wasn't exposing herself, she wasn't flaunting [her breasts] around," Warman said of the incident. "She was sitting off to the side trying to discreetly breastfeed her baby."
With protest signs and babies in hand, the group of moms showed up outside the local pool Monday morning to show their support. Some of the mothers also breast-fed their babies in protest.
"We weren't really trying to do too much as far as stopping anyone from coming to the pool," Warman said. "It was more of a statement to the pool to say, 'Hey, we can breastfeed here. It is our right to do that.'"
According to the Health and Safety Code for the state of Texas, a mother "is entitled to breast-feed her baby in any location in which the mother is authorized to be."
Warman said that "people still judge" breastfeeding in public, making it "very hard" for mothers.
Daugereaux told ABC 13 that she felt empowered by the nurse-in, and Warman said Daugereaux's empowerment served as a statement against the stigma.
"For her to say that she felt powerful means that she felt accepted that it was okay to breastfeed, that I'm not the only one trying to do this, that we have an entire community, an entire state, an entire country supporting us," Warman said.
The Texas City Police Department later apologized to Daugereaux and issued a statement. "We apologize to Misty Daugereaux as it is clear she was offended by how she was treated at our city facility," read the statement. "City policies and procedures will be reviewed and revised as deemed necessary."