Manuela Testloni Archives

Back in 2012, R&B singer Eric Benet (Halle Berry‘s ex-husband) shared a photo (which has since been deleted) of his wife Manuela Testloni on Instagram while nursing their daughter Lucia while she was unknowingly holding up the universal sign for peace.

He shared the photo and it went viral but for the best reason in that it became a de facto advocate for breastfeeding.

There was a lot of debate about the appearance of breaspt in social media and it sparked a bunch of controversy, online discussion and some public shaming of public breast exposure during breastfeeding.

The Benet family including his daughter India and Luciana, with his then-newest daughter born in 2015.

Around that same time, he also shared a super cool photo of Testolini with a sweet message written on her belly (see above)

It has taken off and since then, I have noticed that quite a few women have followed her lease and written phrases, sayings and scriptures on their bellies and incorporated the image in their maternity portraits.

Here are a few from our Pinterest page which you can check out for image source and credit info:

First Eric Benet in 2012 and now Idris Elba in 2014.

In April, Elba welcomed his first child with partner makeup artist Naiyana Garth and last Saturday, he posted a photo on his Twitter account of little Winston innocently flipping the bird while breastfeeding with the hilarious caption, “I’ve been drinking, I’ve been drinking…Drunk in Milk” as a parody to a lyric in Beyonce‘s song “Drunk in Love” off her last self-titled album.

Funny stuff!

A couple years prior, in January 2012,singer Eric Benet (Halle Berry‘s ex-husband) also shared a photo (which has since been deleted) of his wife Manuela Testloni on Instagram also nursing their daughter Lucia while she was unknowingly holding up the universal sign for peace.

Both celebrity men shared the photo because they found amusement in the finger gesture their respective babies’ were holding up when they snapped the pic, not knowing, perhaps or thinking in doing so, they would be de facto advocates for breastfeeding.

In fact, back in 2012, Eric’s share sparked a bunch of controversy, online discussion and some public shaming of public breast exposure during breastfeeding. If it’s taboo when its seen in the general public, it’s become doubly taboo when shown in social media for many more to see. It’s a topic which we’ve seen come alive again recently when last March 2013, a famous athlete’s model girlfriend did the same thing and was virtually shamed off the web, accused of doing it out of pure vanity, not for the purpose of promoting nursing.

It looks like we may have evolved since 2012 and/or the vocal opponents to such natural images are realizing to keep their trap shut and deal with it and/or the image got buried in all the other news items that have been dominating our minds and news feeds.

Anyhooo. All are sweet and endearing and we encourage more of this type of sharing by celebs to help destigmatize public breastfeeding.

Kudos Idris and Winston (and mama Naiyana, of course)!

Winston is Elba’s second child; he has a daughter, Isan, from a previous marriage to Dormowa Sherma.

Manuela Testloni

Trend: Manuela Testolini’s Baby Bump Message From Years Ago Is Thing

Idris Elba & Eric Benet: Celebrity men who’ve shared photos of their breastfeeding partners in social media