How I have scarred a young man for life.

I read this article in the Toronto Star about I suppose a general decline in chivalry. The reporter poses as a pregnant woman and tests how often she will be offered a seat.

How did this happen? How did a city where once drivers would stop to let pedestrians cross any street, any time (remember those days?) become a city where pregnant women can't even find a seat on the bus? The pregnancy pillow made me look ready to pop. I pulled my coat back to enhance the effect. I made eye contact. Riding the Bloor line at Victoria Park at 8:15 a.m. on Wednesday, Grant Bouchard, 33, practically leaped out of his seat for me. "I've had three hip replacements and three kidney transplants and I'm testing for a fourth kidney transplant," he said, by way of explaining his keen desire to help. "I know what it's like when someone doesn't offer a seat."

The reaction was similar on all lines on different days at different times. Young men, middle-aged women, people of all races and cultures leapt up so I could sit. Sometimes women would nudge the men they were with to step up. There were notable exceptions. It's hard to get a seat on the Yonge line headed north at rush hour. On Tuesday evening, two men and three women played the "I can't see you game," though I stood directly in front of them. On Thursday evening, a Sir Galahad remained seated though my belly was inches from his face for several stops. He did make sure I got his place when he exited the subway. I suppose one should be grateful for small favours.

On the 88 bus from St. Clair station during Thursday evening rush hour, a silver-haired woman offered me her seat the moment I boarded, unleashing a domino effect. A man in his 30s gave her his seat. The man next to me remained seated. The woman to my left tapped me on the shoulder. She looked incredulous, like she had just seen a magic trick. "Are you pregnant?" she asked. "Did she give you her seat because you're pregnant?" She couldn't quite believe what had happened.

I turned to the man sitting next to me, who did not offer me a seat. "I didn't notice until after you sat down," said Kerry Williams, 52. "I would have given you the seat." I believed him. It's true that men seem less observant than women, but they may also be more reluctant to ask. Ritchie at Mount Sinai chastised me for declining to take a seat when men offer one up, even though I was only pretending to be pregnant. When a woman offers her seat to someone who declines, she doesn't think twice about it, he said. When a man offers up his seat and it's declined, he feels like an idiot, and may not offer again. "Women don't understand how it affects men to be turned down," he said. "It's a kind of public rebuff. People are listening and they're watching. I think men are more sensitive about that kind of stuff."

Not everyone is so gentle on men who won't give up their seats. Driver Colin Abernethy has seen a steep decline in chivalry among men in the past 28 years. Not only do they not give up their seats to women, they push to get to the front of the line while waiting for the bus. Amy Mullin, a mom of three, a philosophy professor at the University of Toronto and author of Reconceiving Pregnancy and Child Care, says a deeper change might be in order. "I would like to see in general more attunement to others around us and more willingness to make small sacrifices for each other."

I have had three pregnancies in this city and I suppose that times have changed but those are things that are often the price to be paid for living in a large city. The only advice I have for pregnant women and women who are nursing is; go to Jamaica post haste. Two months after the Last Amazon was born I traveled to Jamaica and stayed in the hills outside of Negril as known by the locals as SIN CITY. I could not go anywhere with my newborn in my arms that strangers did not stop me on the road and offer me a ride anywhere I wanted to go.

On the beach, I was adopted by the various people who hawked different things to the tourists. Just before the daily rains came at 2pm on the beach I would be offered shelter and a meal until the rains ended. I never ate so well. In fact, I was so spoiled that I can no longer stand the taste of oranges or grapefruits that are offered in the markets of this city. I was never so well nurtured by the kindness of strangers as when I was a woman with child in Jamaica. It’s no wonder I never wanted to come home. When the time finally arrived and I could not put off leaving for Toronto any longer I cried the whole ride from Negril to Montego Bay – yes, the whole two hour trip.

But my favourite bus story happened on the city street car as I was rushing to get home to feed my baby. One of the things I discovered that wasn’t in any of the books I read on pregnancy and childcare concerned breastfeeding. Every time I was in hearing range of a child crying, any child, my milk would come in and I leaked like a public fountain. I was standing in a crowded street car with a child crying within range while I was rushing to get home to my own child. The pins and needles reflex kicked in and the milk was following. The best I could do was to keep my coat wrapped around me as my bra filled with milk and started to drip down my body. After five minutes of this a young man leaned over me and says, “You smell absolutely wonderful. I have never smelt a woman who smells so good. What are you wearing? I have to get it for my girlfriend.” I squeezed around so that I could look him in the eye when I said “Breast milk.” Once he picked his jaw off the ground he could not get away from me fast enough and started to shove his way far, far, far away from me.