Strollerderby : extended breastfeeding

Unweaning -- It Happens

Madeline Holler — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 17:23:00 GMT

Unweaning. Hmmm.

Unweaning is when you finally get your nursing kid off the breast and then cave in months (years?) later and let her take up breastfeeding once again.

For anybody who has weaned a child, this sounds a wee self-hating. That said, Jenna Hull makes a pretty good case for it.

An essay in the January/February issue of Mothering magazine, Hull explains why she decided to "unwean" her three-year-old daughter Georgia. Pregnant with her second child, Hull worked to gently get her big girl off the breast. Then the baby was born and big sister changed -- a lot. The once sweet girl had become mean, snotty, jealous and intolerable.

Hull writes that she tried everything: showing Georgia her baby pictures, explaining how much she loved her, listening, reassuring. Nothing worked.

Then, the crazy idea: why not start nursing Georgia again? Thus commenced the unweaning. Georgia didn't flinch.

In fact, the big sister changed immediately and Hull nursed the pre-schooler and the newborn side-by-side. All was well and eventually Georgia, the once again happy and now excited older sibling, weaned herself at around 4 years old.

Hull says she doesn't know where she came up with the idea of unweaning, but I do. I've weaned two kids, one easily and the other not so much, but both have looked at me with those eyes, a certain sadness, when watching me nurse a younger sibling. I remember thinking how much easier it would be -- at that moment -- to let whoever wanted to nurse to just get in line. But I never did -- too big of a can of worms.

Despite what the naysayers of extended breastfeeding may think, no kid ever came home from a freshman year at college to warm, sweet squirt of mama's num-nums. Every breastfeeding newborn is eventually weaned -- whether it's hours, days, weeks or years after that first latch (and re-latch).

What do you think? Is Hull a big old wimp or a loving mother? Were any of your kids unweaned? Would you ever consider it?

Photo: greenpeanursery.com

Babble Talk: Extended Nursing = Bad Parenting?

Jen Chaney — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:28:00 GMT

Ronda Kaysen's son is attached to her breasts. Often literally. He is seventeen months old and, as Ronda writes in this Bad Parent essay, he still nurses, hungrily and heartily.

Kaysen says she always intended to breastfeed her child until he self-weaned. Yet even she is often embarrassed by his behavior, especially when her boy demands a meal from his mom in public. Frankly, I can empathize with that feeling. While I totally acknowledge that it's perfectly natural, even healthy to nurse a child into his or her toddler years, I can't imagine ever wanting to do it. After a child reaches a certain age, there is something about that process that seems sort of ... ooky. I'm not saying that's right or fair or even remotely justified. But I can't deny I feel that way, even though I completely respect Ronda's decision.

Based on the comments posted in Ronda's essay, I may be in the minority on this.

"I too am nursing a toddler and I try to dodge the judging questions I get from family. It's almost as if I'm trying to give an excuse when I say,'Yes, he still nurses but it's only three times a day!" when in actuality it's more like six,'" writes one reader.

"I nursed my daughter until her 4th birthday. I loved it and don't regret one second of it," adds another.

In fact, one of the prevailing opinions among the commenters was that perhaps this essay didn't qualify for "Bad Parent" designation: "I am getting very annoyed with Babble editors who continually put rather banal topics into the 'BAD PARENT!!!' column," says one reader.

And this comment just made me laugh:

"Babble... what the hell has happened to Bad Parent? Are there no more parents willing to share stories about being gun-toting, pot-smoking, toddler-alcohol-providers bragging about keeping their kid out of school so [as] not to interfere with a busy bar-hopping schedule?"

Yes, America, where are those parents?

In Babble's defense, I have never thought of any of the Bad Parent authors as "bad parents," but rather as people making choices that some might consider controversial. For the record, I don't think Ronda Kaysen is a bad mother at all. Could I do what she is doing, even if someone gave me $150,000 and a year's supply of nipple cream? I don't think so. Actually, maybe that makes me a bad parent.

I'm not sure. But perhaps you can pass judgment on one or both of us by posting a comment.

Uncover Your Nipples! 7 Gems from the Mouths of Nursing Toddlers

Miriam Axel-Lute — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 18:00:00 GMT

Every mother who has nursed past a year has heard someone's opinion that "Once they're old enough to ask for it, they're too old." This is, from health and evolution standpoints, absurd.

But especially in a culture that's still a little iffy on being made too aware of breastfeeding at all, the fact remains that having a verbal nursing kid can lead to some, ahem, interesting moments. They fall into a few key categories:

Baby Talk: Too Much or Too Little

1. "Num-nums!" "Oobies!" "Boob!" "Nu-nu!" There's no better way to realize that you have, despite your pre-parental protestations, incorporated sickeningly cutesy baby talk into your everyday vocabulary than to have it shouted at you in public and realize you're going to have to respond as if those words were language, and possibly even speak them yourself.

2. "Mama snacks!" "Hello nipple!" "Where's your breast?" Or the gourmet who says "Yum!" whenever he passes by the bras at Target. Some toddlers don't just nurse, they are vocal and articulate nursing enthusiasts. Some times so pointed that it's verbal equivalent of saying "damn the discreet cover-up." Which is fine. Except of course it was your kid's choice, not yours.

Your Words Out of Their Mouths

3. Version A: The politeness backfire. "Ask, nurse, please?" says one kid. "Hi. Milk. Smile," said mine for a while, betraying our attempts to explain what, beyond the technical words, constituted asking nicely.
4. Version B: Crossed wires. One mother reports that after training her son out of bad nursing behavior (oh, the dreaded twiddling) by repeatedly telling him he was all done with that, now he asks to nurse by saying hopefully "All done? All done?" (Bet she gets the "He wants to wean and you're not letting him!" treatment.)

The "Other Side" Confusion

4. "Side! I want side!" I thought it was a funny fluke that my daughter's younger friend picked up on her saying "other side" and began calling nursing "side." But apparently he's far from alone. That doesn't mean that anyone hearing will think it makes any sense though.

Parenting Shortcuts Exposed

5. Many of us have tried the squirting-breastmilk-on-an-oozing-eye trick. Whether or not it works, it gave my daughter the idea that she wanted milk squirted on her every injury. Once she got this in her head, a symbolic waving of a bare nipple across the offended limb was placebo enough to make almost anything instantly all better, so I played along out of laziness. Until, that is, I was on the sidewalk with a kid with a scrape who was screaming "Mommmmy! Milk on my knee! No! Milk on my knee!"

The Mini-Domme

6. "I'm going to open you up!" It's one thing to have a kid determinedly lifting your shirt before you've said it's OK. It's another when it comes with a declaration worthy of a TV surgeon. Of course that's better than . . .

7. "Uncover your nipples!" It's not as bad as it sounds, as she usually means it as a contrast to my having drawn the covers up over us in bed for a falling-asleep nurse, but I admit that I'm not-so-secretly hoping this one never leaves the house.

I'm sure I and mothers I heard these from are not alone. What has your nursing Baby Einstein come out with?

(Images were submissions to the Mothering breastfeeding icon contest.)

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Is Seven Too Old For Breastfeeding? Kids Say "No!"

Karen Murphy — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 16:41:00 GMT

A new study in Australia reports that some Australian women are breastfeeding their kids until age seven. And the kids like it.

Yeah, I'll bet they do. "Children enjoy the taste of the milk, the comfort it brings and the closeness to their mother." Well, yeah. But...seven years old? Isn't that a bit much?

But the moms seem to like it too, feeding up to a dozen times a day, and one women nursing THREE kids. Three.

So while I'm all kind of ewww about this, I've got to remember that one of my kids went until age three and a half and I only stopped then because I was pregnant with her brother and it hurt like hell. And like the Aussie mums, I never intended to go that long necessarily, but there was no reason to stop before then. By that time she nursed only a few times a day or when she needed comfort or was sick. And while I can't even begin to imagine her nursing now at age seven, I can see how these things just go on and on. Kind of, anyway.

But...ew. Still can't quite get past it. I mean, I'm thinking "not for me, please." But at the same time, I can see it happening for other women. But not for me, please.

But some people have a much bigger problem with extended breastfeeding than just the ewww factor. Psychologists say things like, "It's not normal, the umbilical cord needs to be broken," and "You have to wonder if it's for the child or the mother - I bet it's for the mother." Hmm, was the psychologist even breastfed at all? Do I detect a note of resentment there? Are they suggesting these women employ the chestity belt and cut the cord? Are we thinking Freudian stuff here?

Historically, worldwide, children often breastfed until age six or so and still do in some cultures. So what's our problem with it? Beyond, of course, the "rough breastfeeding, acrobatics, nipple twiddling and inconvenient requests," all the things that make extended breastfeeding sound so attractive. I think I'd be donning the chestity belt at that point.

[image source metroactive.com, pastel by Kerri Lawnsby]

Sancti-Nursers: We Must Concede

Madeline Holler — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 13:00:00 GMT

As Captain of Team Breastfeeding, I’m calling on our officers to revise the propaganda: breastfeeding does not protect against asthma or allergies!

A study to be published in the British Journal of Medicine followed 13,889 Belarussian children from birth until 6 ½ years old, with randomized samples and control groups and everything. Researchers found that the group of mothers who received extra education on extended and exclusive breastfeeding – and presumably followed through -- had babies who were no better protected against asthma, hayfever or eczema than the group that continued with “traditional practices.” The Science Daily article doesn’t explain “traditional practices,” but I assume it means feeding babies formula or breastfeeding for only a short time.

Before you get all over Belarussia as the place for the study, apparently it has one of the lowest asthma and allergy rates in the world, which allowed scientists to rule out environmental factors that might have contributed to these annoying and/or life-threatening conditions. Nursing moms, I feel we have no choice but to concede this point in the Battle of Breast vs. Bottle.

But all is not lost, devoted lactaters. One researcher said that the breastfed babies in the study suffered fewer gastrointestinal infections and atopic eczema for the first year of life. Put that in your Comfort Proteins and drink it!

Woman Breastfeeds 7 Year Old Daughter

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 16:12:00 GMT

In the "live and let live" category? Or "some parents are scary" category? You decide.

While I'm not a huge believer in extended breastfeeding, my two year old daughter has other ideas. And being the usual busy working mommy who loves a 6pm snuggle up, I let her have her way. I'm not a devotee. I'm just tired.

[via Zero Boss]