Bad Parent: Getting Something Off My Chest
I'm still nursing my toddler, and it even freaks me out.
by Ronda Kaysen
February 19, 2009
It's two in the morning and I'm on the toilet. This would be a mundane experience if it weren't for the toddler standing beside me nursing.
My son is seventeen months old and still breastfeeds. I intended it that way. After reading oodles of attachment parenting literature, I decided that letting my child self-wean on his own time was best. What I didn't anticipate was how totally freaky and unnerving the whole experience would be.
Believe it or not, letting him suckle while I'm on the john pre-dawn is the path of least resistance. What would happen if he didn't tag along? He would sit up in bed and scream for his "Na Nas," formerly known as my breasts, until they returned.
They are his breasts now. He strokes them lovingly through my shirt and cups them with his palms. He blows raspberries on them and giggles. He nurses in a toddler variation of Downward Facing Dog while simultaneously thumbing the pages of Goodnight Moon. He slaps my chest with both hands and shouts, "Na Na! Na Na!" when I'm trying to discuss the finer points of a leaky faucet with the plumber. I am the body attached to his breasts.
When he displays his more theatrical nursing techniques in public or around people other than my husband, I find myself sheepish and embarrassed. I worry that someone will find this whole situation repulsive: a slapping, grunting, gulping little man waddling along beside me, clamped to my nipples.
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And then I feel guilty. He's still just a baby — a very mobile baby, but a baby. And he's right to see nothing shameful or wrong about his antics. But despite all the books and reassuring words about going at your child's pace, I can't shake the feeling that I'm judged as a weirdo because I haven't figured out how to wean this kid. I thought I'd be able to get over the cultural taboo that nursing a toddler is strange. But the scolding voices are there in my head: "A child who can walk and ask to nurse doesn't need to nurse anyway . . . If he's old enough to unlatch your bra himself, he's too old to be doing it at all."
Sometimes the voices are sitting across from me at the dinner table. Consider this recent luncheon with my mother and her friend at a swanky Napa, California, winery. My toddler hurdles onto my lap and nuzzles my breasts. My mom's friend, who nursed about four kids, says, "Please don't tell me you're one of those freaky Leche League moms." When I unclasp my bra, she fake shivers and shrieks, "Oh no, you are! Gross! He's got teeth!"
It wasn't always this way. Nursing the first year was bliss. I loved it. We'd lie around together for hours. He'd periodically look up at me and coo, but mostly he hummed and stayed put. In public, I tossed modesty aside and whipped out my boobs if he wanted them. If anyone looked surprised or uncomfortable, I didn't care. I was a proud breastfeeder.
Back then, I was nourishing a child. Now I feel like I'm entertaining one. His fascination with the outside world has eclipsed his ability to sit still long enough for the milk to arrive. Rather than wait, he rotates his body in bizarre contortions — on, say, the bus — as he tries to get a better angle or play with his toes. He is hardly subtle.
The nursing books give plenty of advice about plugged ducts, engorgement and latching on, but say little about trying to keep your dignity while you child treats your chest like a jungle gym.
©2009 Ronda Kaysen and Babble
About the Author
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Ronda Kaysen is a freelance writer. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, BusinessWeek.com, New York Observer, Architectural Record and the Huffington Post. She is a contributor to MomLogic.com. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and son, who still nurses. |
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