You can start to breast feed again months after you stop????!!!!

[poppiesinaline]

Tell me please, is this true!!!? A friend of mine (one of those know it all types!!) says that even if you have stopped breast feeding for 6 months or so, if you let your baby suck on you ALOT you will start to produce milk again!! Is this true!? Can't see that it can be myself!

Besides - who would want to do that!? Anyway - was just curious thats all.

[poppiesinaline]

Shall I tell my friend her ideas are weird then or not!!?

[FrannyandZooey]

It is possible - women who have never actually given birth can in theory lactate, for instance when a child is adopted. I think it is hard going and needs a lot of effort and persistence to get it going. There have even been cases of grandmothers who have produced milk for their grandchildren, some people claim men can do it too. All you need is a pair of breasts, some oxytocin which is the chemical your body produces when you feel a wave of love or your baby, and I think nipple stimulation helps too.

Were you thinking of trying it?

[tiktok]

poppies, iit's true, and if you search on here or the web on relactation you will find more info.

People do want to do this - they may have stopped breastfeeding and feel very sad that they did so.

The major barrier to doing this is cultural - people saying it's weird! - and the baby, who may have forgotten what to do, and doesn't want to lie still to try it again.

However, I know of a handful of women who have tried it, with varying degrees of success.

[poppiesinaline]

Really!!!? No way - got far more better things to be doing!

[Rhubarb]

Is it true that you start again years after stopping? That's how Wet Nurses did it I think. Some of them didn't even have babies.

[poppiesinaline]

What like even months and months later!?

[tiktok]

Yes - years and years later.

[poppiesinaline]

[suzywong]

and I'll tell you something else, providing you aren't eating your lunch


You can start to relactate months after you stop if you encounter some manual nipple stimulation in a very rare (time restrictions) bought of foreplay

[Pennies]

My friend's mum started to lactate spontaneously when she (my friend) had her baby - so this was 25 years after she had last bf'd.

[Laura032004]

My mum said she felt the 'let-down' when she saw me feeding ds in the early days, or when he cried.

[Levanna]

Psychobabble's right. Some ladies who adopt babies and have never breastfed before can induce lactation with a lot of time and effort.

[poppiesinaline]

I am Nature is very clever!

[NASWM]

I'm stalking you poppies (!). This one caught my eye and reminded me of a conversation I had with a nurse about 3.5 years ago when I was in hospital with DS1. We were ini for a while so found myself talking about all sorts of things.

Apparently the ward once had a grandmother who was bfing her grandaughter as her daughter (the baby's mother) was ill. I think it is all to do with hormones and love etc etc. The same theory with expressing milk. Incredible eh?

[Pagan]

Bitty!!!

[Pagan]

Bitty!!!

[Pagan]

OMG - I swear I just felt a tingle in my boobies after reading this thread and I stopped months ago - heeeeellllp

[NASWM]

see???!!!! I stopped over a year ago and I'm sure I could restart given the right circumstances! Not that I'd want to now, IYKWIM!!

[bourneville]

I can well believe this, I was able to easily squeeze milk from my breasts AGES after stopping bf'ing, I mean months poss even a year.... haven't tried for a while though for all I know i still could!

[Nightynight]

Im secretly sure that I still could as well

who is going to be the first breastfeeding grandmother on MN???