Does breastfeeding make you age faster?

[Peridotty]

I heard someone say that breastfeeding makes you age faster because it takes a lot of energy. Is that true? I am still BF my 17 month old and don’t plan to stop until 2. But with the sleep deprivation and nursing i feel like my face has taken a beating. Others say I look young though and I was told last week I look 22. My sister just said I look older.

Nope definitely didn't ruin my breast, and I went from a C cup to a D cup afterwards. I honestly just think it's down to genetics.

@wavecatcher

I don't think it ages you, sleep deprivation does that alone. But I do think it utterly ruins your breasts and they just don't recover.

Mine are still exactly the same as pre-pregnancy! No sagging, no stretch marks and still pass the pencil test and I've breastfed for almost 5 straight years!

Nope, I get told I look reasonably young & I bf both mine for a year each.

I wouldn't have thought so. I probably did look older after BF for 18 months due to weight loss (my fault for not eating more to compensate the BF). But I've since got back to my normal weight and look the same again.
I do agree that having children in general could age a person, possibly due to getting less sleep. But not breastfeeding.

*It’s true mine have lost a lot of volume which is upsetting.

Wish other posters would stop calling our experiences ‘rubbish’ because it doesn’t fit with their ‘bfing is amazing and has no downsides’ mantra.*

Thank you, seems I didn’t get any of the magic of breastfeeding, it didn’t make me lose weight, I gained. It didn’t stop my periods they returned at 5 weeks, 4 times. Despite Ebf, still came back pretty much immediately with every child. I don’t think it’s purely pregnancy that ruins them. I dread to think what they will be like when I stop.

I think it’s the engorgement/emptying cycle that makes them sag and that happens more if you bf than the initial few times if you don’t. It that makes sense.

If you are not taking in enough nutrients and fluid it can as you can get a dehydrated sunken look. Make sure you have enough to drink snd the best diet you can. At 22 any aging effect is temporary and reversible. And longer term aging is due almost entirely to genetics, with a healthy lifestyle a close runner up.

Your breasts will change from pregnancy but not nearly as much if you breastfeed for an extended period of time.

Before you feed your breasts will expand/engorge, you will feed and then they go down again. This happening over a series of months is going to have a much worse effect on your breasts than the time it takes your milk to dry up after giving birth. I also got mastitis in one breast so it was engorged for a few days, the skin didn't have a hope!

I breastfed and coslept. Got a brilliant sleep.

Having a baby is generally recognised to age a woman at a cellular level, up to two years according to research (Northwestern have done a lot of research into this). I have also done a lot of research in this field and am very pro breastfeeding, but the pp who suggested women who breastfed were ‘healthier’ than their counterparts is talking absolute rubbish. Unless there is some new cutting edge research they can cite (which I doubt), these anecdotal replies are just dangerous, especially in terms of women’s mental health.

I think the additional sleep deprivation that can go with breastfeeding can age you quite badly, yes.

My DS is two and a half and was a terrible sleeper until 7 months when we sleep trained. I look like I’ve aged about 7 years since he was born.

I was bottle fed and I found a photo of my Mother the other day when she was aged 40. She looks a lot older than I do now at 53. Granted I've never had children but she always said that "I put years on her". You'd swear I was a promiscuous, drug taking, alcoholic criminal with that quote.

I’ve never heard this either but in my case bf has definitely made my breasts saggy, They are like empty balloons now! I wonder why it doesn’t happen to everyone. In my case I had oversupply and my breasts would get so hard/distended and I’ve gone from a HH in the early days back down to a C/D, so that’s bound to have an impact. I’m sure the sleep deprivation and stress/anxiety is the most ageing part.

@SwimmingOnEggshells

Your breasts will change from pregnancy but not nearly as much if you breastfeed for an extended period of time.

Before you feed your breasts will expand/engorge, you will feed and then they go down again. This happening over a series of months is going to have a much worse effect on your breasts than the time it takes your milk to dry up after giving birth. I also got mastitis in one breast so it was engorged for a few days, the skin didn't have a hope!

Not mine. I breastfed for 27 months with DC1 and almost 3 years with DC2 and pumped for the milk bank both times. No change to my boobs, but they're very small anyway.

Breastfeeding had lots of negatives for me and I didn't lose weight (I gained it), but luckily my boobs weren't affected at all.

@RacketeerRalph maybe it's because your breasts were smaller to start off? Mine were ample at a DD and I'm now a C. I'm only 5'0 so they were big for my frame. Or it could be age/skin elasticity/genetics. Who knows. But it was definitely breastfeeding that changed them.

@Bonnealle

Having a baby is generally recognised to age a woman at a cellular level, up to two years according to research (Northwestern have done a lot of research into this). I have also done a lot of research in this field and am very pro breastfeeding, but the pp who suggested women who breastfed were ‘healthier’ than their counterparts is talking absolute rubbish. Unless there is some new cutting edge research they can cite (which I doubt), these anecdotal replies are just dangerous, especially in terms of women’s mental health.

They are healthier and it’s been known for some time. Cutting edge research has even found that ebf children live longer at a population level. I’m a bit worried that someone who has ‘researched’ breastfeeding doesn’t know the bare basics.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2812877/

No

From a purely personal perspective, breastfeeding 2 children for a period of around 4 years in total did take
It out of me. Whether I would have felt as exhausted anyway I don’t know, but I didn’t feel like myself physically until I stopped.

I do think having children does age you quicker though. It certainly knackers your body or at least it has mine!

@Ryannah

It doesn’t age you but it does ruin your breasts.

Oh, gosh. Not necessarily true. Mine looked a lot nicer afterwards...

Never heard this before but I bloody hope not because my DD is aging me fast enough without my breastfeeding her adding to that 😂

@TerribleCustomerCervix I've had that at times, felt like I could just sleep on the spot as soon as let down started.

I've also had it where I've had a euphoria almost like an exercise high! And the weird sneeze inside the boob feeling which only stopped when DD turned 1 probably due to less milk being made

Been breastfeeding for seven years and counting (two children, with a gap in between). I feel bloody knackered and I do remember my energy levels picking up a bit in the months after DC1 weaned, so I'm living in hope on that front. But I still look younger than I am (am mid thirties so no cultural/value judgment really attached to looking older or younger right now).

My breasts haven't changed much at all really, other than the initial engorgement of first milk coming in with each child. They were pretty small and they're still pretty small. Bizarre to think that something pretty miraculous has been so invisible here, really.

The one thing that definitely ruins your breasts is breast cancer, and BF for extended periods is one way to reduce your risk of that.

[quote SwimmingOnEggshells]@RacketeerRalph maybe it's because your breasts were smaller to start off? Mine were ample at a DD and I'm now a C. I'm only 5'0 so they were big for my frame. Or it could be age/skin elasticity/genetics. Who knows. But it was definitely breastfeeding that changed them.[/quote]
Yes quite possibly, they were a 28f pre pregnancy (34A in old money) and 30g during the first year of feeding (34/36C) but went down by 1 year to their normal size and shape. As there was no volume to them initially, there was no volume to be lost!

Not for me, no. In my 8th year of breastfeeding, 4 then a decade gap so not consecutively (4 first child, 2 second, into second year with 3rd) at 44 and usually get taken for early thirties. As I did when I was early thirties. And late twenties. I never change much. I can't deny I'm tired but I watch my diet, stay hydrated, cosleep, don't really drink, quit smoking years ago. I have a tween, and toddlers with a 20 month gap in my forties, of course I'm tired!

As for ruining your breasts, that's mostly a myth. If you feed exclusive on one side you might notice a disparity, but otherwise it's pregnancy which changes them, not feeding. Plus rapid weight gain / loss and simply age. I've gained a cup size during each pregnancy which never went but they still point where they always did.