Calling all breastfeeders of toddlers

[Fran1]

I finished bf dd when she was two. She is now two and a half and has a fixation with my boobs. She gets in our bed in early hours of morning and has a fit if i roll away from her, becuase she holds my boobs whilst she sleeps.

And during the day when we have a cuddle she immediately sticks her hands down my top and tries to tweak my nipples. Also announces " i love boobies" quite a lot.

Her dad says she gets it from him

But on a serious note, do other children do this and do they stop eventually????
I try and distract her when she does it, but at night the only way i can get any sleep is to let her hold them .

Awww - I know, probably not the reply you were looking for, but awwww!

Sorry, not much help...

I'd say she will grow out of it, but since DS is only 13mo and similarly fixated, I may not have a clue what I'm talking about.

It's a safe bet she won't be doing this when she's 12 though. Again, not much help, am I?

NO but i'm glad you said awww.

I worry that people think its a bit "odd"!!
I know its not really at 2yrs but, i do worry how much longer it will go on for!
Thank goodness she doesn't go for anyone else's boobies and announce she loves them! (well not that i know of!)

even formula feeders get obsessed with sticking their hand down your top

although you'd be quite right to pleasantly but firmly tell her she mustn't do it, especially the tweaking the nipples bit as she has to learn eventually IMHO

My dd did this! JUST USED TO (oops) distract her or tell her 'not now'. She accepted this. Dunno about the sleeping holding them though...Poor you!!

My dd who is two likes to check they're still there as well. Shows that bf is a happy experience.

My DS1 stopped BF at 18 months. He still has a thing for boobs, although it mostly developped while I was pregnant with DS2, so I limited what he could do - he just puts his ear to my boob, basically, and calls that "sleepy boob". Sometimes he has to do both boobs. I don't mind it. He sometimes does it to other women, but it's a pretty innocuous thing for him to do. (He did want to put his hand down my top, but pregnancy-sensitive nipples made saying "no" pretty easy.)

He puts his hand down his dad's shirt, though, and gets "sleepy chest" - I think he fiddles, I'm not sure. And he does this with other men he's close to - one family friend, who tolerates it, and his grandad, who doesn't. He talks about the two kinds of sleepy chest, hairy and plain.

I think he'll grow out of this. I'm slightly more bothered by the thumb sucking, but I'm not that bothered by either.

Thanks everyone! I was just curious as to how many others do this.

I am sure it won't continue forever

True Twiglett - ds2 was never breast fed but he still has a fascination with prodding them or putting his hand down my top. He's 2.5!!

a close friend of mine breast feeds and he his 27 months..he would do all of the above...mom has such a hard time expecially since she also has a ten month old breastfeeding...LOL,,,she just goes with it...she is trying to break him but he is hard headed and she is just going with the flow...don't worry about other people....

Did you watch House of tiny tearaways last week, related probelm there. Coming on all Taniaish, The prolem here is her inablilty to sleep without the boobies, and youned to ty to train her to sleep without them, as she associates sleep with holding your boobs. Not judging just saying what was said on programme.

I breastfed until ds was 2,5. He still likes to touch them, but I tell him that's not s.th you do with other people around. He does not touch my boobs to sleep, but my hair (he used to play with my hair while breastfeeding), and am now weaning him off it. Instead of 10 mins, it now takes 30-45 mins for him to fall asleep, and hopefully gradually he won't need me there at all (I sit by his bed). It's not too bad to go through, you just have to persist, and I could only do it when I was thorougly fed up with his hairpulling.

My ds3 stopped bf at 15 months, and is now 3 but still sticks his hand down my top when he is upset or shy.

Agree about sleep association thing. It is something you might want to tackle now so that it does not become a huge issue. I would wear polonecks for a while - even in bed

Sounds sweet though.

Thanks everyone.

She does go to sleep alone in her own bed without me in the room, its just if she gets in my bed during the night that she has the need to hold them .

Mumoftreasures, I have two hairpullers too - both started when b'feeding. They both usually fall asleep without it, but even DS1 (nearly 7) still holds my hair if he's very tired. I fed DS2 until 26 months and I'm not much use, I'm afraid, because when we stopped he didn't mention it again until a few months later when we were on a plane and he said "I want to lie down on your elbows and drink milk from your boobies". (I always used to feed on take off and landing, and at that time we were travelling a lot.)Fair broke my heart but he was soon distracted with the promise of a lollipop instead.

I fed my ds until he was 3 and he was terrible for sticking his hands inside my clothes, I even had to buy a different swimsuit to avoid any accidental 'flashing'!

I did find that wearing less accessible clothes helped to break him of the habit and he doesn't do it at all now.