Why and when did you stop bfing?

[Laura032004]

DS is 17 months and now down to two feeds per day - morning and bedtime. The last two days he's not asked for his morning feed, so we could be on the way to dropping that too. I'd prefer to drop that feed next, as I haven't had a real lie in since he was born!

If he's only having one feed per day, is he getting enough to get the whole benefit of bfing, or do they need 2/3 feeds a day for that?

Just interested in why you stopped feeding older babies. It feels like I need a reason really, because by this age it's so easy and natural, it feels strange to think about stopping. Is that I've had enough a good enough reason? I feel quite bad saying that. When you're feeding a tired baby who drops off to sleep, it can be really really lovely, but when (like last night), you feed for half an hour, just to have them run around their cot (literally!) for another hour (and it's you who always does this bit of the bedtime routine!), it gets a bit tiring.

One feed still has benefits, rather in the same way that eating 1 piece of fruit is better than eating none.

I have recently stopped. Ds was down to 1 or 2 feeds a day (sometimes at night, pretty much most mornings) and then I had to spend 4 days in hospital for pneumonia. Some pretty strong ABs and pain killers were prescribed so poor ds went cold turkey. He was fine when I was in hospital.

We had a sad face and a tear the first morning home when I explained it to him, another sad face the next day when he asked again. And he hasn't asked since.

If you want a lie in then just get someone else to get him up - chances are he won't think about it.

mine all just gave up them selves. If you want to stop now I dont think he will mind. does he happily take milk in a cup? then just try him withit at bedtime and see what happens!!

mine all just gave up them selves. If you want to stop now I dont think he will mind. does he happily take milk in a cup? then just try him withit at bedtime and see what happens!!

you probably still wont gwt a lie in though..men just dont hear when children wake up!!!

DD2 gave up the last nightly feed at 3. Old enough for us to discuss it, she had long got used to it being a private occupation. Sometimes when she was feeling off colour the feeds got more freqent, the supply just seemed to be there. She doesn't drink cows milk, unless we put strawberry milkshake in it so I do feel she had the benefit of at least one milk drink until we stopped.

I hope you get some rest, perhaps DH needs to be told to get out of bed and and deal with DS because you do the bedtime routine. I must listen to myself sometime!

I had mixed feelings too about stopping at 13 months; I had a good reason (chance to go to Paris on my own for three days!) Got dh to put him to bed and there was't any huge fuss, after a couple days he seemed to have forgotten all about it. Your child has definitely had the very best start and great benefits so don't feel guilty.

He doesn't have cows milk as it makes him sick, but he does have goats and rice milk. He's never had them as a drink though. He does get plenty in other ways though, and has yoghurts and cheese, so he'd probably be OK even if he didn't have a milk drink. He might take it if there was no 'mummy' milk on offer?

Maybe it's just that I'm getting tired? I'm on holiday at my parents, so haven't got DH to give me a hand at the moment. He does do mornings at a weekend (one and I do the other), but after I've woken up to feed DS, I'm fairly much awake anyway. I might just have to be stricter about the night times when we get back home.

Has anybody moved the milk part of the bedtime routine forward? DS is usually quite sleepy or asleep after his feed, so I always put him down, but he needs to start brushing his teeth after the milk anyway.

DS stopped a week ago tomorrow - he's 17mo on Saturday. Thread here says more

He dropped his bedtime feed before his morning one - and hasn't fed to sleep for months! It just stopped having the calming effect it used to when he was tiny and feeds got shorter and shorter. I suppose I didn't stop - he did!

16 mths with ds, he was only feeding at 2am, so put the kibosh on that straight away.
dd was 17 mths but she lost interest in bf altogether, she was never the most keen feeder anyway but managed to keep her going, I really missed it with her though. I would always do babyled weaning off the boob tbh... but thats just me.

One excellent reason for maintaining morning feed as long as poss, is that you can lie in a bit and doze with the babe,satisfying hunger pains now and then.

(Unless you have other kids that is.)

Dd was 17 months, we had naturally dropped to one feed in the morning and one day I cant remember why we didnt do it, someone came to the door or something and we never did it again. She just lost interest I suppose. I was heartbroken.

I would happily feed in the morning, if that meant he'd have even another 10 minutes sleep, but those days are gone Now he just wriggles around if I try to feed him lying down, and once he's finished, he's awake for the day.

Mind you, at the moment, I do at least get an hour between the morning feed and giving him b/fast. I'd have to get up and moving a lot quicker if he had his b/fast the second he woke up.

I'm still feeding my little one on demand and still loving it.

She's 14 months.

I've stopped when the babies/toddlers wanted to stop. For the first three, they stopped during the next pregnancy.

My dd was 2 before I stopped, and the only reason I stopped then was because she wanted to stop. But you don't need a reason other than that you've had enough; breastfeeding is a two-way thing, and if either mother or baby want to stop then that's a good enough reason.

You've done terrifically well to keep it up for 17 months; don't feel bad about having had enough now.