Stoping breastfeeding

[findingthepath]

Hi I'm trying to stop breastfeeding my 23 month old. He has had two cups of cows milk and breakfast today but still he keeps calwing and pawing at me, crying and saying he wants mummy milk.

I have given him a dummy which he is sucking but he is still crying for milk off me.

He trys to lift my top up and has just started pinching and snazcking me.

Please help

Hi findingthepath
Probably not the right response (but just thinking about your anxiety when your son is grabbing at you), but why stop? If you have a real need to stop then, I can't advise but am sure someone will be around soon to help. MY eldest self weaned at 2yrs5m and my youngest is still feeding at 2yrs6m. I'm tired at times with it, but am counting on her self-weaning soon like her sister. Am fairly certain that they WILL come to a point where they will stop asking, so why not let things take their course. It'll stop the tension and the anxiety?

I want to stop as he keeps having a sip every time i sit down, he keeps lifting m top when we are out and he bruses me when he pushes and pulls and pinches my breast.

I guess i'm just fed up of him "owning" my body and i think its time he learns feeding manners or stops feeding from me.

We also co-sleep so there is no let up in the grabing and sucking and pinching.

I just think he using me as a dummy and he will not self wean

Is there any benefit to contiuing breastfeeding after 2?

Absolutely there is a benefit with the antibodies he's getting, and your risks of certain cancers continue to drop the longer he continues.

However, you're clearly finding it very stressful and you're not enjoying feeding him which is not acceptable.

If he was to learn nursing manners would you want to quit or are you ready now no matter what?

If i could teach him some manners i would carry on feeding him. I know he likes it.

Im just fed up of him taking sips every 5 minutes and crying for it. I feed him when we wake up for half an hour then at nap time and then at bed time and then again if he wakes in the night. He has lots of food thru the day too so i know its just for confort at the momment.

I hope he is going throu a growth spurt cos i'm so fed up of his demaning every 5 or so minutes.

He is also really rough with me, tat its making me sore now.

Also he gets his toys to feed from me as well and he will have one breast then put his toy to the other pretending to feed that toy

Is this normal? Please tell me he will grow out of it.

DS1 (3 in feb) went through a period of similar behaviour just after DS2 was born. I found the best thing was to keep him as busy as possible. If he was out and about and engaged with something, he was less likely to want to nurse. If he got really anxious and upset I would let him nurse for as long as he wanted and this seemed to placate him. If I tried to limit him at this point it made him worse.

The toy thing is quite normal as far as I know. DS went through a phase of that too.

I found that if I became irritated by his requests for milk he became more and more desperate to nurse. As soon as I gave him his 'time' and let him relax and enjoy it, he stopped asking as often. Now he's back to just the occasional morning.

Good luck. It's extremely exhausting dealing to deal with.