How do I get my head around stopping breastfeeding my last baby.

[Paddingtonblue]

Right, I know that I am over thinking things, but DD is now 14 months and I am BF her only at night now but it is time to stop. She is certainly our last, I fed both DSs for 12 months but I can't quite bring myself to stop because she is my last baby. I know it is time in my head, and it is also a neccessity due to other things happening like school meetings and things, so how do I bring heart around to it?

you don't have to stop you know :) you can keep one feed a day indefinitely

she may well self wean if you are just doing one feed a day too.

My DD wouldn't pass up food in any form, I don't see her self weaning

Hi paddington. First of all, you don't have to stop if you don't want to. Before I had DCs I thought 1 year was the norm, but I fed them both for just over 2 years, and that has seemed very normal and right for me. Lots of people advised me that mine would self-wean, but they never showed any inclination to!

Although I loved (that word doesn't seem enough to describe it) breastfeeding, I have not minded stopping either time becuase I was so ready. With DS it was because DD was born and tandem feeding made me want to vom, so that was easy.

With DD, who I weaned about 3 weeks ago, it was because I was just ready, in my head and in my heart! I can't explain why, but it was I think to do with feeling that her need had gone, although she enjoyed it a lot. It took a few days, and a couple of nights where she woke and cried and for the breast, but because she could be distracted with a story (at 3am, so a bit tiring) and went back to sleep, it was fine. DD is definitely my last and there was a day or two where I felt very sad, but I think in more of an 'end of an era' way, rather than regret.

So that was my longwinded way of saying, follow your heart, do it when you are ready, and it will be easy. If you just bf once a day it's not so intrusive, is it? My DD fed about 10 times a day (no exaggeration) when I weaned her! Now I feel like I have two children, not a child and a baby, and it's quite exciting really.

ha ha, DS was the same :o he is pretty much weaned now (3 this month!) as tandem feeding with 12 week old DD was making me want to vom!!

I have left him to go away for work for a week when he was 18 months old, and he was fine, so missing a day here or there for meetings shouldn't be a big deal.

maybe try and cut down to 1 feed a day slowly, and see how you feel?

Thanks for the replies. My heart isn't ready, probably because our eldest DS is about to start school too, so ALL my babies are growing up at once. I had kind of thought that I would have to just stop, hadn't thought about the fact that one feed a day doens't mean I have to do it every day and so I could just skip for meetings and the like.

I think actually that this thread should be called "how do i stop time a moment before my children are all teenagers"

I'm still bf my youngest who is 3.3. I've been away for a couple of days for work and it's been fine. I now only bf when he wakes up very early (which he does most days), as it's the only guaranteed way to get him back to sleep.

Have a vague idea that i'll stop when he's A. sleeping reliably or B. starts school, depending on which happens first. (I'd like A....)

i kept the morning feed the longest with DS1 and only stopped it as i thought it might be interfering with ttc. (no idea if it was but DS2 was conceived not long after :) )

at that time he had a morning one with various wee ones through the day and occasionally night. i replaced the big morning feed with stories and cuddles on the chair we usually fed in and he was fine. as mentioned above i was a bit sleepy reading lots of stories.

it did seem to cause him to wean though as he gradually stopped asking for feeds. :( he was about 2 when he stopped regularly asking.

number 2 is only 4mo and I've already thought about stopping feeding him one day.