Continuing breast feeding past 6 months

[Racheyg]

i know lots of mums do it so just after a bit of know how.

Ds2 is 16 weeks and feeds well after a shakey start. Recently I have started to want to feed past 6 months, not sure how well it will go as friends and family already think I'm crazy for feeding now (Ds2 doesn't sleep much and is a Velcro baby) as he feeds every hour/hour and half.

When you start weaning and its "established" do milk feeds drop like bottles are at around 7/8 months? Or will he feed like he does now?

Tia

I think you're probably at the cusp of the end of the velcro, feeding frequently stage. DS1 started doing 4 hourly feeds at 18 weeks, DS2 is 21 weeks and has just started much longer stretches too. Once you introduce solids you'll probably find they'll cut down too - by 9 months my DS1 had 4 feeds a day and was down to morning and evening by 12 months.

It depends on how much your baby likes solids. But I'd say it's more likely 9/10months. I know that with both of mine I was down to two feeds (first and last thing) by 11 months but can't remember how I got there. I think it took a bit of engineering too - ie it was my decision to only offer feeds at those times not a natural reduction.

Yeah, depending on how well they take to food you drop feeds as and when.

Also worth saying that, as they get older, you don't have to feed on demand. It is perfectly ok to tell an 11 month old that they aren't getting milk right this minute and that they can have water and a banana!

Wow thanks for the quick responce.

I guess I will play it by ear. I'm back to work when he is 91/2 months and would love to bf morning and night. Also have a holiday booked to Spain when he is 11 months so thinking bf would be easier than formula.

Not sure how well oh will react

It depends how you wean and what your baby wants. Real food/weaning was mostly about exploring textures and flavours for my DD until she was about 10-12 months old. She nibbled, sucked and felt a lot of food but most of her calories still came from breast milk.

I don't recall exactly how breastfeeding got cut back because I just went with the flow and did what felt right for both of us along the way.

Good luck with carrying on.

It really does depend on your baby. Mine was EBF, we did BLW and he started gobbling food right away. By 9 months we were down to four daytime feeds (morning, before morning nap, before afternoon nap, bedtime) and no nighttime feeds. He dropped the daytime feeds pretty quickly after starting nursery at 10 months (even though he still had them when he was with me).

It depends. DD was a Velcro baby and used the boob for comfort so her feeds didn't drop until 18mo and after an effort to move away from so much milk and towards solids because she had become anaemic.

DS took to solids like a duck to water, he started eating at 6mo and just ate. By 7mo he had dropped many feeds and fed only over night and afternoons.