How long did you breastfeed your baby for?

[DancingDelli]

Just as the title says really!

I plan on weaning and continuing to breastfeed until I go back to work when baby is 9 months old. Would really like to carry on a bit longer though

3 years.

2 kids, breastfed exclusively for 6 months, went back to work when each were around 9-10 months but still did a morning & before bed breastfeed, dropped the morning one around 1 year old and stopped entirely at around 18 months.
Everybody is different and what works is different - everyone just needs to do what's right for them & their baby, right from the start and not worry about what others do.

I pumped milk for 8 months then had enough to last until he was a year old. Tough going though.

2 years to the day with my first. I'd finally had enough and she was only taking a 30 second feed at bedtime.

Currently 9 months with my second, plan to feed until 2 again as both have allergies and my milk is allergen free as I cut out everything in my diet.

I work full time and when I went back to work with my first she just adapted to feed around my work schedule. Not sure what will happen with my second as nursery won't take any babies at the moment so he'll be with me all day. He's dropped more feeds than my first had done by now though as he's better with solids.

9 months first baby,
3 years 2nd child

DC1 12 weeks
DC2 6 months
DC3 16 weeks
DC4 currently still feeding at 18 months

4 months, stopped due to baby didn't gain weight. Tried all kinds and it resulted in a lengthy hospital admission.

It just didn't work out for us.

@Wolfgirrl You here again with the same stupid comment ? Seriously have a diabetic cookie you really need it. He’s my baby. He’ll always be. My mum still calls me her baby after 35yeara and nobody gets so offended so please stop picking in other people’s comment when they’re trying to help. Have a life

6 months for DS1, exclusively expressing for 3 months of that as he struggled to feed
3.5 years DS2
3 years (so far) DS3
3 months DS4 as he had a health condition which made him struggle to feed

I went back to work at 9 month and DS is still breastfeeding at just over 2.

22 months, but he had cows milk during my working days when I went back to work after a year - pumping never worked for me

There are a lot of people on this thread who fed for over a year, in real life I know one person other than myself who's done this.

DD is 18 months and we're still going. I went back to work when she was 12 months. She just doesn't have milk in the day on nursery days. I've never been able to pump and she won't drink cows milk. She just makes up for it when she's not at nursery!!

At 9 months you can usually continue to breastfeed in the evenings and weekends and the daytime when they are apart from you isn't a problem.

I fed DS1 until he self weaned, he was just over 4. DS2 is 21 months and not likely to stop any time soon :)

Dc1 - 18 months (back to work at 12 months).
Dc2 - he is currently 8mo and bf, will continue as long as he likes. Returning to work when he is 11mo.

I tried and couldn't, so 2 days. She was fed my expressed colostrum via an oral syringe. It turned out that FF was the right choice for us anyway and I feel relieved that I made the decision that early to stop trying to BF, despite the enormous pressure from hospital MWs.

3 yrs, the last 6 months following the last teeth coming through were very short and far inbetween in terms of days between feeds. DD told me on the day before her 3rd bday she wasn't having it anymore as she was a 'big girl' now.

I'm greatful she fed for so long as it kept her out of hospital at 2.5yrs when she had a particularly bad case of norovirus when she didn't keep anything else down for about 7 days.

8 months

4.5 years and wanting to stop soon, enough is enough now 🥴 she would go forever if I let her but I want my body back!

2.5 years for all 3 kids, plus or minus a few months.

The second two had formula at nursery.

6 weeks. Tiny dc fed v little, lost weight, I couldn't express, supply was rubbish. My local support group was not women only, so not for me, so I gave up.

You can definitely keep going once you go back to work. Your body will adjust and so will baby. You can feed when you’re not at work.

DC1 10 months
DC2 15 months
DC3 2 years
DC4 2.5 years

It got progressively longer! In the end it was just a feed at bedtime for dc3 and 4.

Yes, breastfeeding past a year is quite rare in the UK, only 0.5% of babies are receiving any breastmilk at 12 months old. I think partly because of the length of maternity leave, most people return to work at 9/10 months and assume they need to stop by then, also the NHS advice mainly reiterates 6 months as a time point (even though that's just related to exclusive breastfeeding) and I think they used to say it was recommended to breastfeed for a year, which people take to mean exactly a year, no more/no less. And of course culture plays a part - I know before I had DC I assumed you breastfed for about 9 months/a year and then stopped because they were eating solid food by then. I didn't know that you could continue to breastfeed alongside solids or why you would want to, and then when I did find out some people did this, I thought it was a bit weird, which is how most people feel about it unless they are familiar with it.

Also UK breastfeeding support is shocking honestly - midwives are really the only HCPs who get any training in breastfeeding support and since they are only really around mothers for the first 5-10 days that is heavily focused on initiation of breastfeeding and not much on ongoing support. The fact that your front line support for new mums (which is essentially health visitors and GPs) do not have breastfeeding training and often have no idea where they can refer mothers for experienced breastfeeding support (maybe aren't allowed to refer to non-NHS resources too?) is likely why our drop off rates are so high. By 6 weeks babies getting any breastmilk at all are in the minority, and these are UK-wide stats. Break it down further, and in Scotland for example, slightly less than half initiate in the first place so formula feeding is actually the norm, although support seems to be a bit better there, as the drop off rate is much slower (49% at birth down to 38% at six weeks, which is a drop of 22%, compared with England's 73% at birth down to 43% at six weeks, which is a massive, almost 60% drop). Those are the figures for any breastfeeding, not exclusive breastfeeding, BTW.

16 and a half months, best thing I ever did.

6 months. I wanted to carry on longer but had to go back to work. Then-husband put me under so much stress and anxiety that I couldn't express (nothing would come out) so we had to switch to formula. Was devastated.

13 months. I returned to work at 9 months (nhs shift worker) and he had expressed Milk or formula when I was away from him.