whats the longest anyone has bf for? anyone still doing it with lo's at school?

[prettylovebird]

ok i know dd is only 7 months,but, i want to bf her forever, and just wondering what it will be like when shes at school or preschool

plb - I really liked b/f to begin with but when the DCs got to just over a year I was ready to stop. Luckily, so were they. If you continue that's great but don't worry if your feelings change. Whatever suits the pair of you.

yes i take your point tdonb i may decide to stop before then, maybe im still on the newborn high, ill been so high since having dd, im sur ill come down to earth with a big bump one day!

I bf'd dd till about 21 months, then stopped, mainly bcs she was waking for feeds still and it was having serious impact on our (already stretched to the limit) life. But she never 'let it go'- and after a couple of times when she had hurt herself, and simply would not be consoled except by bfing, we started again. And the milk was still there!

She's now 2.4 and we feed in the am (at 6 - dp is starting to mutter) and once she's in pyjamas. Mornings can be long - 20 mins - but eves are always symbolic iyswim.

She does ask during the day v occasionally but I'm quite firm about telling her that we don't do it during the day.

I bf'd dd till about 21 months, then stopped, mainly bcs she was waking for feeds still and it was having serious impact on our (already stretched to the limit) life. But she never 'let it go'- and after a couple of times when she had hurt herself, and simply would not be consoled except by bfing, we started again. And the milk was still there!

She's now 2.4 and we feed in the am (at 6 - dp is starting to mutter) and once she's in pyjamas. Mornings can be long - 20 mins - but eves are always symbolic iyswim.

She does ask during the day v occasionally but I'm quite firm about telling her that we don't do it during the day.

Duchess - it's a Little Britain sketch about a middle-aged man who's still breastfeeding. He climbs onto his mother's lap in various incongruous settings and demands 'Bitty'. It has become a handy all-purpose insult for nobbos who are revolted by breastfeeding.

Urgh I feel all dirty now.

plb - how lovely to hear about you feeling 'high'. My post-birth high with DS1 was unreal.

I bf'd dd till about 21 months, then stopped, mainly bcs she was waking for feeds still and it was having serious impact on our (already stretched to the limit) life. But she never 'let it go'- and after a couple of times when she had hurt herself, and simply would not be consoled except by bfing, we started again. And the milk was still there!

She's now 2.4 and we feed in the am (at 6 - dp is starting to mutter) and once she's in pyjamas. Mornings can be long - 20 mins - but eves are always symbolic iyswim.

She does ask during the day v occasionally but I'm quite firm about telling her that we don't do it during the day.

Main reason for that is that one of the reasons i wanted to stop in the first place is because we could never do anything that meatn we were physically close - reading, cuddling, playing on lap - without having to abandon it for bf, and that was getting me down. So rule of not feeding during day solves that one.

My post is VERY IMPORTANT

Please read it three times. third one has a different ending, just to surprise you.

thanks policy, its the best high in the world,isn't it? i hated my so called good job ie stressful,but hooked on the money

and now i feel like i have the best job in the world, so free, feel a bit like a different person because im now so relaxed

Sorry for the rant prettylovebird. I struggled with BFing to start and am so proud to be still feeding DD now. However everyone has a different experience and I have a lot of pro BFing friends who could not concieve again so gave up or the LO went off BFing by themselves quite early. You don't know what will happen so take each day as it comes.

DD will happily feed Morning and Night and has done since 12m but early on she was latched on pretty much all the time and I could not imagine carrying on as I am now doing. TBH I have considered giving up the morning feed as it would be easier on me trying to get to work on time but she enjoys that one so much, she is cranky in the Mornings (like her Mummy) but just like me with a cup of tea her BF perks her up for the day. When she is finished she looks at me and gives me a toothy grin - all milky dribble - and says "chair" i.e Give me Breakfast!

well,.. me, Franny! He was (and still is) very big and boisterous. At soft play, for example he would go and have a little scrap, then come back, hop on mums knee pull up her jumper and feed.. I never said anything and would never dream of saying anything to her, as I said right at the beginning, tis your own choice. From my point of view I felt uncomfortable seeing my friend exposed, when she didn't necessarily choose it. Sometimes they had a little fight where she fought to cover up and he dragged her clothes up/off pointing and explaining to my ds's..mummies boobies!

rant away cmoc,yes i will just take each day as it comes

DS4 stopped a couple of weeks ago. It just petered away. I was sad really, but I've been doing it so long now and for four babies.

Of course our bodies are designed to be pregnant and breastfeeding year in year out in reality and don't forget that extended breastfeeding helps cut down the chances of breast cancer.

I did know a girl who was still bfing at 8. She's 10 now and I don't know if she's still doing it. Perfectly nice, well adjusted girl with a 'normal' mum.

I'm glad you're so enjoying breastfeeding. It's absolutely lovely isn't it.

"From my point of view I felt uncomfortable seeing my friend exposed, when she didn't necessarily choose it"

would seeing her body inadvertantly while feeding an older child be much different from accidentally catching a flash while she was feeding a baby, though?

and I do understand, honest - I think it can make you do a double take when you first see an older child feeding - it is an unusual sight in this country - but could you not just look away?

How lovely you are enjoying bf so much!

I fed DS1 till he was nearly 17mo - he stopped when I was about 5m pg with DS2. I'd have continued to feed him, but he had other ideas!

DS2 was 2 last week and he still bfs morning and evening (and occasionally during the day if he asks). I'll bf him till he wants to stop.

I have a theory of why Macdoodle posted thus, but I'm not going to say why until she explains, because I'd (possibly) give her an out!

OBM - you just didn't want anyone to read MY brilliant post. You put me in a post sandwich

oh for goodness sakes ingles

Look at your post again, as if you weren't you but from mars, and ask yourself whether there's anything actually there that is odd, or whether its all about your own projections.

I don't want to jump on people too much - the first time I went to a LLL meeting and saw a 4 year old breastfeeding I just GAWPED, and when the mum said she had come on the bus and breastfed on the way I just thought NO FREAKING WAY

but I mean you get over it pretty quickly. I would think being out with your friend and her ds who breastfed casually like this would be a pretty quick and effective way of getting used to seeing older children feeding. It's only a cultural thing that we find it unusual, it isn't physically odd or against nature or anything - quite the opposite. It's much odder, if you think about it, to see children with bits of plastic stuck in their mouths, and we all seem to manage to cope with that without having to look away or wince or feel embarrassed.

It is unusual to see an older child bfing. And I'm not sure I'd be 100% comfortable with a child of 5 who lifted my top up to show my breasts - and it sounds like your friend maybe wasn't either - but if she didn't do anything about it, that's her lookout, and the fact that she
still bfed her 5yo anyway makes me wonder whether it is, as OBM said, your own projections and the fact that she probably knew you weren't comfortable with her doing it.

I bf dd for 2.4yrs she pretty much self weaned seemed right for us

Pistachio obviously everyone's experience is different, but I found past the age of two it just got easier and more useful, really. You may not be feeding at night by then, you can set down limits about day time feeds if that works best for you, and it is such a useful thing to be able to sit down quietly, reconnect and calm the BOTH of you down at any point you need to, when life with a 2 year old just gets too much.

Most children do self wean between 2 and 4. There is often a right time to encourage weaning, when they have lost interest to some extent, but that time may not be the time that you choose! I do feel that after 2 years, there is often little point to stopping, and many benefits to carrying on, but breastfeeding a toddler was mostly a very positive and pleasant experience for me; I know other people have had different experiences.

pw - thanks for explanation. I can't watch toe-curling TV.

yes i have no clothes pulling rule. and i have long ago left feeding bras, have got properly fitted expensive ones and they don't seem to suffer.

I wear underwired non-feeding bras and on the odd occasion DS2 wants a feed (whoa there, just typed DS3 then by mistake!), I just hitch it down - not comfy, but he never wants a long feed in the day anyway.

i have an interesting thing going with dummies. ds (2.9) pinches them at cm and we bought him one to go on a long car journey recently, but generally it is discouraged. he is equally keen on dummy (forbidden fruit) or bf (best love) i wonder what will happen.