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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

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Original poster

stopping bf - Times article

23 replies

whenwillisleepagain · 18/02/2008 22:01

Hi, did anyone else see article in Times today by Tanya Byron - a woman had written in with problem of being woken every 2 - 3 hours at night by her LO who wanted to feed - this child was 10 months. I thought the advice was quite considered, but wondered about a few things. Firstly Dr T said there was no nutritional value in bf by 10 months - is that really so? And secondly she said to this woman - be prepared for the hormonal riot that will occur when you stop bf. I'm just thinking about stopping - DS is 15 months and our nights are far from great, never have been. I find it hard to imagine being much more hormonal than I have been since I had DS, so this is making me wonder what it'll be like - anyone got views / experience?

OP posts:

policywonk · 18/02/2008 22:06

Plenty of nutritional value in breastmilk for children of any age - that bit is just complete bollocks and I'm surprised to find Tanya B talking shite on that.

Yes, stopping bf can make you hormonal - weepy, sad, maybe disturb your sleep a bit. Probably for a couple of weeks at most, in my experience. BFing stimulates hormones in the mother to promote bonding and relaxation, so when you stop bf-ing you'll experience a sharp drop in these hormones and you might feel a bit wibbly for a while.

kellymom is a great site for breastfeeding info

Pesha · 18/02/2008 22:07

AFAIK there is still nutritional benefit at 10 months and I think it continues to help their immune system until its fully developed which is around 6 I think. I'm sure someone more knowledgeable will correct if I'm wrong!

As for hormonal riot I never experienced any hormonal problems when I stopped bfing my previous 2 although I stopped very gradually. I would imagine thats different for everyone though.

PrettyCandles · 18/02/2008 22:08

No nutritional value is a load of tosh.

As for hormonal riot - too true. When I stopped feeding dd at 23m I had a couple of nightmarish weeks when I thought I was plummeting into PND. I had had it with my first child but not with dd, my second. But after that my brain returned to normal and I was able to see what had happened.

Right now I'm in that sort of state as well. I'm still feeding 16m ds2, but we have been doing sleep training and I haven't fed him at night for a week. I'm feeling utterly low and - well, I'm not going into that, can't quite face it right now. But I know what it is, it's hormonal and it will pass.

Ds2 also bad sleeper (ds1 and dd were good sleepers) and probably took a substantial proportion of his bm at night, so I expect dropping the night feeds has made a big change in my body.

But I do think it's worth persevering with the bfing - just not at night! What you describe as "being hormonal" since having him is probably not so much hormones as the result of chronic sleep-deprivation.

PortAndLemon · 18/02/2008 22:09

No nutritional value? Does she think it magically turns into water? That part is complete bollocks and I'm surprised at her.

You can stop night feeds without stopping bf altogether, and I didn't have any hormonal riot when I did that. Haven't stopped completely yet and will be segueing into feeding DC2 (possibly tandem feeding) so can't comment directly on that, but there's certainly no hormonal riot with gradual child-led self-weaning.

tassisssss · 18/02/2008 22:10

oh dear, i fear the lovely doctor tanya is talking rubbish with the nutritional bit

I stopped BFing my 2 very gradually between 13 and 15 months and there was no "hormonal riot" here.

FrannyandZooey · 18/02/2008 22:10

I think comparitively you may feel a bit down after stopping bf
you are no longer getting all the lovely oxytocin and I personally noticed the difference every time ds cut down on feeding
for that reason alone I would advise mothers to carry on bfing for as long as they feel comfortable

FrannyandZooey · 18/02/2008 22:11

sorry what I meant was, even if only for that reason I would advise it

there are plenty of other reasons I would also advise continuing if you want to

SlightlyMadSecretSoundWinner · 18/02/2008 22:11

The major source of calories for a baby until 12m is milk. Weaning is about practising eating not gaining calories.

On that basis milk must be the most nutritionally relevant food they consume, be it bm or formula.

PrettyCandles · 18/02/2008 22:11

Sorry, P&L, beg to differ. Apart from a couple of daytime feeds which I dropped at about 19m, the rest of DD's weaning was completely child-led over a period of about 2m. Yet I still had the hormonal readjustment period of miserablness.

hunkermunker · 18/02/2008 22:13

She might wear a mean neckerchief, but her bf knowledge is shady

I do wish people wouldn't write authoritatively about bf when they know arse all about it.

(Hormone thing is possible, by no means definite and the stuff about nutritional value is bollocks in the extreme)

alarkaspree · 18/02/2008 22:14

no nutritional val... oh Tanya [reproachful]. It goes against all common sense to say this. Milk has no nutritional value? Wtf?

I don't know about the hormonal aspect of stopping because I haven't stopped yet, but I have stopped feeding ds during the night and it has enormously improved his sleep. You could night-wean if you you're not sure you want to stop completely yet.

hunkermunker · 18/02/2008 22:14

I mean it's possible in that she might feel the impact, she might not - not that it was possible it existed btw.

crapmomonMN · 18/02/2008 22:18

i didnt breast feed for that long - but crap! of course there is nutritional value - otherwise SMA and the likes are ripping the world off with all their milk - actually that could be true but still disagree - of course its nutritional!

PortAndLemon · 18/02/2008 22:23

Yes, sorry, I overgeneralised -- realised as soon as I hit post. I should have said "people I know who have experienced gradual child-led self-weaning haven't had a hormonal riot". It's never wise to deal in absolutes in this area, and I apologise.

PortAndLemon · 18/02/2008 22:31

OK, reading the article here she doesn't actually say that there's no nutritional value in bf at ten months.

The mother in question has completely weaned her DS (presumably onto formula, although she doesn't say) for all daytime feeds when he was 7 months but is still bf him before bed and every 2-3 hours at night and wants to stop.

TB says "Your son's need to be breast-fed throughout the night is nothing to do with nutrition and everything to do with his night-time sleep pattern. The breast milk itself is irrelevant - it's the sucking on your nipple, the feel and smell of your skin and the sound of your heartbeat that he needs to get back to sleep if he wakes in the night.", which isn't quite the same as saying that there's no nutritional value in bf -- rather, she's saying that the DS is not being motivated by nutritional value.

Later she says that "Fundamentally, this has happened because you have allowed the night breast-feed to continue long past your son's nutritional need for it. I have no issue with this (and certainly am not one to pronounce on the ?right way? to do things, as with parenting there is no one-size-fits-all), but if his dependence on your breast to get back to sleep in the night is disrupting both your sleep and his, it may be time to try to change this. However, I do know families in which the baby who still likes to suckle throughout the night sleeps with, or near, the parents and they all finds that this works best for them." -- again, not that there's no nutritional value in bf, just that there's no nutritional need for night-time bf at this age (or presumably for some time before that, given she says "long past"). That's not an uncontroversial statement in itself, of course.

SlightlyMadSecretSoundWinner · 18/02/2008 22:38

REading that excerpt as presented in PALs post I see no flaws in accuracy.

I agree with PALs summary at end of both paragraphs

PrettyCandles · 18/02/2008 22:38

Thanks for that. Rather changes the discussion! What she says seems to make complete sense to me - though I'm not so confident "that there's no nutritional need for night-time bf at this age", it seems to be a rather sweeping, one-size-fits-all statement. My ds2 only got interested in solids at about 8m, so I suspect he may well have had a continuing nutritional need for night feeds at that age.

policywonk · 18/02/2008 22:56

tiktok · 18/02/2008 23:07

I don't think there is a whole lot wrong with Dr T's response, except she could have described the benefits of meeting a child's needs for comfort at night, instead of merely accepting that people do this and it is fine for them...she certainly does not say there is no nutritional value in breastmilk and doesn't mention hormonal 'riot'.

I do think some babies of this age will need the nutritional aspect of the milk, too, but as she says, it is not the milk but the comfort of the breastfeed that's more important at night at this age.

She could also have said the baby was behaving normally.

But on the whole, not an answer to get cross about.

tiktok · 18/02/2008 23:08

She could also have said more clearly that the milk still has value and will always have

zim · 19/02/2008 23:11

really interesting.enjoyed reading that and responses to it

Original poster

whenwillisleepagain · 20/02/2008 19:46

Thank you so much for all the comments. I see that in my sleep-deprived, frazzled, over emotional state the other day, I misunderstood the part about nutritional value of breast milk, so thanks to PAL who was thorough enough to point that out to me. And apologies to Dr TB as well. It was really interesting to read the debate about how hormonal or not different MNers have felt when stopping BF. And the distinction between what's hormonal and what's simply the result of feeling very, very tired. For now I'm going to stick with it and I wouldn't just stop without thinking through the timing, the reasons for stopping, and totally involving DH in the discussions. But that article was timely because it just jumped off the page and seemed to be about what I was feeling.

OP posts:

duchesse · 20/02/2008 19:57

I think that when people state that breast milk has no "nutritional value" beyond a certain age, what they actually mean is that it has no nutritional advantage assuming your child is eating a balanced diet. For a two year in Darfur, being b/f could mean the difference life and death (ie clear nutritional value) , whereas in Britain in an otherwise well-nourished child, there are many other issues to take into account other than straightforward nutrition that may override continuing breastfeeding, including health of the mother, lack of sleep etc, etc... Semantics, but an important distinction.

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