Struggling with decision to stop breastfeeding at 8 weeks.

[7GEMM7]

Hey! I have a beautiful 8 week old baby girl. Initially I aimed to try and breastfeed her for 6 weeks but I am still going. It’s my favourite part of the day almost. I absolutely love feeding her and I never thought I would say that but it’s such a special time. I especially love the middle of the night feeds. I have been breastfeeding her 6 times over 24 hours (5 of those feeds are during the day and 1 at night) and I top up 3 of the feeds with formula as I don’t produce enough milk. However, I think I have decided that I need to stop breastfeeding by 12 weeks because each of those feeds in the day take 45 minutes, then add on the burping, holding upright and formula top up in feeding for 1.5 hours straight each session. I’m also miserable about my weight and want to have some control over my body again and obviously not one of those people who loses weight whilst breastfeeding. I have also had issues with an old injury flaring up and think that the hormones from breastfeeding might not be helping.

My plan is to drop one feed per week but just thinking about doing it upsets me. I have also built up a freezer stock with what little I can pump each day to give her a dose of breast milk per day of 2oz after I stop for a further 2 months. Is it normal to feel so sad and conflicted and does it get easier? I feel like I am having a constant internal battle as to whether to stop or not.

I feel like once I stop I can never ever get this time back.

p.s. I am a first time mother

You've given her a great start and it's fine if you want to stop now. But you don't sound like you really do want to stop? It's taking up time (though that will get quicker) but that's kind of what you're with your baby for just now, as in that's a worthwhile way to spend your day!

While it’s obviously your choice why would you give up when it’s going well and the thought of stopping upsets you?
It’s fairly normal for an 8 week old to take 45 mins to feed and they do get quicker and feed less often when they get to around 3 months old.
You can also lose weight while breastfeeding by eating healthily, it is early days to have noticed much weight loss just yet.
You could actually save yourself time by breastfeeding more to increase your supply and ditching the formula- no top ups, washing bottles, sterilising etc, it will take a couple of weeks of increased feeding but your supply will increase. Breastfeeding older babies is also easier than bottles because you don’t need to plan feeds when out and about or if you wanted to go on holiday or anything like that.

I had similar with my first, although unlike you I could never really enjoy it, in fact I felt miserable and glued to the sofa wasn't producing much milk. Feeds were taking about a hour so DC wasn't finding it that gratifying either. Went to bottle at 9 weeks and we were both so much happier and I felt I bonded with them better after that as well.

It is only normal to feel conflicted insomuch as there is so much pressure to keep breastfeeding no matter what, it being held up as being 'a good mum' and scare stories about 'consequences' of bottle feeding. I'm lucky in that I really don't give a flying what anyone thinks about that kind of thing and never looked back, totally happy it was the right call. Breastfeeding can be hard and thank God we have an alternative when needed.

NB, I did manage to breast feed my second for 10 months, so it can work out second time around if you decide to try again.

So basically from my experience I am a massive advocate of do what works.

It doesn't sound like you really want to give up OP as your reasons for doing it are pretty dubious! If pregnancy hormones didn't flare up your old injury then I'm not sure why breastfeeding would - not that I'm an expert, it just makes no sense to me! And why do you need to spend less time cuddling and feeding your baby? What is there to do that's more important than that?

Breast feeding is going to use more energy/calories than not breast feeding, so giving up breast feeding because you're not losing weight would be crazy! You can still eat healthily and sensibly while breast feeding and you can get out walking and pushing the pram a couple of times a day between feeds.

Why not just keeping feeding and then reassess after every 2 weeks or month has gone by? BFing only ever gets easier IME although I found the first few months really hard and didn't really enjoy it at all! It will definitely take less and less time as dd grows. I ended up feeding for 2 years and am so glad I did despite finding it really hard in the early days.

Your choice but why would you stop something which is normal and working?
stop thinking!!!
go with the flow!!!!!!
and yes. Babies take time over their meals. Just like we do.
however it is not always like this. They do get quicker. You are supposed to spend hours sitting down. At home and out with other mothers. NCT coffees morning. Bf mother meetings. Local mums yoga and coffee etc.

you may even find you don’t need to keep topping up.

how do you know you do not produce enough? Have you seen a IBCLC or other specialist to agree this?

I say this as a mother who did not have enough at one point but I know that it is rare for mums to not have enough .
i topped up every feed for 3 months between month 1 and month 4 with my first born

she bf for 4 years.

her brother took to it with no hassles and also bf for 4 years.

i had significant support. Both from volunteers at LLL and from a paid IBCLC

pleased I got there in the end as made life so much easier.