For those who enjoyed BF - when/why did you stop??

[ChocOrange05]

I am interested in the following:

1. When did you stop BF?
2. Why - was it because you felt it was time to stop, did baby self-wean or were other factors a part of your decision, i.e. returning to work?

I am currently mix-feeding my 18 week old DS - he has 2 bottles a day. I love BF but I am wondering when I might have to stop. Although DS takes the bottle he has started refusing it sometimes and I am worried that when I go back to work one day a week in May he will refuse to eat. I don't want to stop BF but not sure what to do, its early days yet so I don't have to make a decision but I am interested in what everyone else has done.

Thanks!

1. at around 16 months
2. she self-weaned

I was really gutted and would have liked to have fed her for longer tbh ...

I stopped at 10 months and just over 1 year, basically because they started biting me. I worked part time from 4 months but still managed to carry on. You could express milk to put into a bottle when working but I didnt get on too well with that.

1. with DD1, when got pregnant with DC2 so around the 2year old mark... still BFing DC2 at 11months

2. didn't fancy breast feeding during pregnancy and she was down to one feed a day anyway. i'll BF DC2 for a while yet.

ds2 has just weaned at about 16 months.
he stopped because I am pregnant and my milk went.
i'm gutted

My dd stopped a week after her 3rd birthday - she had her usual morning milk, thought for a moment then said "I don't think I want to have milky any more" and she didn't.

Ds was 11 months. He adored (and still adores) his father. He gave him his first bottle at 11 months and he never wanted to breast feed again, just wanted bottles from DP!

Sorry - that doesn't help, does it?

I think by May if you feed him night and morning he will be all right even if he doesn't take much other milk - it's only one day a week after all.

I stopped at 2.5 years approximately. DD would have gone on for far longer, but I had to be hospitalised suddenly and this meant that abrupt weaning was necessary.

3 years 10 months. We agreed it was time to stop .

Hi, DS3 will be 1 year in a few days time and I am still BFing him when I am with him about 3-4x in 24 hrs. I returned to work when he was 5 months old and it was no problem to get him to take a bottle with either EBM or FF from CM.
I am planning to stop after our Easter holiday (going to be sharing a house with 3 other families and giving him a quick BF when crying in the middle of the night is the fastest way to shut him up ) and am looking forward to the freedom that will bring. This is by far the longest I have BF any of my children and I am chuffed with myself for getting this far, but although I do know there are LOTS of arguments for extended BFing, it is just not for me.
Strangely, though, I already know part of me is going to be sad at the passing of this special relationship..

Bottomline, IMO, keep going as long as you can or want. Babies are actually v flexible and your DS is v likely to adapt. He could even start "reverse cycling" ie not drinking so much during the day when not with you, and making up for it at night... apparently some kids do that, thankfully mine did not. HTH

9mths self weened, I just thought it was natural, as he was having 3 meals a day & didn't want me!!

1. Mimi was 10 months old (dc3 but first BF baby of mine)

2. I had a mc and the hormones and shock or something just cut my milk off. I miss it desprately and would give anything for none of it to have happened.

I cannot wait to BF again.

1. 20mo
2. I had had enough

DS1 11 months, he rejected the breast for 24 hours and I knew nothing of BF strikes at the time
DS2 as above

would probably still be doing it now if that hadn't happened, I really loved it and it is the one thing that saddens me about not planning on havinf more children

Still feeding 3.5yo ds. I am waiting (and waiting!!) for him to self wean.

Hi, I stopped breast feeding my son when I was 5 months pregnant with my daughter, because I didn't feel I'd have the support to tandem feed and there'd be no way I could hope for my son to self-wean before his sister's birth. He was 21 months. My daughter is 19 months and I'm going to breast feed her for as long as it takes.

DS self-weaned at 3.2 when DD was born (he'd only been feeding very occasionally at that point, having cut down drastically over the last trimester of my pregnancy, then when she arrived he decided that breastfeeding was for babies and something he "used to do" so stopped entirely).

From the time I went back to work when he was 9 months he'd only been nursing two or three times a day, though.

DD is nearly one and still going (but I'm back at work, so it's only two or three feeds most days).

dd 1 and 2 both self-weaned at around 3 - 3 and a half.
we kept going through pregnancy, tandem feeding, going back to work full time, going away for three or four days at a time....
there is no need to stop until bothof you are ready

Just stopped feeding ds1 as he self weaned at 23 mths on fri 27th feb. ds2 was born on the mon 2nd march and is also bf. I anticipate that i'll have that 1 weekend break in 4 yrs (unless ds2 wants to wean earlier/later) future dc's not yet in the equation I love it! went back to work pt when ds1 was a yr old and it did't effect anything.