Tired of breast feeding

[Rasha]

My son is turning 5 months in days. He eats 5-6 times daily. Each time 6-8 ounces. I breast feed most times and bottle feed pumped milk very often. Occasionally I give a bottle of formula just so the baby is used to it in case I cannot take it and need to wean. Truth is, I hate being a breast feeding mother, although I don't hate bf itself. I love that I can do something good for my boy and I love holding him to feed. I hate having larger than size D breasts. I got stretch marks on them after I started feeding. I see them increase every day. I am trying to lose weight but do not. I hate my breasts filling up overnight. My baby sleeps through and I have to wake up at times to pump. I pump 2-3 times a day.
My son started teething. It hurts. In my community some mothers bf 4 months some a year, no rules. I insisted on bf with no supplements for 4 months. I want to wean at 6 months to get my life back. I work as a presenter on TV and hate being big breasted. I feel ugly and vulgar and in pain. As for my baby, he prefers the bottle ( with breast milk) but will nurse happily but lesser amounts. If I wean him tomorrow he will not notice because he got used to every feeding method. I just don't want to stop for health reasons. My son has not gotten sick once. I heard that my at 6 months babies eat twice a day and feed twice a day. How can I make my breast produce less milk and shrink again if I decide to go on

Not sure but I hated bf too and found it claustrophobic and confining but thought I had to do it for health reasons of my child. Stopped at 3 months because it was SO depressing and hated how my body felt and my DD was still a healthy resilient allergy-free person. NExt one was FF after the first two weeks and is also a robust kid who is never ill. When you are someone who wants to carry on all the encouragement on here is fantastic. But there is no shame in stopping. I wondered what I'd worried about when I stopped and the sun started to shine again.

I love breastfeeding and the bond I get from it. But yes, I am getting to the stage (6 months) where I want my body back at some point (I'm small and my tits are 34G) and want to be able to have more than one-two glasses of wine occasionally.

Partly I'm beginning to feel a bit of strain from feeding on demand and feeding her for comfort. I have friends who are b/f 3 times a day at 6 months. I'm feeding her 10 times.

I'm planning to continue to a year (we'll see from there) because soon I'll be returning to London and will BLW her, so in a few months she'll hopefully not be feeding so frequently.

I'm deeply conflicted about this. I love doing it SO much and feel proud of myself for getting this far (had a wobbly start) but I have a snacky baby who likes to suckle on off for ages and it's VERY VERY confining.

I have to go out to space the feeds out. Which is getting expensive!

Anyway. I hear you. Maybe get to the weaning stage and see how often your feeding then and whether you can cope better.

Worth noting that it's pregnancy that's done things to your tits, not breastfeeding per se.

And I've lost 3 stone of the 4 I put on while pregnant (yes, I did say 4 stone....)

Rasha
could you try not pumping (so much or at all)? By 5 months your body should be in tune with your baby and produce what he needs, so I'm wondering if you're encouraging your body to make too much?

You've done a fantastic job to have got to 5 months - I remember being utterly fed up from 4 to 6 months with dc3 because my previous children had started solids at 4 months. But just taking it day by day really helped me. If by now you want to give up tomorrow, that's fine. If you want to carry on tomorrow, that's fine. Either way is fine!

I was wondering about the pumping too.
The more of a demand you make on your boobs, the more milk you will make. So the more you pump, the more you'll need to pump.
If you need to empty some milk for comfort sakes then you should pump just enough to be comfortable rather than emptying your boobs.
Leaving them full sends a message back to your body to produce less milk.

bumping for bf gurus.

Hope you get some good info

Stop pumping.

doris You CAN have more that 1-2 glasses of wine occassionally.

Agree about the pumping, and agree about the wine.

I also though want to say- bf is a choice we make; it's not something we have to do. Like every other important choice- especially those that have to do with our health / body- it involves good bits & bad bits (and these differ from woman to woman). It's up to you to make these choices, to weigh what's most important to you, to say when's the right time to stop for you & your baby. Don't let anyone influence you on making these decisions, they're very personal! Just remember, whatever choice you make (whether you continue or stop, or even phase bf out a bit) it's not going to be the 100% right choice, because there is no such thing; as I said, bf (among so many other things) has pros & cons.

Good luck with whatever you choose to do!