'Mother breastfeeds 5yo son' Is this really news?

[Disenchanted3]

BBC article here

Really amazes me the stuff that is classed as news these days

Would probably upset someone if I comment, so I won't. Just

I think custardo's cooment says it all really. . My sister said something similar recently about how she thought bfing a baby over 12mo was a bit weird.

Does anyone know where to get hold of stats on international average weaning age? Would love to know if OMP8's post is right!

The BBC should be ashamed of themselves.

oh have they lifted it from something else? If the something else was more positive then fine. The whole tone of the article seemed to be "mother feeds child who is far too old and refuses to apologise" to me
Good question, what do I expect her to do?? Not sure. Just I suppose what I'm saying is that even that this is a story is counter to normalising bf iyswim.
BTW the story has changed slightly: "Mothers who breastfeed older children face "cultural" opposition despite no evidence that the practice is harmful, a leading parents' charity has said.

The comments came after a mother from South Yorkshire defended her decision to continue breastfeeding her five-year-old son Jonathan. "

I'm very happy with that. If this genuinely does get ebf talked about by people without a cats bum mouth, I'm happy to admit I was wrong

though she's going to get slated for

"I know I'm doing the right thing and I'm a firm believer in children making their own choices,"

I'm happy to let my DS self wean, however left to make his own choices days would be spent wrecking the lounge with beebies on and a vat of chocolate

Stealth... I think we're possibly missing something here... why don't you, me and Indith invite Chat/Take-a-break to our next meet up - then we can get paid for our story about breastfeeding toddlers and use the money to buy more cake and get very fat

Incidentally I was filmed by TFM (local) radio yesterday along with the rest of the peer supporters, I think my interview was awful, for some reason the question "what do you think about breastfeeding?" really through, so a gabbled on about how women having been doing it for millions of years and it was perfectly normal...I think I sounded a bit mad tbh lol.

But I thought the question was really asinine.

really threw me, that should have been!

what did they thiunk youd say?
urgh its disgusting??
good idea re cakes
we could even swap children for extra yuck factor
true LG, i suppose it might get people talking about it...we'll see. no doubt itll be in the DM & mum will cut it out for me

swapping dcs would get an extra slice
whens the interview on? i get tfm if i drive 5 mins down the rtoad

chiccadee, I thought I'd read it on MN, but just looked it up online and it's not as clear as I thought.

I'm in no way an expert on this, I've just had a quick google.

International average is sometimes quoted as 4.2 years old, but this may not be accurate. What I found was the suggestion that anything between 2.5 and 7 years old would 'fit' for humans as mammals.

A natural age for weaning

Natural term weaning then would look at what the biological imperative would be, rather than the actual world average (although there are plenty of cultures where it is normal to bf to 2 year, 4 years, even 7 years).

I also read the suggestion that historically breastfeeding has lasted for 2-4 years (for one thing it was a good way to space out pregnancies).

Anyway, I don't claim to know any of this as fact, and stand a little corrected on my earlier post.

SPB it was a video which will be on TFMs website, I can't find it so I don't think they put it up yet.

Good for her

That "international average of weaning age around 4 yrs" is demonstrably false.

WHO Global Data Bank on Breastfeeding and Complementary Feeding.

American Region:
Belize: 6 months
Colombia: 16 months
Nicaragua: 18 months

Eastern Mediterranean:
Afghanistan: 17 months
Bahrain: 15 months

Africa:
Algeria: 14 months
Angola: 25 months
Botswana: 19 months
Burundi: 24 months
Cameroon: 19 months
Congo: 19 months
Ivory Coast: 20 months
Congo: 9 months
Ethiopia: 25 months
Ghana: 22 months
Kenya: 21 months
Liberia: 17 months
Mozambique: 22 months
Namibia: 17 months
Uganda: 23 months
Zimbabwe: 19 months

Eastern Mediterranean:
Afghanistan: 17 months
Bahrain: 15 months

South East Asia:
Bangladesh: 25 months
India: 28 months
Indonesia: 24 months
Myanmar: 27 months
Nepal: 29 months
Sri Lanka: 23 months

It's hardly a big story but it is unusual to bf at the age of 5, and the unusual gets reported on.

Western Pacific Region:
Cambodia: 24 months
Fiji: 7 months
Lao: 16 months
Papua New Guinea: 21 months

I spent a bit of time on it and the maximum country average duration of breastfeeding I could find was Nepal with 29 months (population: 28 mn). Meanwhile China's average is 4 months (population: 1.4 billion).

There must be some hugely populous countries out there that we don't know about, who breastfeed to about age 10. That is the only way I can see that the global average for breastfeeding age can come anywhere near 4.

Cote d'Azur, I think the age of four thing came from people just sticking a pin between the ages of 2.5 and 7 years old, which were the range of ages given for amounts of time breastfeeding can last which fits in with biological models.

I think my conclusion is that although it is not the cultural norm (here) to breastfeed to 5 years old, it is certainly within the range that is suggested as natural for humans. And there are some places where it does happen. There was a link to an article on MN a while a go, about a Canadian mother who lived in Mongolia where everyone bf until childhood, Breastfeeding in Mongolia, it gives a really interesting viewpoint.

Surely, everyone here can see that is not what "Global Average" means

So someone has written a book saying "biologically" we should be breastfeeding until at least 2.5 yrs, possibly until 7 yrs. But hardly anyone does. So what? Global average looks closer to 1-1.5 from where I sit.

By the way, Mongolia has about 2.5 mn people scattered across a huge country, with a large chunk of the population leading a nomadic lifestyle. It is hardly surprising that they breastfeed longer than the vast majority of the rest of the world.

You can always find some tribe somewhere on the planet doing something different. It doesn't mean they are right. It doesn't mean everyone else is wrong. It just means that there are a lot of people in the world and some do things differently.

Is this the same woman who is currently in the Daily Mail? In their article they say she breastfeeds the babies of friends - with their permission. Maybe a different story?

i know you AENRE alloowed to say this on mn
but i think bf ing a 5 year old is FREAKY