How to stop breastfeeding

[Luckygreenduck]

How do I stop breastfeeding? I have had a really positive experience but feel ready to stop soon (12 months). I am not in a huge rush but know I don't want to naturally wean.
I know all the benefits of natural weaning but just feel personally like it's time for me to stop. Any advice on how to do it around this age?

Depends on how often you’re feeding at the moment. The nutrition your baby is currently getting from your milk needs to be replaced with something. They really do need milk or milk products of some kind through toddlerhood. Will your baby drink full fat cows milk from a cup? Or do they love yogurts? Replace each decent length predictable feed with one of those or another milk product over the course of a couple of weeks until you’re nit breastfeeding anymore. If you’re only doing a feed before bed or something then you could probably just stop cold Turkey without any potential mastitis. If you find your breasts get engorged, you want to hand express just enough to feel comfortable rather than trying to empty your breasts of milk. You might find this doesn’t happen at all, it’s less of a risk this far post partum. It’ll likely take a while for your milk production to completely stop. Could be several weeks where if you try to hand express, you will see milk.

@Aerosarethebest thanks, I think I might need to get more predictable with my feeding first then as I currently just do it on demand when he seems to want it.
I will try to limit it a bit more to set times and then start replacing them with milk in a cup. I think he mainly likes the comfort though so not sure how it will go. He pulls at my top and knows wh as the wants.

Perfectly understandable @Luckygreenduck. If you are feeding at night, can I suggest starting with some gentle night weaning?

I started weaning my (then) 12 month old at the end of February. She was feeding multiple times a day and feeding to sleep for every nap and at night. I managed to completely daytime wean her within two weeks. It’s all gone completely out of the window now but that’s because of personal circumstances.

I started by cutting out one feed at a time. Pick the easiest feed. So for me that was the feed she had before her nap mid morning. I would make sure that we had plenty to do/were out of the house and completely distracted her. She would fall asleep in the buggy or car instead. After a few days she stopped asking for that feed and I no longer had to distract her from it. Then I did the same for her other feeds one at a time. Don’t cut out more than one feed every three days at a minimum! My boobs never get full but if yours do just express as little as possible to feel comfortable.

My daughter was an absolute milk fiend so I never thought it was doable. But it is. What didn’t help for me was that deep down neither her or I was ready to stop.

Good luck!

Thanks that's a really good article @SiouxsieSiouxStiletto. I think trying to not feed for a section of the night would be a good start. As I said I am not desperate to stop right away but do want to reduce it soon.

We cut it down in stages just like that.

Once they were used to being night weaned, DH took them straight down for breakfast in the morning instead of having a BF. Gave them some time together abs stopped them expecting milk on wake up. We dropped the one before bed last but by that time they were happy to have a cup of milk from DH if I wasn't home anyway.

The other way to look at this is just to not worry about the times he breastfeeds but start to add in cows milk at predictable times - so maybe mid afternoon, then evening, then morning. As you add in cows milk, the amount of milk he takes from the breast should reduce, even if he’s still asking for frequent minifeeds.
Wearing a top he can’t pull down can help when you’re trying to drops feeds or stop- especially with nightfeeds.

I went from feeding a LOT on demand at 12 months (not the best on solids) to just one pre-sleep feed at ~14 months. Started with formalising feeds (pre/post sleeps mainly), then dropped one feed about every week. I just used water and distraction when she asked, but tba lot less than I feared. Her solids intake improved with each dropped breastfeed.

She then stopped feeding in the night by herself shortly after (she still woke but stayed lying down and just wanted a bum pat for reassurance whereas before she'd be sat upright waiting for me).

I very recently dropped the final evening feed at 19 months - a bit emotional for me, but not sure she noticed to be honest!

Thanks for your experiences. Trying more cows milk might be a good start. Do you give it in a cup of bottle? He is so messy with cups but I suppose it's just one of those things to learn. Don't cry over split milk 😂

I offered water to wean off night feeds, or rather, got DP to do it so that link between waking/me/milk was disrupted.

With day feeds, it was a mixture of offering other drinks and distraction. I don’t think you need to always give milk.

Get a non-spill closed cup. A sippy cup or 360-type cup. Toddlers do need to learn to drink from open cups but for your own sanity do that with water (maybe with meals. Outside is good 😂) and not milk.

Once I night weaned, I set myself on a feeding schedule. At 9 mo I think we were on 3 feeds a day (morning lunch and night). My feeding guide said another full feed in the afternoon, but he just didn't want it!

10 months we dropped the lunch feed.

At 11 months it was only bedtime feed left. It has always been a big session, so he was definitely getting enough milk!

On his birthday I just stopped. There was no drama; he had milk from his cup and went to bed. That was that.

@DragonbornMum that sounds like the dream! I think it might cause a bit more upset here. He loves his milk and definitely knows what he wants

So did mine! He always had minimum 40 min feeding sessions (even pre-weaning), but he was totally fine with upgrading to cow's milk! I was semi panicking for the entire year about quitting, but it turned out I was overthinking - it really was smooth sailing once we sorted out night feeding.

All the best!