I'm sorry things are tough right now. This can be a HARD age to nurse through. I feel like no one warns moms about this age.
I am interested to hear more about this... Do you mean this age as in 8-9 months, or as in this age forward? I guess I'm just wondering if its just like.. going to be harder as time passes, or if this is a tough time and then it gets easier again? not sure if that makes sense.
I am struggling slightly too with it, mentally. Mostly it's the pumping that I hate, but even breastfeeding itself isn't as "special" as it was I guess. I feel like obviously it would feel different, she's not a newborn anymore. However she's also only slightly bigger than she was a month ago and yet I didn't feel like this a month ago.
I definitely still have more positive feelings than negative and i feelso sad at the thought of weaning... however I also feel a bit like, sometimes I'm sick of it. But for no reason I can actually articulate!
Well with H it got easier because the distraction peaked (meaning it didn't get worse )and she nursed less and she ate more solids. Teething didn't mess things up after the first few teeth broke through.I worked FT though. That meant only a few feeding during the week days and reconnecting time during the weekends. I might feel differently this time as I'm home 5 days a week and right now D is nursing every 90 minutes because she has a cold. D seems to be more into nursing than H was from day 1. I'm happy I'm not wrestling with weaning at the 1 year mark but who knows what will happen with this one. It is easier to go with the flow this time whereas the first time I was torn with planning vs. not planning.
Thank you for the follow up dahli! yes going with the flow would be good.. if only I didn't overanalyze everything,ha!
I think another thing is that I assumed by 8/9 months she'd be eating much less milk but really it doesnt' seem to have changed at all! It's the same frequency really as when she was just a little baby. At daycare she takes slightly less in each bottle but I have to pump just as much or for longer even to get it!
Ladybug I hope you find a solution that fits! And please keep us all posted as I am very curious as to how weaning stories go..
I don't know.. nursing is just getting so hard, mostly when we're out in public and I just feel like I'm not enjoying it as much anymore and she doesn't seem to care either, I mean she eats but sometimes it's a struggle to get her latched or undistracted enough. We don't have any cute cuddly moments (except MOTN) she just nurses for 1-4 minutes then wants down. Today we were out for a long time but I couldn't get her to eat-- I went to the mother's room and she latched on fine (because she was really hungry) but as soon as someone else walked in (30 seconds later) to change their baby she had to see what was going on. Once they left she was fine again until someone else came in. All the time she's distracted I'm leaking, then she wouldn't latch back on but was crying because she was hungry in that moment I decided I was going to buy some formula-- I have been thinking about this for a few weeks but I feel so guilty, I thought I wanted to go to at least a year but I just don't know.. I also would like if DH could do some MOTN bottles. ugh this is getting long,, the point is I bought formula today. But she hates it.
also the stupid formula container was messing with my guilt feeling by having huge bold letters BREASTMILK IS BEST FOR BABIES-- seriously? That sucks. What about people who CAN'T get give BM.
I don't feel like I want to wean completely, I do still enjoy it some and I know she does too (usually) I just feel torn and tired.
thanks for "listening"
I've totally had those moments too! I know how you feel. Around 5 months or so this started happening to me and I thought I would buy formula for emergencies but I never got myself to do it. We got into more of a rhythm now - he only nurses every 3 hours or so and if we are out doing stuff I just bring a real food snack of some sort (pouches usually work well) or fruit and some water and he is fine with that. So we only really nurse at home and side-lying in the bed (in a quiet and somewhat dark room) is the only thing that works well. It used to be such a struggle to do it in public for the same reasons as you listed above that I just stopped trying. If we are at a friend's house I just go into a bedroom and lay down with him, or at my Mom's. We haven't been anywhere where this wasn't possible other than the zoo - and there I did try to nurse and it was only a 5 min "check in" and I gave him solid food and he was fine w/ it. Then again, Max has ZERO teeth so I think that's helped too - I haven't dealt with any biting! The only problem is I have a hard time pumping since I EBF still and havent pumped in months, so when I do I get very little milk. I would have to build up supply to get anything worthy of a bottle - so when we went out to the movies the other night and left him with my Mom, he woke up and demanded milk 3 1/2 hours after we put him down and would NOT go back to sleep much to my dismay. I don't know what I was thinking, I planned it poorly. So we rarely get out of the house for long together at night. That is the real thing that we have sacrificed but it doesn't bother me much at the moment... Good luck and honestly, you've been doing it for so long that it's totally fine whatever you choose. Don't pay attention to what anyone else is doing and do what's right for you guys!!!