pump weaners

musicalsilver

So I'm late to this party, but I was wondering about pump weaning advice.  I've been pumping once a day at lunchtime for 20 minutes since LO turned 1.  He gets 10oz of milk sent to daycare, 3-5 of which is breastmilk.  

My original plan was to scale down my pumping by 5min/week, and be down to nothing by the time LO is in the Toddler room in January.

I failed to take into account the fact that LO is out of daycare for the last week of Dec and the week spanning New Years.  Soooo he'll be nursing on demand over the holidays.  I'm a little scared to go cold turkey after that, because LO still nurses a ton when we're together.

So my new plan is to continue to scale back my pumping.  I'll be down to 10min or less a session by the time he's out for his 2 week break.  I'll give quitting cold turkey a try in January, and I guess just pump to comfort if necessary?

Sorry that was long winded, I'm sure I'm just overthinking this.

ilovemarfa

I weaned off my pump by dropping a pump every few weeks. I exclusively pumped for 16 months though. By the time I was down to 1 pump a day I was only getting about 5 ounces in a 24 hour period. I think you would be fine just stopping the pumping as you don't seem to be getting that much by pumping if you get between 3-5 oz a day. Once I dropped the last pump I did have to pump once after about 4 days and then again at around 10 days just to relive some discomfort. If your LO is still nursing you should be ok.

kh59

In retrospect, pump weaning wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.  I think I did it in April or May?  I even cut out my last session cold turkey rather than reducing time gradually because I had read that more drastic changes were more likely to jumpstart my period (nope).  Anyway, LO still nurses on demand evenings and weekends...in fact, it was at least every two hours this weekend because she's teething.  On work days, we go anywhere from 5 to 15 hours without nursing, no problem.  Sometimes I see her during my lunch break and she nurses.  Other times, she goes from her last middle of the night feeding until I get home from work the next day.  During a ten day vacation in October, she nursed constantly, and then we went back to my regular work schedule with no trouble.  On Mondays and days when I don't see her at lunch, I have pretty full boobs by the end of the day, but I haven't had any real problems.  Chances are, your body will adapt pretty quickly to a new--even variable--routine.  Congrats on 18 awesome months of pumping--and on finally being able to ditch the pump!