Really need advice re weaning my toddler

choirgirl

My sweet DS will be 2 years old in less than a month, and it's long been my goal  to BF him as close to 2 years as I could get unless he self-weaned.

Kiddo is a boobaholic, so it's not happening easily. On weekends when I'm around him all day, he begs to BF at least 5 times a day, I bet sometimes he begs 10 times, and probably gets 4 sessions out of it.  But my supply is low, so he mostly just tries and then starts to cry that "it's all gone" when he's on the third time of the day or 5-10 minutes in any time of day.

It's heartbreaking for me when he starts to cry and whine, all gone, it's too hard, milk gone, no more milk.  I feel like I'm involuntarily violating don't ask don't refuse because I'm sort of refusing.  

At the same time as being sad about weaning, I'm ready to get my body back. I'm 40 and we're trying for #2 and weaning can only help at this point.  And every time I've gotten serious about exercise since giving birth, my supply tanked, and I'm starting to run again (3x/wk) to take back just a little bit for myself.  What good am I as a mother if I'm at risk of dying young because I'm so out of shape?

To maybe make it easier, I've taken a bunch of gigs lately that require DH or a babysitter to put DS to bed (if I'm home there's no him going to bed unless I nurse him to sleep, and it takes an hour). He goes down great for them and probably gets 45 more minutes of sleep. The downside to being gone evenings is he's been super clingy  (for me and only me) lately, probably partly bc I've only put him down 3-4 nights a week lately, and also maybe he sees the writing on the wall and is sort of backsliding? 

I just can't get over how desperately sad he looks either when he figures out I'm not going to be there to feed him to sleep or when he tries to BF and there's no milk.   Please, do you have any advice?   He's a smart little guy, and I'm thinking there may be some things I can tell him to make this easier, too.  Right now, I've talked to him about how he's becoming a big boy and once kids aren't babies anymore, they don't usually get mommy milk anymore, and big kids definitely don't, so we are going to have to find something else we can do together for mommy/DS time when there's no more mommy milk, but somehow that's just not satisfying for either of us.   

I don't know what else to do. It's feeling like time to me, but not to him. I'm starting to feel enslaved by don't offer don't refuse, I mean, if I never refuse, I'd never leave my livingroom couch! I'm running out of milk. I desperately need to get healthy with exercise. I didn't want weaning to feel like something I did to him, but something we hit on mutually, but at this point I'm afraid he's gonna want me to go to college with him.  I just hoped he'd self wean the same way he self weaned from his paci, and the way he took the early lead in pottytraining.

Do you have any advice? I didn't go to the BFing or AP boards because I have never even lurked there and don't want to just jump in with people I don't "know."

(EDITED to add: I probably should have read crackerjack's post!)

tommigirle

i think it might help to offer him somthing in place of it. if you think he's hungry/thirsty, offer food and water, or milk in a cup that he likes. if you think he's bored, offer an activity. if you think he needs cuddles, then cuddle. i forgot to mention in crackerjack's post that when i weaned my daughter (at 2 years 4 months) she had the option of laying her head on my breast without nursing. we talked this option up big time the week before so that when it came time to not nurse the first night (she was only nursing before bed) she knew right away that she could lay on me skin to skin. i'm sure it was really comforting. she will still occasionally ask to do that, though she never asks to nurse unless she is trying to be funny.

 

it sounds like you have made up your mind that you want to end the nursing relationship, even though doing so is bittersweet. i felt the same way. but it's better to end on a good note than go through the end feeling resentful or unhappy. both parties need to be happy for the relationship to be healthy, you know? your LO might surprise you once you decide to go through with it. i was very surprised at my dd's willingness to move on.

hamilton.ja

tommigirle:

i think it might help to offer him somthing in place of it. if you think he's hungry/thirsty, offer food and water, or milk in a cup that he likes. if you think he's bored, offer an activity. if you think he needs cuddles, then cuddle. i forgot to mention in crackerjack's post that when i weaned my daughter (at 2 years 4 months) she had the option of laying her head on my breast without nursing. we talked this option up big time the week before so that when it came time to not nurse the first night (she was only nursing before bed) she knew right away that she could lay on me skin to skin. i'm sure it was really comforting. she will still occasionally ask to do that, though she never asks to nurse unless she is trying to be funny.

 

it sounds like you have made up your mind that you want to end the nursing relationship, even though doing so is bittersweet. i felt the same way. but it's better to end on a good note than go through the end feeling resentful or unhappy. both parties need to be happy for the relationship to be healthy, you know? your LO might surprise you once you decide to go through with it. i was very surprised at my dd's willingness to move on.

 

i would have written almost the exact same thing. we did cuddles at night as that was the only time left that he was nursing by the time he was weaned. i had cut out all daytime sessions and his morning wake up (simply by having DH get up with him and not allow him to come into the bedroom with me anyway. he would do something fun with dh. he never once looked back on that session!). so at night before bed we would sit in his rocker and cuddle for as long as we want. it only lasted a little while that he wanted extra long cuddles or anything like that. now he is the same and sometimes jokes about nursing becuase his little sister does it but usually it is more in a "eww gross, i don't have mommy milk i have big boy milk!" kind of way that he brings it up. 

I also sort of beat myself up about it but I had to do it. I had a really bad pregnancy nursing aversion and I made it about 18 weeks in before I just could not stand it anymore. I think sometimes you just have to do what is right for you because at this point having a miserable and unhealthy mother as a result of nursing is NOT healthy for either of you. Good luck! And congratulations on making it so far  

Lotte134

You've gotten lots of good advice already and I don't really have advice about weaning itself since we haven't yet, but I do have some advice about cutting down sessions which I would say is the first step.

Like others have said try to distract or offer food or drink when he asks during the day.  I found as he got older he would often ask to nurse when he was bored, hungry, or thirsty so those were easy sessions to get rid of.  Definitely don't feel guilty for stopping "don't offer, don't refuse."  While it may be the 'ideal' way to wean it doesn't work for everyone and it's certainly better to have a happy mommy than a touched out, tired, cranky one.  I know I would not be nursing any longer if I didn't start refusing some sessions.

Once you've dropped some daytime sessions I would work on nightweaning if you haven't, and then cut down to only the most important sessions.  For us this was bedtime, morning, and before nap on weekends.  I now refuse when he asks any other times.  We also had DH take over bedtime routine every other night around 14 months so now he doesn't nurse in the evening on DH's nights.  It was rough at first but we stuck with it (we had DH put him to bed every night until he didn't cry anymore with DH which took 3 nights for us and we've alternated ever since).  DS now happily sits with either of us and DH loves his extra cuddle time with DS!

Good luck and keep us updated.  I think I'll probably have to wean at some point so I'm interested to hear how people go about it.

papagena

Do you know why he wants milk?  For DS at the end, it wasn't really the milk, but the checking in/closeness that he was still trying to get.  So, I'd offer cuddles instead of milk.  Also, after he tried once and I didn't have any, I just told him "remember, mama doesn't have any more milk - would you like cuddles?" and he was usually fine with that.   I'd try to replace it with something that takes care of whatever need he's trying to get (may very well be trying to connect, or if it's a drink, etc.) and work on making that very special to him. 

Good luck - we weaned at 2 - he was pretty much done, but hanging on but like you, I was ready!