Ladies, seeking advice. I'm taking a two week international trip for work in May. DS will be almost 9 months and stay at home with DH. I am feeling very anxious about leaving him that long. I have a huge freezer stash so I know he will continue to take breast milk but I'm anxious about two things:.1. Will he go back to nursing after two weeks? 2. Is he going to be upset/traumatized because I left him? I'm bound to a bit heartbroken as I'm already worried! Any experiences and/or advice for managing the trip would be appreciated. Cross posted in breastfeeding forum. Thank you
Re: Two week work trip
2 - baby won't be traumatized, I imagine it will be harder on you than baby. I would make sure he gets comfortable with whomever will put him to bed while your gone (DH and I switch off, so I never have any concerns about bedtime when I'm traveling, but I know other moms who do bedtime every night and LO refuses anyone else). Try to minimize the impact to his routine, and he should adjust just fine. Be prepared for long, long, long nursing sessions when you get back (one of the best parts of traveling while breastfeeding, IMO).
My DH was working overseas for a bit when my DS was 8 months... so we flew out there and spent time site-seeing, hanging out etc (DH tacked on a vacation at the end, so we also went on a mediterranean cruise). at that age, the travel was really not that hard (honestly). DS slept most of the way (the airline I was on moved us to the bulkhead and gave us a "bassinet" - basically a basket we could put at our feet for DS to sleep/play etc... in when we were cruising.
Might be worth a thought??
Or not.
I nursed DS until he was two, but the longest I was gone was about 4 days. I pumped and brought all that milk back with me, but I don't see how you could do it for two weeks...
Good luck!