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I know moms whose kids self-weaned between 12 and 24 months. I also know that the longer you wait, the harder it is to wean older children. My 17-month-old and I both enjoy breastfeeding, but I worry that every month I continue, I’m making it harder for us to stop it in the future. I really hope he’ll self-wean naturally; is there any data on this? If he doesn’t, what can I do to make weaning easier, especially since he refuses to drink cow milk?
—The Breast Worrier
I appreciate this question, because my sense is that we think — as a society — quite a lot about early breastfeeding and not nearly so much about the later parts. This wonderful article is a qualitative report: interviews with 66 women about their breastfeeding experiences, many of them well past a year. They talk about the complicated feelings around the social acceptability (or not) of nursing an older child, and also about questions of continuing versus ending.
Ending a breastfeeding relationship with an older child may be quite different than with a younger one. We do not have any good data on this — on how often kids quit on their own, on when they do it, or about how to make it easier.
There are a couple of things we do know.
- First, extended breastfeeding is completely fine if it works for you (and your child). Globally, breastfeeding until 2 and beyond is common. I know there is often pressure to quit nursing an older child, but again, if it works for you, there is no reason to stop.
- Second, there is no particular reason to force the drinking of cow’s milk even once you quit nursing. Your child needs calcium, but they can get that from other dairy (cheese, yogurt, ice cream) as well as non-dairy sources.
But back to your original, broader question. Changing a breastfeeding relationship with an older child is likely to be somewhat different from that with a younger child. In some cases, kids just gradually lose interest – they nurse less and less, and then one day not at all. In other cases, though, you may be ready to stop before your child is.
If this is the case, you can approach this as you would with any other change – moving to a new room, enforcing a new sleep routine, etc. That is: decide when you are going to change this, tell your child (in an age-appropriate way) that the change is coming, and then implement it consistently.
Like all changes, this may be hard. If your child really doesn’t want to stop nursing, there may be tears. It’s worth thinking about the logistics – habit formation is real, so sometimes simply changing up the routine, or mom being away during the normal moments of breastfeeding, can help. Distractions can work wonders – there’s no milk right now, but how about we play a game?
I cannot tell you what approach will work for you – one friend finally resorted to rubbing her breasts with garlic, which was enough to get her toddler to throw in the towel. What I can say is that this will go better if you plan it out, since that will help you be consistent. And toddlers are not known for their long memories; new habits can usually be formed in just a few days. Those days may not be amazing, but they will end.
For now, though, you don’t need any of this since you don’t have a problem! Everything is good, keep doing what you are doing, and save the worries for when you need them.
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