Day One | My Arvada Breastfeeding Journey

Sarah and my beginning has been shared before on the blog here. But as with every journey, it has continued. See, she will be three this month and we are quickly coming to the end of our breastfeeding journey together.

Our story hasn’t had too many trials, for which I am thankful. I have loved so much of this journey with her. But weaning, or even wanting to wean, is a bittersweet struggle. I had always planned to wean when she turned one. Like many others, I believed that her birthday would be the magic time she would no longer need or want to nurse.

Boy was I wrong. Her birthday came and went and she was still the same dependent boob monster (I do say this lovingly) she was before her birthday. Quickly, I made the decision to continue until she was two. It is what is best (and recommended) after all. So, on we went. Unfortunately, too many people developed the need to communicate their opinion.

“When are you going to wean?”

“She should be eating real food (she was).”

“She’s too old for that.”

“Aren’t you sick of that?”

All the while more people started to want to shame me into not nursing near so-and-so or at blank place. Now, I am a strong-willed, determined mother; so, while these comments and questions got to me, and irritated me we kept going – wherever she wanted. This worked for us.

But then something happened: she turned two. Now we were on shaky ground. I couldn’t hide behind my own conviction or the WHO’s recommendation anymore. She was two…. What now? She was still just as attached to me and definitely still as needy – especially at night. Well, after a lot of self-thought and arguments with those closer to me, we continued.

I will say, I did start to give her boundaries soon after her birthday so she wasn’t attached to the boob ALL day. We used small measures to do this. Mostly distracting her with food, water or play. But this worked well for her and further for us. Sure, we had boundaries and I no longer felt like I had to give it to her simply because she asked but we still nursed – often.

Then, a terrifying miracle happened: we got pregnant. This is only terrifying because I am high risk for preterm labor, but that is another story. With my known complications, I had good reason to believe that my doctors were going to tell me to stop with urgency.

The decision was going to be taken from me and I was going to have to accept it. I must say that this was a sad, disheartening event for me. Sure, I knew we weren’t going to nurse forever, and I am beyond excited for our new addition; but knowing I had to stop right now brought on so many melancholy feelings I didn’t quite know what to do.

Alas, we started to wean – for real this time. To make the process more manageable, I decided I would day wean and only let her breastfeed at night. Mostly this still included a lot of distraction and talking to her to explain that we needed to wait for bedtime. I am not going to lie and say she didn’t throw a lot of fits but she did at least understand what I was saying and would even try to convince me of how much she needed “up boobies.”

As it turned out, my doctors were not too concerned with my breastfeeding. But then, I started to pass kidney stones and due to pain medication not managing my pain, I needed to be hospitalized for 5 days (not fun). Everyone thought this would be the perfect time to cut her off. Woefully I agreed.

That was until I got home. Sarah had missed her mommy and did not understand any of what was going on. I tried to keep my decision to wean her but by day three both of our emotions got the best of me and I gave in.

Back to sleep nursing we went. She had been sleeping through the night fine, so it was only the once. I was happy with this. We had our bond and I wasn’t hurting anything. This was perfect, until I needed some intervention to help keep our new baby growing in my belly. The doctors finally said I had to be done; that night.

After the procedure (the next day), I knew it was the right thing to stop. I want this baby so much – and that is much more important than keeping one little nursing session. The problem is that I feel so terrible taking this away from her. So much of her little life is changing with this baby and breastfeeding is one of her favorite things I am just cutting off.

Again, after much deliberation and research, I have made the decision to continue the one nursing session per night. She only nurses for 5-10 minutes per night and either falls asleep or switches to water. So far, this has worked for everyone involved – including the doctors.

We will see when we finally call it quits. All I know is that I do not want to tandem nurse so the end is approaching – quickly. She hasn’t asked for it in two days – so maybe we are there already. Only time will tell. All I know is that I am pleased to know that I made it so far with her and could be so many things to my daughter with the simple decision to breastfeed.

How do you feel about weaning? Share your thoughts in the comments. Be sure to come back and read Kim’s Journey tomorrow.

If you would like to share your own story please contact me and we can plan the perfect session for your post.