OM
05-06-2007, 15:52
6 days ago was the last time Ozzy breastfed.
My breastfeeding relationship with his has finally come to an end – no longer am I a tandem feeding mama – I am now just a breastfeeding mama of 1.
After 2 years and approx 4 months my boy has decided he is confident enough in himself to not need me as much for security and comfort. I am very proud of him.
Now breastfeeding certainly wasn’t an easy task for me – it was damn hard actually. No one explained to me that a grater scraping down your nipples would have been less painful. I remember the first few weeks just gritting my teeth and wiping away the tears rolling down my cheeks from the pain of Ozzy sucking. It was horrible my breasts were bleeding and incredibly sore. I did overcome that though.
Around 5 months of age Ozzy’s first tooth popped up and oh did he love testing his new fang out on my nipple. At first when he would gnaw on my nipple I used to jump in fright and scream – this only led to me being bitten more from a giggling little baby thinking it was highly hilarious watching his Mama jump around going ‘ooh, the little bugger bit me’! I eventually learnt to not react to his biting and to just calmly grit my teeth, un attach him and then firmly say no and then let him breastfeed again. He grew out of that biting stage – but it certainly was a trying time whilst it was happening.
6 months of age we introduced solid foods. I thought this would stop Ozzy from wanting the breast as much – WRONG!!!! For some reason he decided that he wanted to now feed for one hour every feed with only a break of one hour between feeds, this continued day and night till around 12 months.
Approaching Ozzy’s first birthday began the comments from friends, family and total strangers. ‘Ewwwww, that’s disgusting when are you going to wean your son?’! I was made to feel very embarrassed and a little disgusted in myself by breastfeeding. Sad really isn’t it. It got to a point where I just stopped feeding Ozzy in public as I was frowned on and the comments really hurt. It wasn’t like I was just flopping my breast out and yelling ‘oi kid, the dairy’s open’!
A few months later I fell pregnant with Isla. Everyone seemed to presume that because I was pregnant I was going to wean. How wrong were they – it made me more determined to let Ozzy self wean. When Ozzy was around 18 months I mentioned to my husband the idea of ‘tandem feeding’. He hated the idea and didn’t like the idea at all. He was somewhat in the same opinion as other’s that Ozzy was just getting too old to be breastfed. He however was kind enough to say that he understood though that it was my decision and whatever he said was not going to change my mind. He was right – I didn’t care what he said!
Isla was born and Oscar adjusted into tandem feeding incredibly well. Often he would just wait until Isla had finished her feed then ask for some milk himself.
I am not sure what happened to make Ozzy decide he was a big boy now and didn’t need the milk anymore. Just for humour I thought I would try again and offer him the breast he giggled at me and said ‘no Mummy! And told me to give it to Isla lol! What a champion that boy is!!!!
I can only hope that I have as long of a breastfeeding relationship with Isla:yes:
My breastfeeding relationship with his has finally come to an end – no longer am I a tandem feeding mama – I am now just a breastfeeding mama of 1.
After 2 years and approx 4 months my boy has decided he is confident enough in himself to not need me as much for security and comfort. I am very proud of him.
Now breastfeeding certainly wasn’t an easy task for me – it was damn hard actually. No one explained to me that a grater scraping down your nipples would have been less painful. I remember the first few weeks just gritting my teeth and wiping away the tears rolling down my cheeks from the pain of Ozzy sucking. It was horrible my breasts were bleeding and incredibly sore. I did overcome that though.
Around 5 months of age Ozzy’s first tooth popped up and oh did he love testing his new fang out on my nipple. At first when he would gnaw on my nipple I used to jump in fright and scream – this only led to me being bitten more from a giggling little baby thinking it was highly hilarious watching his Mama jump around going ‘ooh, the little bugger bit me’! I eventually learnt to not react to his biting and to just calmly grit my teeth, un attach him and then firmly say no and then let him breastfeed again. He grew out of that biting stage – but it certainly was a trying time whilst it was happening.
6 months of age we introduced solid foods. I thought this would stop Ozzy from wanting the breast as much – WRONG!!!! For some reason he decided that he wanted to now feed for one hour every feed with only a break of one hour between feeds, this continued day and night till around 12 months.
Approaching Ozzy’s first birthday began the comments from friends, family and total strangers. ‘Ewwwww, that’s disgusting when are you going to wean your son?’! I was made to feel very embarrassed and a little disgusted in myself by breastfeeding. Sad really isn’t it. It got to a point where I just stopped feeding Ozzy in public as I was frowned on and the comments really hurt. It wasn’t like I was just flopping my breast out and yelling ‘oi kid, the dairy’s open’!
A few months later I fell pregnant with Isla. Everyone seemed to presume that because I was pregnant I was going to wean. How wrong were they – it made me more determined to let Ozzy self wean. When Ozzy was around 18 months I mentioned to my husband the idea of ‘tandem feeding’. He hated the idea and didn’t like the idea at all. He was somewhat in the same opinion as other’s that Ozzy was just getting too old to be breastfed. He however was kind enough to say that he understood though that it was my decision and whatever he said was not going to change my mind. He was right – I didn’t care what he said!
Isla was born and Oscar adjusted into tandem feeding incredibly well. Often he would just wait until Isla had finished her feed then ask for some milk himself.
I am not sure what happened to make Ozzy decide he was a big boy now and didn’t need the milk anymore. Just for humour I thought I would try again and offer him the breast he giggled at me and said ‘no Mummy! And told me to give it to Isla lol! What a champion that boy is!!!!
I can only hope that I have as long of a breastfeeding relationship with Isla:yes: