Yes, ladies and gentlemen... my almost 4 years old boy finally weaned from breastfeeding.
Yes, you read that right. Almost 4 years old. He's 46 months old now in case you are wondering. 2 months shy to being a 4 years old kiddo.
What do I feel? Oh well... it took me sometime to acknowledge this is happening. Correction, that this has happened.
It took me some time to write this down that I have weaned my first child.
I feel sad of course, Benjamin is my first child, the one who started our breastfeeding journey. One of the reasons I quit my IT job is to breastfeed him for at least 6 months and then decided to continue once I became a SAHM.
The ups and downs (well, honestly, mostly ups!), I direct latched him and demand fed him and he nursed through my pregnancy. Yes, nursed THROUGHOUT my 2nd pregnancy.
I cannot forget how disgusted I felt, how I was mad and angry at him for wanting to nurse when we brought Alyson back home from hospital. I don't understand why just months before giving birth to my 2nd child, I was so eager and anticipating a tandem nursing journey and the moment Alyson was born, I never imagined I could feel the complete opposite.
That I hated Benjamin for still wanting to nurse. That he's stealing all of mummy's milk and starving his baby sister.
I don't know why I have all the hatred and disgusted feelings until I researched more and finally acknowledging that I have nursing aversion and that I am struggling and trying to cope with tandem nursing..
And the moment I acknowledged that, I felt a burden lifted off my shoulders and realised all the hatred and disgust were just in my head. My poor boy doesn't know what he did wrong to have mummy being so angry at him everytime he asked for his feed.
I thank God it only took me 1 month to get over my nursing aversion (I read online a lot of tandem nursing mothers takes months, some more than a year to get over the aversion)
So, since then, Benjamin, Alyson and I continued on our tandem nursing journey.
Me tandem nursing Ben at 3 years old and Alyson at 6 months old...
I have always stressed to anyone asking me on weaning my boy that I am practising the 'Don't offer, don't refuse' method.
Meaning, I do not offer my child their feed. But if they ask for it, I will not refuse it either. It has been that way and everything is fine and dandy.
I do not believe in stopping the feeding just because I am pregnant or just because my child gets past 1 year, 2 years, 3 years and so on.
I do not believe that nursing beyond toddlerhood means the child is going to go on forever and ever.
I do not believe in all those crap.
I believe in letting my child decides when to stop.
I believe that when they are older enough, they know when to stop.
And so we come back to my post today...
My boy has finally weaned at 45 months old.
I teared when I think of him no longer needing to suckle from mummy.
I teared when I remember back our breastfeeding journey.
How I could easily comfort his pain, fears, discomforts, fuss, crankiness with my breastmilk...
How my boy falls asleep after nursing from mummy...
All by breastmilk. And no formula at all in the house since we brought him home back from hospital in March 2009.
But I tell myself this also means my boy is growing up and moving on to other exciting milestones! So yes, this full-time mummy has got to learn to let go...
Oh heck... typing this post makes me tear up too...
I just want to write this down so that Benjamin knows mummy truly cherished our breastfeeding journey together and that nothing will change any of this. We still move on with our life and continue enjoying our bonding and mummy hopes that he will understand and appreciate what we have been through.
Picture taken of Benjamin nursing at 43 months old...
