Huge BF problem w/ 1 year old - weaning or nursing strike???

[Torey]

Hey all,
I haven't posted in forever, but hopefully someone will be able to help me. First of, up until last week DD, who is 13 months old, nursed at least 7-8 times a day (and a few times every night as well). We went to the Dr. for a checkup (last Thurs.) and when we came home she refused to nurse. She has done this once before and it only lasted a day. So anyway, I was able to get her to nurse from a sound sleep a couple times that day. Unfortunately, the next day (Fri.) I was having surgery to repair an umbilical hernia so I was away from her for several hours that morning. When my DH and I returned she still refused to nurse and seemed generally irritable. We decided that she must have an ear infection and took her to the Dr. the next morning (Sat.). The Dr. thought her disinterest in nursing was due to the ear infection and predicted she would be back to nursing as soon as she felt better.

Anyway, I continued to try to offer her the chance to nurse, but she screamed at me when I even showed her a breast. After several days of antibiotics she seems better, but still refuses to nurse (even when drowsy). I had to rent a good breastpump to maintain supply and she will drink maybe a cup of BM a day. Her increase in solid food has gone up 200%. I think she associates BF'ding with ear pain (even though she isn't in pain right now) and I have no idea how to convince her that it won't hurt. At this point she has gone cold turkey - no nursing for an entire week. I have no idea what to do.

Should I continue to try to nurse her, or just let her be weaned? I am sad that our nursing relationship seems to be at an end - especially since she seemed to be a very happy and frequent nursing baby last week. Also, since she doesn't seem interested in regular milk either, so how can I get her to drink milk? Should I buy a breastpump and continue to pump out a cup of milk for her every day? I hope someone with more experience can answer my questions. I know nursing strikes can last up to 2 weeks, but honestly, after 1 week I wonder if she even remembers what it was like to nurse. I'm so confused.

Thanks for reading this very long saga.
Torey

[JulieL]

At nine months for a good month or more DS lost total interest in the breast. It didn't matter what I did, and I did do everything told to me, he was so not interested. So I decided to give up the frustration. When feeding he would literally turn and flip off me. I decided that he decided it was time to wean. That is what I did. It WAS sad, but he was happier. I don't know what you should do in your situation, but kids just often decide it's time all on there own. We mom's are so kept out of the loop!:-) Do what you feel is right. But why fight with her if she seems determined? Hey you can get a new fun bra at Victoria's Secret as a well deserved treat for being so good to your daughter!

[lukkykatt]

My older son quit nursing cold turkey 3 days after his first birthday. Like you, at first I assumed it was a nursing strike and pumped. I gave him the EBM in a sippy cup. For a week or so, I continued to offer him the breast a few times a day. It got to the point where when I would offer, he would look at me like "are you crazy - I already said no!" So that was the end of our nursing relationship.

It is interesting though, because he had a cold when this happened. One morning I had to use a snot sucker on him before I could nurse him. I always wondered if he then associated nursing with that, causing him to refuse. But, we will never know...

This is just my experience. I hope that you will nurse as long as you are both interested. Maybe someone else will have more experience in working through this. BTW, DS did not drink a great deal of milk when he stopped nursing - I think that is fairly common. You can add milk to some foods like cereal, give yogurt and yogurt drinks and keep offering milk as a drink - eventually she will take more.

[Rachels]

Oh, I'm so sorry! I can imagine how sad you must feel. Here's a link that may help:

http://www.kellymom.com/bf/weaning/babyselfwean.html

-Rachel
Mom to Abigail Rose
5/18/02

[jal]

Should I buy a breastpump and continue to pump out a cup of milk for her every day?
I would think that just a cup per day would not be enough to tell your body to keep producing and would therefore dry-up soon.

Given DD's age, she very well may have decided that BF is over. If you think it might only be a strike and you want to keep up your supply in the mean time, I would suggest purchasing one of the hand pumps (so that you're spending <<<$50 compared to >>> $100 for electric) and a box of EBM storage/freezer bags. For the next several days, pump several times a day and build up a cache of EBM in the freezer. The pumping several times per day should insure your supply stays up, and even if it turns out DD has decided its over, you'll at least have a small cache of EBM since she doesn't seem interested in regular milk yet. (Question? Is it ok to attempt to get her used to regular milk by just mixing EBM and regular milk, starting mostly EBM and slowly increasing the percentage of regular milk til you reach the point that she's doing nothing but milk?).

[wendmatt]

I'm so sorry for you if it makes you sad, which it sounds like. I'm also a little envious! I was hoping to nurse about that long and then was hoping dd would self-wean. There are no signs of that happening so I'm stressing about when it's going to happen! Your daughter got a wonderful start in life from you nursing for 13 mths, so if she does not go back to nursing, just be proud of how well you both did.

[Rachels]

WEndy, you might check out Mothering Your Nursing Toddler. It's a great resource for info about nursing an older baby.

-Rachel
Mom to Abigail Rose
5/18/02

[Torey]

I am actually very, very sad. I still have hope that she might change her mind. I couldn't focus on getting her back to nursing too much last week, as I was still recovering from surgery and all she did was throw a fit when I tried to nurse her. I'm thinking of renting the pump for another week in the hopes that maybe we can fix this thing. I also should call a LL leader or something this week. From everything I have read, there doesn't seem to be anyway that this is just weaning. Although what started out as a nursing strike maybe turned into weaning. I don't know. Also, as someone on a different post was saying their baby doesn't drink much liquids, DD really drinks very little too. She has maybe 2-3 wet diapers a day and a couple soiled ones (due to the antibotics she is on). I'm really worried about her fluid intake. When she was nursing it was so much easier to know that she was drinking and eating enough. Now I feel like she doesn't drink nearly enough and can't tell whether she is eating the right things or not (she seems to always be hungry, but is rather picky also).

[Rachels]

Torey, did you see this?

http://www.kellymom.com/bf/concerns/baby/back-to-breast.html


-Rachel
Mom to Abigail Rose
5/18/02

[wendmatt]

Thankyou so much Rachel, I was going to post and ask for a good rec to read about it. At the mo I've decided to just stop worrying and see what happens! I have to stop listening to people who say it's time to stop nursing and I need to stop worrying that I'm the last in baby group (well actually there's another). I'm sure it will happen when she's ready.

[Torey]

Yes Rachel, I read most of it. Thanks for the links - they were great. Unfortunately, it is hard to use most of their suggestions since my DD is so much older than a little baby. I have tried many times to nurse her when she is sound asleep. Unforunately, even having a breast near her face causes her to wake up screaming. At least when she is awake now she doesn't scream at the sight of it. But she doesn't seem at all interested in nursing, and doesn't even seem to want to drink EBM in a cup. She will rarely let me even hold her in our usual nursing position since she associates that with nursing so much. Fortunately, she has been allowing me to rock her to sleep (since we always relied on nursing to go to sleep before). I'm still really hoping that she changes her mind. Maybe a LL leader will have some ideas that I haven't tried. This is so difficult with an older baby - she definitely has a will of her own and cannot be coaxed into anything.