The benefits of giving up breast feeding

On Monday it was 20 months, 27 days and approximately 6 hours since I started breast feeding BB. Today it’s 5 days and approximately 18 hours since I stopped. It already seems like a lifetime ago.

For her, I think it really is. After joining the library and taking out a book only to be read at bedtime – previously her longest feed of the day – and buying a Special Cup from which milk is only to be drunk at story time, just a week in she has already stopped asking for my milk and started asking for her book and cup instead.

I never dreamed it would be this easy. To be honest, I’m even a tiny bit disappointed it has been this easy. But there are also upsides I hadn’t considered.

1) We have gained a good two extra hours in the day time.

Mammaries are made of this

An Ode to BB

It’s been 21 months since you first latched on

I can hardly believe how big you’ve become.

For the first six months you drank my milk alone

Sucking and slurping you were right at home.

♦

There was so much milk it would roll down your chin

And collect in your neck in the folds of your skin.

Daddy used to say we could open a factory for cheese

Because by bath time it had congealed and resembled a nasty disease.

The last supper

So that’s it. After 20 months, 27 days and approximately 6 hours, last night BB had her last ever breast feed.

As of bed time this evening, Misery Guts will offer her cow’s milk from a Special Cup instead. I won’t be there – I shall make myself scarce – because mummy = booby. It’s not days one or two that worry me, it’s on day three plus that I suspect things will get tricky. But we shall see.

The last week, in which we cut out day time feeds completely, couldn’t have gone any better. By day four she was asking for milk pretty much on the hour, but was easily diverted, and while there were a few tears, these quickly dried up if orange juice was on offer instead.

Silent Sunday: May 12, 2013

It’s a good job men don’t have to give birth

Misery Guts has sprained his ankle. And don’t we all know it. He fell off a curb while running, and had to be brought home hobbling by his fitness instructor. To be fair it has swollen up to the size of a balloon, but I’m not sure all the grunting and groaning is really necessary.

I likened the noise coming out of him last night to the sort of sound emitted when a baby’s head is crowning. He looked at me blankly. ‘What’s crowning?” he asked. If you have to ask…

So that’s me on Everything Duty this weekend. He can’t even stand upright. He did manage to make himself a cucumber gin and tonic with capers by himself last night though. Funny that.

It’s no use crying over spilt milk

Who thought giving up breast feeding would be so hard? Not me. I thought, if you let things roll, that babies just ‘gave up’ or grew out of it of their own accord. Silly me. I don’t think BB will ever grow out of it if left to her own devices.

So after two days in which no breast milk was consumed owing to the fact Misery Guts and I were away, giving up breast feeding has (once again) started in earnest.

Having read absolutely nothing on the matter or furnished myself with any kind advice, in a bid to avoid the dreaded mastitis or engorgement we’re going for a week of bed time feeds only, followed by a week of dropping those too. Is this the right way to go about it? Is this approach too hasty? Will it work? I haven’t the faintest.

I’ve got the whole world in my hands

So you may (or may not) be surprised to hear we made it back from Scotland unscathed. I say unscathed – we were both nursing the kind of hangovers we haven’t had since BBB (before BB) – but apart from that we managed to make it home in one piece.

And you may (or may not) be surprised to hear that two whole days and nights away from BB weren’t that bad after all. Walks one would never entertain with a pushchair, tops one would never wear while breast feeding, afternoon naps, leisurely baths before going out to dinner, sipping numerous wines and spirits into the wee hours without being under the glare of the baby monitor: I could get quite used to it.