A Cup of Milk

Brothers!

Around the time my firstborn turned one, the whispers started.

Every mom who has chosen to breastfeed, especially if she’s succeeded in avoiding formula for any length of time, is familiar with those whispers. When are you going to wean? Why don’t you let me give him a bottle? You’re spoiling him. You’re going to be breastfeeding him to sleep in college.

Those reasons start much earlier than a year, of course, for many moms. Some start hearing them when baby is a few months or even weeks old. I, however, made it clear from the get-go that breastfeeding was the way for me, and I wasn’t interested in any encouragement to switch to formula.

That, and I chose my friends carefully. A good support network is a big part of breastfeeding success, after all.

Anyway, I pointedly ignored those whispers. I steadfastly remained on the course of self-weaning, and my son nursed until he was four. Shortly after that birthday, he finally stopped asking to nurse at bedtime. It was bittersweet, but the time was right for both of us.

A few months later, I got pregnant again.

It was planned. But still, I only got to enjoy a few months of having my body completely myself before a baby took up residence in my womb, and I only had about a year before the breastfeeding grind began anew.

My older son, of course, still remembered breastfeeding. And while he understood that my body wasn’t producing milk for him anymore, he was very curious about my plans to nurse our new baby. It wasn’t long before he asked if he would be able to start nursing again, too.

If I had milk again, he reasoned, why not? He loved mommy milk. He wanted his baby brother or sister to share!

The first time he asked, I smiled fondly and told him that my body would be making milk for baby, and that I wouldn’t have enough to share. (This was a lie; I knew I’d likely overproduce at first.) When he asked again in the future--and he asked frequently--I offered other excuses. Baby would need it all (also a lie). He’d gone for so long without nursing that he probably wouldn’t remember how (possibly true, but I was uninterested in testing the theory). He was “too old” for mommy milk (most people in the US would say truth, but other cultures might disagree).

I avoided the real reasons why I did not want my older boy to start nursing again. I was not interested in tandem nursing two children so far apart in age (truth). I did not want to maintain an oversupply (truth). Water was a perfectly healthy beverage for him (truth). And, after a year of not nursing him, I was admittedly a little uncomfortable at the idea of nursing a five-year-old (truth--but props to the full-term breastfeeding mamas out there who nurse to five or beyond!).

I managed to deflect my son well enough early on that the questions stopped coming for awhile. But once I received my breast pump--a month or so before the baby’s birth--the issue came back. My son was intrigued by the pump, fascinated that a machine could extract mommy milk so that baby could drink it when I wasn’t there to feed him directly. He understood bottles in theory, of course, but I never used bottles with him; he always drank straight from the source, as it were.

After a few more rounds of questions and deflections, I finally hit upon a new idea. I had a pump. I could pump milk. I could put pumped milk in a bottle… or a cup.

So I told my son that sometime after the baby was born, perhaps I would give him some of my pumped milk to drink in a cup. Deflection: successful.

My husband, when he heard this conversation, was mildly horrified I think, although he’s used to me and my crunchy ways and he did his best to go with it. He simply inserted himself into our discussion to make sure our son knew that first, this--the sharing of mommy milk--would not be a regular occurrence, and second, it’d likely only happen at home. Two points I wholeheartedly agreed with.

I may be a bit on the natural side, but as I mentioned before, I was not particularly keen on getting my older boy hooked on “the good stuff” again. That was a phase of his life that was over, and I really wanted it to stay over. One nursling at a time for me, thank you very much.

Liquid gold

And then baby came. I pumped almost exclusively at first, as baby had to stay in the hospital for awhile after birth. And it wasn’t long before the question came. He asked me if he could have some mommy milk.

I put him off at first. I told him I needed to save every drop for the baby, who was still in the NICU and needed milk to grow. But eventually, I gave in. After one pumping session, I emptied one of the bottles into a bag to freeze and later take to the hospital. And I emptied the other bottle into his blue cup, which I offered to my then-five-year-old.

He took a sip, grinned at me, and said “Mmmmm!” Then he put it down and scampered off to play with his grandma.

He never came back for the rest of the milk in that cup.

Look at that freezer stash!

It was with a sad smile that I eventually dumped those five or so ounces down the drain. After all the questions, all the haranguing, after the insistence that he still loved mommy milk and wanted to share in his little brother’s bounty, it turns out that my big boy just wasn’t that interested anymore. For a preschooler, mommy milk just couldn’t compare with the other adventures that life holds.

*****

I know a lot of women do genuinely worry that their babies will never want to wean. They worry that baby will be nursing forever. They believe that they’ll eventually have to force the issue. Sooner or later, we’ll just have to start saying no. Right? Our babies will surely never say no on their own.

I understand that self-weaning isn’t for everyone. Some women have to wean because of life circumstances. It might be because of a job, or because of an illness, or perhaps because of a custody situation. Others choose to wean at a certain age for reasons that may be more or less defined. They’re not enjoying breastfeeding. They’re ready to be done.

No one needs to define those reasons if they don’t want to. Breastfeeding is a relationship between mommy and baby, and it has to work for both parties. And if it’s not working, well, you don’t need to justify your decision.

That being said, don’t ever let anyone tell you that your child will never wean.

My new baby recently turned one, and I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before the whispers start again. And when they do, I can pull out this story of my older son and our journey to self-weaning. I can’t speak for every baby, of course, but self-weaning turned out just fine for us the first time around. I have no doubt this baby will eventually wean on his own, too.

My older son never did ask what happened to his cup of mommy milk. He never missed it when it disappeared. And he never asked again about sharing.