There are about a million reasons why I no longer breastfeed my child. One is he has some killer teeth. Secondly, I stopped at 14 months for breast feeding became difficult to pump at work, no privacy and not enough time. These work challenges were coupled with the supply and demand of my son’s milk needs, basicly I was unable meet the demand. I mourned the loss of what was a morning and evening ritual of quiet then sleep. I then started to enjoy the freedom of having my breasts back, not waking every few hours to nurse and not having to deal with finding a room to pump .
I recall (and I have shared this story with Jessica) once being at a new mom meet up. This was when my son was only a a few months old. This one mom asked me how long I planned to breast-feed my son, at the time my goal was a year. My sister was battling breast cancer and this was the time I worked out with my doctor, I did not share my doctor’s demands with this mother. It was really not her business why I was planning to stop at a year. She (fellow mother) coldly replied back to me she intended to breast- feed for at a least two years and ended our conversation. Ouch. Feed your kid for as long as you like, that is your business, but why judge? Some of my friends think its nuts my son still sleeps in our bed, is this attachment parenting? Yes, I suppose however I was raised in a similar fashion and it works for us. This cover story from TIME is going to fire up some intense conversations on the parent boards. Will it be positive? I hope so, I hope we can all start respecting our parenting methods and realize that as cliche as it sound we our all in this together.
Photo Martin Schoeller via Time