BREAST FEEDING A 3 YEAR OLD !

El_Dangeroso · 12-05-2012 10:04pm

grindle wrote: »

I think Dudess meant it more as a work/home life convenience deficiency? Could be wrong though.

Nah, it's just as convenient to feed the infant the same food as the family eats. Why would those women bother to breastfeed for so much longer?

flutterflye wrote: »

But at 3+, it's just weird.

Ok, so most of the world people of the world do this, if you take the definition of weird to mean unconventional, then it is the western world that is weird.

grindle · 12-05-2012 10:15pm

El_Dangeroso wrote: »

Nah, it's just as convenient to feed the infant the same food as the family eats. Why would those women bother to breastfeed for so much longer?

Lack of a snobbish "civilised" culture that demonises our animal-instinct roots, I'd imagine.
It also makes more sense for a mother to deal with her own cravings (which will include her child's if breastfeeding) than second-guessing for the infant, which may or may not lead to wasted food.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 10:15pm

El_Dangeroso wrote: »

Ok, so most of the world people of the world do this, if you take the definition of weird to mean unconventional, then it is the western world that is weird.

Well yes, seeing as that's where we live, and where our 3 year old's live and where they have to conform to some extent in order to be accepted and so on - your point is what exactly?
Our western world is very 'weird' in so, so many ways - it isn't really relevant to bring up the rest of the world seeing as we don't live there and we are not talking about there.

Cork24 · 12-05-2012 10:17pm

Got milk

grindle · 12-05-2012 10:18pm

flutterflye wrote: »

Our western world is very 'weird' in so, so many ways - it isn't really relevant to bring up the rest of the world seeing as we don't live there and we are not talking about there.

It's very relevant because this is a biological choice that should supersede cultural affectations.

lynski · 12-05-2012 10:22pm

Greentopia wrote: »

I don't see any problem in mothers breast feeding kids up to 3 or 4 if that's what the mother and child wants. And I don't feel mothers should have to be 'discrete' about breast feeding in public either as if there's something to be ashamed or embarrassed about.
I don't mean stripping off topless like(!) but I don't see the need to cover up breasts when it's obvious there's a baby being fed.

well my 15mth old does not need nursing more then twice per day, morning and night, so a lunchtime nurse for a 4yr old is not even an issue.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 10:25pm

grindle wrote: »

It very relevant because this is a biological choice that should supersede cultural affectations.

Cultural and societal norms are important for a child's social inclusion though.
I would 100% agree that it should supersede these affectations for newborns to one or two years of age.
But for a three year old in our society in our time, I do not agree at all.

grindle · 12-05-2012 10:35pm

flutterflye wrote: »

Cultural and societal norms are important for a child's social inclusion though.

Would it not be better for a society to become less ignorant of their own physical needs, rather than demand that a child's most appropriate food be taken away because most of us think it's icky?

Paparazzo · 12-05-2012 10:37pm

I remember a story the nurse in antenatal class said.
Someone was brest feeding a 3 year old. She said: "isn't he a bit old to be breastfed?". The kid turned around and said "fuck off" before returing back to the nipple.

up for anything · 12-05-2012 10:45pm

flutterflye wrote: »

Breast is best and so on blah blah blah.
But at 3+, it's just weird.
I don't think it's weird due to sexualisation etc...
Just that the child simply does not need it, has a full set of teeth, can use a cup on it's own and is gaining independence and so on.
It can walk over to it's mother, ask for milk in a full sentence using please and thank you, pull down her top himself, suck away, and put the top back up.
Then there's the importance of socialising and social norms at that age for understanding the world, the self, and making friends and so on.
Especially at 4+ and the child is in school.

It's not all about the milk and sustenance. There are other hugely important elements such as comfort, closeness, skin contact, tactility and the wonderful feelings that it engenders that I can't find words to describe. If it had just all been about the food I would have given up on loads of occasions and shoved a bottle in their gobs.

Johro · 12-05-2012 10:47pm

Cork24 wrote: »

Got milk

Will travel.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 10:51pm

up for anything wrote: »

It's not all about the milk and sustenance. There are other hugely important elements such as comfort, closeness, skin contact, tactility and the wonderful feelings that it engenders that I can't find words to describe. If it had just all been about the food I would have given up on loads of occasions and shoved a bottle in their gobs.

I hated breastfeeding!!!
I breastfed my first for a while.
Didn't try at all the second time, and I'm much more bonded with my second child.
That's all just bull to me in fairness.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 10:52pm

grindle wrote: »

Would it not be better for a society to become less ignorant of their own physical needs, rather than demand that a child's most appropriate food be taken away because most of us think it's icky?

What?
What physical needs?
And I don't think it's 'icky'.

lynski · 12-05-2012 10:54pm

up for anything wrote: »

It's not all about the milk and sustenance. There are other hugely important elements such as comfort, closeness, skin contact, tactility and the wonderful feelings that it engenders that I can't find words to describe. If it had just all been about the food I would have given up on loads of occasions and shoved a bottle in their gobs.

I was delighted when my then 2.5yr old decided she wanted to 'baby milk' too, she has an occasional nurse, 2/3 times some weeks and could go 2/3 weeks between 'baby milk' drinks. but knowing she is getting the immune boost, and the other ingredients that are so good for her, as well as the best source of iron for a small child.
My 15mth old son cant take formula, he has a reaction, and cows milk seems to give him some tummy probs, so 'extended nursing' here i come.

up for anything · 12-05-2012 10:59pm

flutterflye wrote: »

I hated breastfeeding!!!
I breastfed my first for a while.
Didn't try at all the second time, and I'm much more bonded with my second child.
That's all just bull to me in fairness.

Fair enough - bull to you but not to lots of other people. If you hated it it doesn't mean that everybody else does and just because I loved it doesn't mean that everybody else has to love it or even like it. Why did you hate it so much? People usually hate the idea of it which is fair enough or else have bad advice early on leading to problems which leads them to dislike it.

lynski · 12-05-2012 11:06pm

flutterflye wrote: »

I hated breastfeeding!!!
I breastfed my first for a while.
Didn't try at all the second time, and I'm much more bonded with my second child.
That's all just bull to me in fairness.

what is bull? because there is reams and reams of evidence show the benefits etc.
The bonding is purely individual so breastfeeding might or might not increase that.
You can't dismiss breastfeeding benefits as bull because you had one bad experience.

grindle · 12-05-2012 11:12pm

flutterflye wrote: »

What?
What physical needs?
And I don't think it's 'icky'.

Baby formula is ALWAYS the same and doesn't contain the hormones and antibodies needed to grow as naturally and as free of infection as possible, building immunities that the mother has also built up, and building upon thousands of years of biological evolution.
Breast milk does.
It's like comparing the pink sludge used to make turkey twizzlers vs free range turkey.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 11:14pm

up for anything wrote: »

Fair enough - bull to you but not to lots of other people. If you hated it it doesn't mean that everybody else does and just because I loved it doesn't mean that everybody else has to love it or even like it. Why did you hate it so much? People usually hate the idea of it which is fair enough or else have bad advice early on leading to problems which leads them to dislike it.

It hurt, and just the feeling in general wasn't nice - it was a horrible feeling when I could feel the warm milk moving through my boobs, and then there was the suckling on my nipples.
I did it because I thought it was best, but I felt uncomfortable each time.
Didn't get the bonding experience at all.
I meant it's bull that that always happens is all.
And it would be just plain stupid to be against breastfeeding in general, or think it was weird or find it unacceptable and so on.
I am purely talking about extended feeding - I don't think there is any reason strong enough to warrant it personally.
It's unnecessary and just weird imo.

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 11:17pm

grindle wrote: »

Baby formula is ALWAYS the same and doesn't contain the hormones and antibodies needed to grow as naturally and as free of infection as possible, building immunities that the mother has also built up, and building upon thousands of years of biological evolution.
Breast milk does.
It's like comparing the pink sludge used to make turkey twizzlers vs free range turkey.

Yeah, I don't know why you keep directing your responses to me.
It's as if you think I think something that I don't.

grindle · 12-05-2012 11:21pm

flutterflye wrote: »

Yeah, I don't know why you keep directing your responses to me.
It's as if you think I think something that I don't.

You... Responded... To me?
"What physical needs?", you said, quoting me...
Unless you thought I meant the whole physical-closeness some seem to like. I didn't.
Soooo....

*tumbleweed*

flutterflye · 12-05-2012 11:22pm

grindle wrote: »

You... Responded... To me?
"What physical needs?", you said, quoting me...
Unless you thought I meant the whole physical-closeness some seem to like. I didn't.
Soooo....

*tumbleweed*

I was responding to you responding to me!

*a parade of neo nazi tumbleweed*

grindle · 12-05-2012 11:36pm

flutterflye wrote: »

I was responding to you responding to me!

*a parade of neo nazi tumbleweed*

Well, the first was due to you saying society's mores should take precedence.
I have a limit too, I think at around 4, just because science hasn't shown any biological positives past that age.
I don't get the need for some mothers to feed after that, it's almost like a pre-emptive nostalgia for young motherhood.
I also hold nothing against women who stop at 6 months, it's just a fact that that is less natural than stopping around the 2-3 range, so people shouldn't be giving shiit to this woman on Time's cover, or others like her, until they selfishly force the feeding past the natural stage.

Cork24 · 13-05-2012 1:00am

Johro wrote: »

Cork24 wrote: »

Got milk

Will travel.

How much a ltr

heathersonline · 13-05-2012 1:49am

grindle wrote: »

It's like comparing the pink sludge used to make turkey twizzlers vs free range turkey.

Mmm turkey twizzlers

grindle · 13-05-2012 2:36am

heathersonline wrote: »

Mmm turkey twizzlers

I know, right??? Who the fuuck cares about free-range?

Free-range MSG, for sure, but turkeys?

Nawwww.

Spread · 13-05-2012 2:53am

Can't see what the problem is ........... unless the husband/lover/father/girlfriend gets jealous and goes postal. Had a dream last night that Kim Kardashian was breast-feeding me .......... tasted like Bailey's ........nom nom nom burp!

Dudess · 13-05-2012 1:07pm

Meh, trying to find prejudice where there isn't any is boring. Breastfeeding of a child past toddler stage in non western societies isn't wrong but it's a very different culture. Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

hondasam · 13-05-2012 1:23pm

Dudess wrote: »

Meh, trying to find prejudice where there isn't any is boring. Breastfeeding of a child past toddler stage in non western societies isn't wrong but it's a very different culture. Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

I would say 10 mths/1yr same as bottle fed babies but everyone is different. No one will have the same opinion.
Personally I would not be happy breastfeeding a child over this age or close to it anyway.

iguana · 13-05-2012 2:00pm

Dudess wrote: »

Meh, trying to find prejudice where there isn't any is boring. Breastfeeding of a child past toddler stage in non western societies isn't wrong but it's a very different culture. Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

The World Health Organisation recommends exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months followed by another 18 months of supplementary feeds, slowly increasing solid food and reducing breastmilk until age two.

I'd like to follow this advice if possible but I'm hoping to feed from the breast until about 11 months-ish wean from the breast at that point but continue to express milk that the baby can drink from a cup or in it's cereal, etc. I want to do this because I am squeamish about the child growing up to remember sucking from my breast. I accept that this may not be something that causes future sexual issues but I'd prefer not to just in case. Also I'd ideally like to be pregnant again around this stage and I was so very sick for the start of this pregnancy that there is no way I'd have been able to breastfeed a baby/toddler in that state. A lot of days I wouldn't have been able to care for a child and was very lucky not to have been hospitalised on a couple of occasions. If that happens again I'd rather the child be used to drinking expressed milk and being fed by my husband or a family member and not be upset at not being fed by me.

grindle · 13-05-2012 2:24pm

Dudess wrote: »

Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

grindle wrote: »

I have a limit too, I think at around 4...

Note that the WHO's* recommendations are a suggestion towards an ideal minimum, but compared to the way most Irish talk, it's a doubling, maybe a quadrupling, of what they find tasteful.
How people can't separate pithy cultural values and biological ideals is ultimately, about babies, so who cares? a great mystery to me.

*<insert Pete Townshend joke>

Karpops · 13-05-2012 8:03pm

iguana wrote: »

The World Health Organisation recommends exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months followed by another 18 months of supplementary feeds, slowly increasing solid food and reducing breastmilk until age two.

I'd like to follow this advice if possible but I'm hoping to feed from the breast until about 11 months-ish wean from the breast at that point but continue to express milk that the baby can drink from a cup or in it's cereal, etc. I want to do this because I am squeamish about the child growing up to remember sucking from my breast. I accept that this may not be something that causes future sexual issues but I'd prefer not to just in case. Also I'd ideally like to be pregnant again around this stage and I was so very sick for the start of this pregnancy that there is no way I'd have been able to breastfeed a baby/toddler in that state. A lot of days I wouldn't have been able to care for a child and was very lucky not to have been hospitalised on a couple of occasions. If that happens again I'd rather the child be used to drinking expressed milk and being fed by my husband or a family member and not be upset at not being fed by me.

THANK YOU. I have no issue with breastfeeding but I really do think there should be a cut off point when the child is around two-three years old. I'm in my twenties and I can clearly remember a lot of my childhood from when I was four/five, and I think I'd feel fairly sickened at the thought of remembering sucking my moms boobs at that age.

forfuxsake · 13-05-2012 8:12pm

Karpops wrote: »

THANK YOU. I have no issue with breastfeeding but I really do think there should be a cut off point when the child is around two-three years old. I'm in my twenties and I can clearly remember a lot of my childhood from when I was four/five, and I think I'd feel fairly sickened at the thought of remembering sucking my moms boobs at that age.

You wouldn't though. This is not hoe memory functions. We are programmed to remember important events or things that stand out. You may remember your first day at school but you are much less likely to remember your fourth or your 53rd (unless something extraordinary happened those days.) You would be highly unlikely aged 4 to have a memory of eating any more than going to the toilet. Unless for some reason it was extraordinary.(for example - you got chocolate milk from your mum's breast).

Zulu · 13-05-2012 8:21pm

forfuxsake wrote: »

(for example - you got chocolate milk from your mum's breast).

Sure that, or something more realistic, like if some event happened while breast feeding.

El_Dangeroso · 13-05-2012 8:28pm

Jeez, I was breastfed until about 3 and a half, I'm almost 30 now and I vaguely remember being breast-fed, big f-ing woop! I also remember playing on swings, watching bosco and a lot of things that I don't do as an adult.

I don't see why people find it weird at all, get over yer Victorian prudishness seriously! This is how things have always been before we started eating out of cardboard boxes.

People raise eyebrows when they see a three year old breastfeeding but not when they see a three year old eating jelly tots, get some perspective ffs!

Dudess · 13-05-2012 8:37pm

El_Dangeroso wrote: »

Jeez, I was breastfed until about 3 and a half, I'm almost 30 now and I vaguely remember being breast-fed, big f-ing woop! I also remember playing on swings, watching bosco and a lot of things that I don't do as an adult.

I don't see why people find it weird at all, get over yer Victorian prudishness seriously! This is how things have always been before we started eating out of cardboard boxes.

People raise eyebrows when they see a three year old breastfeeding but not when they see a three year old eating jelly tots, get some perspective ffs!

It's not prudishness. At all. Where did any non Breastapo heads indicate they think it's grand for a three-year-old to be eating Jelly Tots btw? Oh yeah, they didn't. Not that there's any harm in a very occasional treat either.
It's not that I see anything particularly "wrong" with late breastfeeding, just that I personally don't see the necessity, particularly when the kid has teeth. There has to be a cut-off point - unless you'd deem it ideal still at eight/nine? - and for me it's toddler stage.

Karpops · 13-05-2012 8:41pm

forfuxsake wrote: »

You wouldn't though. This is not hoe memory functions. We are programmed to remember important events or things that stand out. You may remember your first day at school but you are much less likely to remember your fourth or your 53rd (unless something extraordinary happened those days.) You would be highly unlikely aged 4 to have a memory of eating any more than going to the toilet. Unless for some reason it was extraordinary.(for example - you got chocolate milk from your mum's breast).

Funnily enough I don't remember my first day of school at all?! I also despise chocolate milk. If I was getting Fanta Exotic from her boob - now that I'd remember!

stoneill · 13-05-2012 8:53pm

Dudess wrote: »

Meh, trying to find prejudice where there isn't any is boring. Breastfeeding of a child past toddler stage in non western societies isn't wrong but it's a very different culture. Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

Apparently in Ireland it is when you leave your front door.
I have no opinions either way - breast, bottle, it is the choice of the mother.
What is the cut off point? Again it is up to the mother but when the child starts playschool or Montessori is as good a choice as any.

El_Dangeroso · 13-05-2012 9:26pm

Dudess wrote: »

It's not prudishness. At all. Where did any non Breastapo heads indicate they think it's grand for a three-year-old to be eating Jelly Tots btw? Oh yeah, they didn't. Not that there's any harm in a very occasional treat either.

Breastapo? Ah nice to see we've resorted to hackneyed name-calling.

A toddler should not be eating jelly tots ever. Life long food preferences are partially influenced at that age. But you don't see near the same level of outrage about that that I have seen on this thread.

You seem to be trying to construct a notion that I think this is mandatory, which I can understand, because then maybe you'd have a leg to stand on in this debate. As it stands I don't find the 'traditional societies carry out extended breastfeeding because they can't go to Tesco' argument less than compelling.

Yakult · 13-05-2012 9:33pm

Dudess wrote: »

Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

18

Spread · 19-05-2012 5:01pm

Dudess wrote: »

Meh, trying to find prejudice where there isn't any is boring. Breastfeeding of a child past toddler stage in non western societies isn't wrong but it's a very different culture. Nobody has answered my question yet - what's the cut-off point for breastfeeding?

Well I'm 63 and still have the urge for a mouthful. Occasionally

aaronjumper · 19-05-2012 5:10pm

I saw an English documentary about an eleven year old girl who was still being breast fed. This seems tame in comparison.

forfuxsake · 19-05-2012 5:17pm

Zulu wrote: »

Sure that, or something more realistic, like if some event happened while breast feeding.

such as?

Spread · 19-05-2012 5:23pm

The implant exploding and the nipple choking the, er, sucker?

Feeona · 19-05-2012 5:25pm

Photo is obviously staged.... no evidence of a breast feeding bra? Without one it'd be Leaky McLeak Leak Central.

Time should've run the headline 'Look at me breast feeding my child, now dare to say something about it'. Just looks like attention seeking overall. I wonder did the child have any say about being on the cover of Time?

El_Dangeroso · 19-05-2012 6:42pm

Found this:

http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2012/05/are_you_mom_enough.html

Totally sums up my thoughts on the article.

Zulu · 19-05-2012 9:22pm

forfuxsake wrote: »

such as?

such as anything out of the ordinary; a car crashing through the front room window; an asteroid striking the mother on the head; the dog spontaneously combusting; you admitting your wrong - you know something outside the routine.

forfuxsake · 19-05-2012 9:36pm

Zulu wrote: »

such as anything out of the ordinary; a car crashing through the front room window; an asteroid striking the mother on the head; the dog spontaneously combusting; you admitting your wrong - you know something outside the routine.

So mothers should stop breastfeeding at a certain stage in case of:

a car crashing through the front room window
an asteroid striking the mother on the head;
the dog spontaneously combusting.

Me admitting my wrong.?

Zulu · 19-05-2012 9:40pm

forfuxsake wrote: »

So mothers should stop breastfeeding at a certain stage in case of:

a car crashing through the front room window
an asteroid striking the mother on the head;
the dog spontaneously combusting.

Me admitting my wrong.?

yea that's exactly what i said & meant; nothing more to it; good for you.

BREAST FEEDING A 3 YEAR OLD !

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