Tandem breastfeeding is not something I thought I’d ever do, if I gave any thought to it at all.   Eh, to be honest, before I actually had a baby and learned a lot about breastfeeding, I had the standard sort of society values that we pick up somewhere along the way in life.  I thought that a baby was too old to be breastfed if it was some ill-defined age which was definitely before the baby was walking and talking.  Then I got pregnant and I started getting some accurate information about breastfeeding.  Not only did I discover that it can be quite difficult to do at the start, but I also learned that extended breastfeeding is not only good for the baby and mother, but it is recommended by agencies such as the World Health Organisation.  WHO recommends breastfeeding to the age of two years and beyond for as long as mother and baby are happy to do so.

I guess that one of the possible reasons that I thought that feeding an older baby was a bit weird is just that you don’t see many, if any, people feeding older babies.  Maybe I just didn’t see it because it never occurred to me that people do that, though now that I’m in that category I still don’t see many people feeding toddlers when I’m out and about.  I stopped feeding Nathan outside the flat a long time ago, so I’m certainly not helping the cause either.  Nathan was rarely interested in breastfeeding when we were out simply because there were new and wonderful things to excite him, and I assume that most toddlers are the same.

I breastfed Nathan beyond 12 months not because it was recommended by WHO, but essentially because Nathan loved it.  It really is a great tool for the parenting toolbox.  Not only does it provide nutrition and antibodies to the child, but it helps the wakeful toddler get to sleep, it calms and soothes a hurt, sick or upset child, and is quiet time and cuddles with Mummy.  With all the trouble we have getting Nathan to sleep, I wasn’t about to wean and have to deal with his sleep in other (generally less efficient and often less happy) ways.  So when I became pregnant with Toby, I figured I’d just keep feeding until Nathan weaned himself at some stage during the pregnancy which I thought he might do.  From what I’d read, many women stop producing much (or any) milk during pregnancy and so the baby weans, or the baby may decide he dislikes the changed taste of the milk and wean. Keeping in mind that Nathan was only 13 months old when I became pregnant, and I thought he wasn’t ready for weaning then anyway, I just thought I’d keep feeding and see what happened.

I should have known that Nathan was such a keen breastfeeder that he wouldn’t give it up even if I was pregnant.   As I got towards the end of the pregnancy I had to start thinking about what I would do when the baby arrived. Trying to deny Nathan the breast only made him very upset, so I figured that the two or three times a day that I was feeding him wasn’t onerous and I could easily do that when the baby was born.  That was when I was thinking rationally while not feeding.  I actually got to hate breastfeeding Nathan, though, because it hurt a lot and was even worse when Nathan wriggled which he did a lot.  I also hated the way he pinched me while he was feeding too.  We ended up with a host of rules including ‘no pinching, no wriggling’.  I was really worried that the hatred of breastfeeding that I felt while I was pregnant would endure and affect my breastfeeding relationship with the baby, but again in my rational moments I assumed that the pain, which mostly caused my negative thoughts about it, would disappear when I was no longer pregnant.

What I didn’t foresee was that Nathan would want to breastfeed more when the baby was born, nor was I prepared for feeding both of them at the same time. But that decision was taken out of my hands hen Nathan decided he wanted to breastfeed when Toby had his first feed in hospital.  Nathan had been through a lot that morning and not only was it a form of comfort for him, but I think it helped him to bond with the baby by gently touching him as he fed.

I’ve been reading a book I borrowed from the Australian Breastfeeding Association library called Adventures in Tandem Nursing – Breastfeeding during pregnancy and beyond.  It is written by Hillary Flower, and I really wish I had read it while I was pregnant.  It is an excellent insight into the emotional and physical side of breastfeeding during pregnancy and continuing to breastfeed a toddler after the new baby is born. It discussed how the milk changes as a baby gets older, and what happens during pregnancy. It talked about some other cultures and discussed the ages of weaning, weaning (or not) during pregnancy and their beliefs on which their decisions were based.  It went into what other mothers have experienced when breastfeeding during pregnancy, and dealt with a lot of other topics as well.  The author explained the negative feelings I had towards breastfeeding Nathan while I was pregnant, and includes a lot experiences from other women so I got an idea of how others did things and dealt with their issues.  It’s really normalised all the feelings and issues I had with feeding while pregnant and tandem feeding.

This parenting gig is a big learning experience.  I’ve learned lots from books,  online sources, sessions in real life with various people, and talking to other mums in all sorts of settings ranging from the informative ABA sessions, meetups with people interested in baby carrying, cloth nappies, elimination communication, my mother’s group, and simply by observing my own babies and how they react to various things.  I’ve had to use my own common sense, learn to trust my instincts, learn to ignore those who don’t support my/our decisions, change my ideas on parenting, and change my mindset on many issues to accommodate Nathan and now Toby’s needs.  No, I never thought I’d tandem breastfeed, but then I never thought I’d co-sleep or practice elimination communication either.  I can’t say that I enjoy it, because I don’t.   What I can say is that it seems to be the best way I can provide for the needs of both my children at the moment.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 27th, 2010 at 2:33 am and is filed under Nathan's second year, Toby's first year. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.