"Help with Getting Son to Stop Breastfeeding"

I am now breastfeeding my 3rd child and each experience has been very different. My 1st child did stop breastfeeding on his own around 10 mo. and my 2nd was not that easy. With her she wouldnt take a bottle or cup only the breast, but I just didnt give in and she finally took a bottle. For me drying up was kinda painful. When you start getting engorged hot showers do help and then pump when they get real full, usually before bed so you can sleep. Depending on how much you breastfeed now, you dont want to pump that much because you will keep producing milk. I always wore tight tank tops under my clothes because that helped also. Try to pump only once a day and then skip a day, and then keep spacing it out and you should dry up. As for your son, after not breastfeeding for a week he should start to get used to it. maybe when he gets back instead of your normal breastfeeding times with him just have snuggly times because I think that is what they miss the most "the closenest with you". well hope this helps..Good luck!!!

i have a 2 1/2 years old son. he's my only child i breastfed him for 18 months. i enjoyed it so did him. but i had to stop because he wouldn't let me sleep at night. at that time i didn't know what to do. so i check some websites and there were severals advices and all of them did not fit me except for one. somebody was talking about " Thums". it's a product that you can find at Walgreen and other stores.it's good for thums sucker so i thought that it was a great idea. it's a little bitter and it's safe. i would have it around me all the time so i can apply it on my nipples and at first my son would still suck it and then he start realizing that breastfeeding is not that fun anymore. i felt so sorry for him but i had to do it. and it took him about 3 weeks to stop. my nights were more peacefull since.

For us it was easiest to get rid of the morning and night feeidngs first. In the morning we got up and right away we went downstairs to eat breakfast, I didn't make nursing an option during that time. At night we went straight from bath, brush our teeth, read a book and to bed. We didn't sit in our glider in her room for a few months because she associated this with nursing. Then the afternoon nap was next, I just told her goodnight and put her in the crib. She cried some but I just made sure to give her a snack when she got up. Her morning nap feeding was the harest for us to give up. I ended up making shorter and shorter. Then one day we were going to Orlando for the day so we left at this naptime and I didn't feed her. She did fine because she was distracted with the trip. The rest of the trip I didn't nurse her at all and then we were done.

As far as engorgement, as long as you stop nursing slowly it shouldn't get too bad. I wore a sports bra for several days and didn't let the warm water in the shower touch my breasts until I knew I was dried up.

I'm sure the doctors have told you that if he is hungry he will eat eventually. Ask others to help you out for a while during the tough times where you know he is going to want to nurse. Good luck!

I've always been told that kids eventually ween themselves. It just depends on whether you want to still be breastfeeding them at 4. Some kids do stop at 12 months or 18 months. Some others don't. I can't really offer help with weening because my daughter is 2 1/2 and I'm still breastfeeding. I haven't figured out how to do it either. But I can tell you that engorgement depends on how often you breastfeed and how quickly you stop. I only breastfeed her 2-3 times a day. Sometimes I don't breastfeed her before I leave for work and I'm usually not to engorged after. If you still breastfeed a lot you probably will have some engorgement. You can try hot compress with parsley if the hot water alone isn't helping. Massaging also can help. Good luck!