The Weaning Post

    It's been about a month and a half since Perrin last nursed. He did ask a few days ago, and I responded with "I didn't think we were doing that anymore; you haven't nursed in a long time." He immediately started talking about something else. I think we are done. While it is a little weird and little sad that I am done breastfeeding, I am really excited. I was so ready to be done. Our nursing relationship was everything I could have hoped it would be, save the trouble in the beginning. I made it to my goal of a minimum of two years and letting Perrin decide when he was done. Perrin was fed completely from my body for his nine months in utero, and 7 months on the outside, and continued to receive nourishment from me until exactly three years old. And I was able to donate somewhere around 2,500 ounces of milk to other babies. So in honor of me being officially done with breastfeeding for the rest of my life, I want to do a quick review of our journey with some major highlights and favorite moments.

In The Beginning

Photo credit: Audria Abney Photography

    Perrin was born; he came to my chest. He wasn't much interested in nursing at that exact moment, and I needed some additional medical attention, so he went straight to Joey for about a half hour after he was born, then came back to me. We snuggled into bed, he latched, and nursed for about a half hour. Thus began our nursing journey. Within two days I was in a lot of pain and by the state of my nipples it was obvious something was wrong. Perrin was gaining extremely well, only losing 4 ounces and being back up over his birth weight by one week. We saw midwives and doctors and lactation consultants. Everyone had a lot of good ideas, but there was no silver bullet. But Perrin was gaining, breastfeeding was "working" in that sense, and I new if we figured it out, we'd be golden. So we kept trying. We used pumps, an SNS, compresses, gel pads, and all number of apparatuses in the beginning trying to get a handle on the problem. We slept in 45 minute increments for a few weeks, staying up 30-60 minutes in between trying to get a good feed. In the mean time, I was diagnosed with PPD. As part of my treatment we started going to parent and baby groups as well as La Leche League meet ups, and it all helped immensely. We struggled with two bouts of mastitis, a raging case of oversupply and an extremely forceful letdown. And at 9 weeks, the pain was gone, the night feeds were done lying in bed, and we found our groove.

First plane trip around 3 months

Adventures Nursing in Public

     One of my earliest vivid nursing memories is the first time I tried to nurse in public. I was averse to the idea of using a cover, as normalizing breastfeeding was very important to me. But Perrin was only about 6 days old, I was engorged and leaking, and it took a lot of work to get him on the breast. So when I sat down on the bench at the mall to nurse, I threw a blanket over my shoulder. He wouldn't latch. I was spraying milk everywhere, I couldn't get him positioned right, random employees from a nail salon were asking questions about his name and age and whatnot. And I couldn't deal. So I cried, and I went to the nursing room. And there I sat, under bright fluorescent lights, in an uncomfortable chair, in a tiny closet sized room all by myself. And I cried. This was supposed to be a village. This knowledge was supposed to be passed down through generations, perfected by women all around me who had done it all before. And I was in a room by myself. That was the one and only time I used a cover or a nursing room.

Upside down yoga snack

#NOL #nurseoutlout

     After that, we got more coordinated and got more practice in and became NIP pros. We nursed while hiking, while shopping, while doing housework. We nursed walking the dog, watching movies, chatting with friends and family. We've nursed at rock concerts (even back stage at Slipknot), Cons, and sporting events. We've nursed while swimming, while relaxing on the beach, and at grad student parties. I loved not having to pack a bag to go somewhere. The food went with us no matter what; we just had to jump in the car and go. Being able to feed Perrin anytime, anywhere with no fuss or preparation was one of my favorite things about nursing.

Beach snack

Watching Godsmack at KFMA Day

Park Snack

Zoo snack

Nursing Goten at Tucson Comicon

Waiting to meet Corey Taylor with all the other metal heads. 

Reaping the Rewards
     My other favorite thing about nursing was the health and comfort benefits it afforded us.  For me, nursing lowers my risks of different types of cancers and some later chronic illness. It also delayed my cycle for 17 months, which I consider a hella win! For Perrin, it gave him an awesome immune boost, provided tons of excellent nutrients that he needed, got him through illness and oral surgery and numerous bumps and scrapes. It was an instant comfort for him in times of fear and stress. He has a lower risk of obesity, asthma, gastro-intestinal illness, some childhood cancers, and food allergies because he was breastfeed. He's only been sick twice in his three years- one upper respiratory infection and one stomach bug. And of course, it was amazing to see that I could feed all 9lb 14 oz of him and watch him gain so well. He was in the 90th percentiles for his entire first year.

A Word About Support
     It's damn near crucial. I'm sure some people can make it work on their own, but I know I couldn't have. Joey is the sole reason I was able to successfully nurse. He was on the phone calling doctors and lactation counselors, he was on the computer reading articles and watching videos. He stayed up with me for every feeding. He went to the baby groups and La Leche Leagues. He shooed people off when they mentioned giving up, and he never for one second seemed to doubt that we were going to do this. I joke that he would make a wonderful IBCLC because he has so much knowledge and can troubleshoot a latch with the best of them!

   If it wasn't for him and all the mom groups we went to where I was able to see other women nursing and ask for tips and advice and experiences, I wouldn't have been able to do it. I cannot stress enough how important having support is, and that begins in pregnancy! This is coming from someone who swore they would never breastfeed, until of course I actually did my research preparing for having a baby. I read books and blogs and watched documentaries and spent way too much time on the internet. But having that knowledge and semi-realistic expectations was what allowed me to prepare for and deal with the problems we did end up having.

The End
    It was my goal to make until at least 2 years old (the recommended age by the AAP) and then allow Perrin to decide when he was done. I ended up being a little more hands on with the weaning process than I intended to be, but overall we met our goals. After a one year, he was still nursing much more than I had expected, but I knew that it was still within the realm of normal and I really didn't want to make any adjustments. While some kids handle limits on nursing fine, for others it initiates weaning and I didn't want to compromise our two year goal. But after two years, I developed a nursing aversion- where you have a negative physiological and/or psychological reaction to nursing. I'm not sure if it was because I had reached my goal and felt "done" or if it was just coincidence, but around 26 months we began toying around with some adjustments to our nursing.
     I was hoping to reduce frequency and night wean (no longer nurse him during the night), but he wasn't very receptive to either. However, I found reducing the length of our nursing sessions went over well, so we went with that. I'd allow him to nurse whenever he wanted, but we generally nursed for less than a minute, except at nap and before bed. Then around 28 months, he slept though the night for the first time. He didn't do it consistently, but I used that as a cue to move on with the weaning process.
    By 30 months, he was more receptive to me reducing the number of nursing sessions. We began nursing only before and after nap and before and after night sleep, making exceptions for boo-boos or other stressful situations. He still asked to nurse during the night, but less often and it was about 50/50 whether or not I could get him to go to back to sleep without. From then on, he completely took over the weaning process.

18 months

   He started dropping our nursing sessions- first the morning, then before and after nap so by the end he was only nursing before bed. He also began sleeping through the night more consistently and not asking to nurse even when he did wake. By about 34 months, he would sometimes go several days in between nursing. We took family pictures before his birthday and I realized half way through it was the first time we wouldn't be taking nursing pictures. I thought about asking him if he wanted to try only to realize it would have been impossible for me to nurse in my dress. We were already at the point where it wasn't part of our everyday. He asked to nurse about two days before his third birthday and I managed to get a quick picture. At this point he was averaging about a week in between, so I was surprised when asked again just two days later. But it was his birthday, so I didn't mind. That was the last time he nursed.

The last nursing picture ever taken, his second to last nursing session. 

    So while it is a little sad to realize that that part of my life is over, it makes it so much easier knowing how much all of our hard work and dedication paid off and what a huge part it was in Perrin's infancy and toddlerhood. Nursing is by far the hardest thing I have ever done and I am damn proud to have done it.

Check your privilege- Why the Similac Ad is not ok

    *Throws her hat in the ring* I have tried really hard not to weigh in on the whole Similac Ad debacle. Most of the discussions seemed pretty futile and I would hate to be accused of contributing to the supposed "mommy wars" (more on that later) that the commercial pretends to address. But too many of the responses I am seeing by people, both to the ad itself and to the critics of the ad, are extremely problematic. Far be it from me to think I could add to the wealth of perspective and insight that is already out there on the topic, but I feel like I need to speak my truth on this one. Ahem...

      No one cares how you fed your baby. Maybe somewhere somehow there is some nosy person who cares, but why do YOU care? If you are comfortable with your decision, then why get upset over what someone else thinks? I can assure you- I do not care.

I don't care if you breastfed for 12 years, 2 years, or two days. I don't care if you didn't breastfeed at all. I don't care if you didn't because of a medical condition or because you were worried about how you would look in your bikini. All I care is that you had a choice in the matter and then did with your body how you saw fit. 

    So kindly get over yourself. It's not about you. It's not about your choice. It's not about choices at all. The things wrong with this ad have nothing to do with mothers. At all. Stop being self centered for two seconds and take a minute to look beyond your own knee jerk emotional response to this ad and any critiques around it. Step back for one goddamn second and actually LISTEN to what people are trying to say, because it has almost nothing to do with you. 

    The idea that somehow criticizing a formula company is attacking mothers or being judgmental is not only myopic, it's steeped in privilege. By the virtue of being able to access a computer to watch that ad, you are probably in place where using formula is a viable option. While there are and will always be risks and costs to using formula, it's a pretty safe bet that you can expect your infant to thrive while being exclusively formula fed. That is not the case for everyone and by dismissing this discussion as being one of preference and not one of health and access, you are completely ignoring a population of moms in the U.S. and a huge portion of moms world wide who have much more at stake in the conversation.
    There are women who cannot afford formula. There are women who cannot afford enough formula, so they water it down or cut it with other substances. There are woman who do not have a way to safely prepare the formula so as not to contaminate it with dangerous germs. There are children who live in less sanitary conditions or have less access to healthcare and are especially at risk without the protection of breastmilk. By acting like choosing formula over breastmilk is like choosing pancakes over waffles, you are completely overlooking all of the people less fortunate than yourself that have a much higher stake in this discussion. You are crying over your perceived "persecution" for you parenting choices because someone said something unkind to you on the internet. Woman across the world are crying over their sick and dying children. Take a seat.

     Now companies like Similac are not single handedly responsible for these situations, but they sure ain't helping. It's no secret that formula companies directly target mothers who intend to exclusively breastfeed. They offer "breastfeeding support", "free" samples, and heavy handed marketing. And you better believe it works, because they would not be shelling out the money if it didn't. In fact, take a second to think about why they shelled out the money for the commercial we are talking about. In other places, their influence is even more direct. It is not uncommon for formula reps in lower income countries to dress in white coats and wear stethoscopes while making house visits to talk about the "health benefits" of formula and leave samples. Formula companies are so intensive and so unethical in their marketing that the World Health Organization has an official Code for the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes. Millions of children die every year because they are improperly fed, and Similac and other companies purposefully misinform mothers to make a profit.
     And it is not as if these practices don't have a cost, even here. The price of formula itself is astronomical for many families. All of those "free" samples that are given in the mail and through hospitals come at a price. And Similac is netting some impressive profits. It's not as if these companies are non-profit entities dedicated to feeding children. In fact, many of the improvements in formula over the years have been due to discussions such as these that highlight the many shortcomings of artificial infant feeding. Discussions that Similac would label as silly women bickering.

    But the ad in question ignores all of this. And what is worse, it disguises the issues by belittling parenting decisions and discussions and labeling them as petty, catty "mommy wars". It dismisses important conversations that we all need to be having for the benefit of breastfeeding and formula feeding mothers. And then acts like it is doing us a favor by lifting us all up. Should we all be kind to each other? Absolutely. Does that mean we have to agree on everything? Or that we can't have in depth discussions about the consequences of each others choices? Not at all.
   But that is not what Similac tells us. They are saying quite blatantly that we should be too self-absorbed to consider the wider implications of infant feeding. They are encouraging us to focus on what they tell us is personal judgement while at the same time sweeping their own accountability under the rug. And they are doing it all on the backs of the millions of children and women in the world who pay the toll- sometimes the ultimate toll- for this type of marketing and these types of products. And that is why, no matter how warm and fuzzy the message may seem, I cannot get excited about the Similac ad. I refuse to pretend that a company that profits billions at the expense of both formula feeding and breastfeeding mothers and their children really just wants us all to sing Kumbaya. I'm not buying it.

Sushi Dip

     Interrupting my other post AGAIN to address something else- something delicious. I haven't put any other recipes on here, but I'm really proud of this one and it seemed to go over well at the Super Bowl party debut, so here it is. Sushi Dip. We like to make sushi at home, but after making it we usually have no left over rice or nori, just all the other stuff. So last time I mixed all the extras up and put it on crackers and realized it was pretty tasty. I tweaked it a bit and added a few other things for the formal trial run, but the great thing about this dip is that you can customize it however you like.


Sushi Dip

One package cream cheese
One avocado
One tin of crab meat
Wasabi (to taste)
1/2 cup finely diced cucumber
1/2 cup shredded carrot

Mix cream cheese, avocado, and wasabi until smooth. Add crab meat and veggies and mix until combined.
Serve with crackers, toasted seaweed chips, and smoked salmon. Can also have pickled ginger and extra wasabi on the side.

Enjoy!