Fresh from bed, true to the morning, true to life. Mussed hair, scraped knee, morning light throwing itself over our little corner of calm. But not just any day. A last day. A first day. A day when a little girl is not so little after all. Last nonnie day. That's right--toddler weaning. Why talk about this? Publicly?? Well, first off, to remember. This picture was taken nearly a year ago. Several of those below are over a decade old. Secondly, because I was not the first woman to wean a toddler and I will not be the last. Maybe we can help each other by remembering.
Nursing can be such a struggle in the beginning. It can be a triumph and a relief when it starts to feel easy. It is bonding, soothing, virtually free, goes wherever you go, and requires no clean-up. For a long time, the nursing relationship was a positive force in my life and the lives of each of my children. After working so hard to get nursing off to a good start, it seems strange to throw on the brakes, reverse directions and put time and energy into quitting.
My goal was to nurse for two years. I was motivated by the health benefits for my children, but also for myself. There is a strong history of breast cancer in my family, and prolonged nursing reduces the risk. With Solomon I made it past two years, but barely.
While some women can nurse through pregnancy with no difficulty, and some toddlers choose to wean on their own if their mothers are pregnant, I was in the third category where neither case was true. Nursing. Was. Excruciating. When Solomon was just over two and I was three months pregnant with Nova, I decided we had to quit. I gave myself a month to taper off. Though it still hurt, I continued, gradually nursing less and less, putting him off more and more. I did not tell him we were weaning, or that nursing hurt. I didn't want to give him any reason to resent his future sibling. In truth, I never knew the exact last time--I didn't want to know (mostly because I didn't really want to quit at all). He still seemed so little. But I just had to stop.
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| Solomon doing 'Slowly Slowly' on Pooh Bear at about 20 months of age |
Something that eased the transition was 'Slowly, Slowly', our family nick name for a finger play game we learned from the board book My First Baby Games. It goes like this:
Slowly slowly, very slowly
Creeps the garden snail
Slowly slowly, very slowly
Over the wooden rail
Quickly quickly, very quickly
Runs the little mouse
Quickly quickly, very quickly
Round about the house
Except we never did the second part about the mouse (or the tickling fingers at the end). Instead we repeated the first verse, walking our fingers from his little wrist up over the back of his neck and down the other side (or up to his neck and back down again if he was resting in a position that kept us from going to the other arm). Charles put him to bed using 'Slowly, Slowly' when I was away for an evening, and in the end I put him to bed this way too. It was instantly soothing and connecting. He choose it himself and often requested 'Slowly, Slowly.' It was our best substitute for nursing.
Solomon some time after nursing--probably about 2 1/2. I made a point of not undressing anywhere he could see me for months, an effort to make the transition smoother. When I finally did, I he happily shouted 'the nonnies!' as if he had found a long lost friend or stuffed animal. He did not ask to nurse. He did not seem to know they'd been there under my shirt the whole time. This may sound weird to adults that think of breasts as sexual, but for a toddler it is not like that at all.
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| Nova on her 'last nonnie day' about 2 years, 9 months |
Nova's weaning story was 100% different. She was older, and I couldn't wait for her to wean. I kid you not, from the day Nova was born, I knew that she was a determined person. She knows what she wants and if she can have it, things are pretty easy, but if not--watch out. (She is now 12 and it is still this way. The older she gets, the more this trait works in her favor, luckily she usually wants good things.) At one, Nova was determined to nurse more that I wanted to. The frequency, which was still nothing compared to a little baby, was enough to make me agitated and grumpy. Keeping my two year goal in mind, I put her on a strict nursing schedule, nursing at particular times of the day instead of whenever she asked. Things got better and we went for another year. Then I started getting that grumpy antsy feeling again whenever she nursed. Over years of nursing, I've come to believe there is a physiological change my body goes through when nursing an older toddler that makes it no longer enjoyable or relaxing--part of my genetic programing to try to get me to have another baby, I guess.
Anyway, we cut back and we cut back until nonnie was only happening at bed time and first thing in the morning. I waited for her to loose interest. I waited for my milk to dry up. Neither happened. When she was about 2 and 9 months, I told her to pick a last nonnie day sometime that week. She picked Friday, the last day I offered--smart girl. All day she was happy. At night there were some nursing demands and some tears, but I held firm and they disappeared in roughly a week.
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| Charlotte in October of 2011, a few weeks before weaning. |
Though Charlotte nursed as long as Nova (almost exactly) her weaning story was much more like Solomon's. Charlotte was and is a sweet good natured child. She is aware of the world around her (far more than the rest of her family--when she was very young she knew when we took a different way to Grandma and Grandpa's house, could usually find my lost keys, and politely warned me when I had too much planned for the day). Unlike either of her sisters, she is willing to be persuaded to change her mind now and then.
When she was under two I got pregnant for a fourth time. We wanted a close sibling relationship for our younger two. Charles and I had both seen enough group dynamics with three to know there were drawbacks. Four seemed like a good number. Nursing while pregnant hurt, but not as much as it had last time around. These two would be closer together than Solomon and Nova. I kept my two year nursing goal in mind and powered through. I'm glad I did. At my first medical appointment they did a dating ultrasound. No heartbeat. Miscarriage. After three healthy pregnancies it was the last thing I expected. I'll skip the details, since this post is really about weaning. However, I am glad I didn't wean my young toddler. Ultimately I was able to get pregnant again.
Charlotte was well over two. Nursing hurt a little during this pregnancy, but it was nothing terrible. We gradually trailed off until November 11th, 2011 (11/11/11--which is why I remember the date). On that day, we realized there was no milk. It had all dried up. I remember distinctly, we were sitting on the couch and it was mid morning. "It's all gone. You drank it all up. You had as much as you could possibly have." I said to her. And we were both happy with that.
And then there was the last time around--Ariadne. Ariadne got to nurse the longest, over 3. Part of this was because she is the baby (we don't foresee having more kids at this point). I had an opportunity to go on a trip to the boundary waters with a dear friend of mine when Aria was approaching two. I was not willing to wean for the trip and I was afraid of getting mastitis in the wilderness. So I decided to pass.
At 2 1/2 we started a concerted effort to wean slowly, slowly. Twice (maybe even three times?) we were down to just a little night nursing, only to have Ariadne get very, very sick. She was so sick that 'nonnie' was the only thing she could keep down. I was thankful we hadn't completed the weaning process. But we were back to the beginning again. Like her brother before her, she was (and is) a tremendous fan of 'Slowly, Slowly.' It is funny how these things resurface. Charlotte and Nova never especially asked for 'Slowly, Slowly' but in is a staple of Ariadne's bedtime routine. It was very important in getting her through my solo trip to New York. I went for a week to visit my sister and see a play that she'd costumed as part of her graduate work at NYU. I thought a week away would probably be the end of nonnie for Ariadne. While I was away, I noticed my milk supply was all but nonexistent. Still, I didn't want her to associate me going away with loosing something important to her unexpectedly. I decided on a 'don't offer, don't refuse' police when I got back. To add complication, I managed to break my arm while skating at Rockefeller Center right before I left. NONE of this deterred her.
Finally, I chose the same strategy that had worked with Nova. I asked her to choose a last nonnie day. I asked if there was anything she wanted to do to mark the occasion? I was thinking cake, an outing, a toy. She responded that she wanted to take pictures! Full disclosure, there is a professional nursing photo in our bedroom taken when Charlotte was six weeks old--at least I know where she got the idea. So early one Saturday, we took some pictures that will never see the light of day. We also took a few to share, like the one at the top of this post and the two of her grinning happily. As you can tell, she was very pleased with herself. Like Nova, we had a couple rough nights after an initial great first day, but I held firm. Nearly a year later, She still remembers nonnie fondly, and we still do 'Slowly, Slowly' at bedtime.
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