Weaning and behavior issues?

[Marina]

Hi Everyone,

It's been awhile! I notice some changes around here, and I couldn't log in with my old name and password!

Anyway, my dilemma. Lately dd has not been herself. Very moody, sad, belligerent, cranky.

Dh finally had a chat wit her about her "attitude", asking why she has been so out of sorts lately. She blurted out that it was because mummy didn't want to give her "boobah" anymore.

*sigh*

Admittedly, I have been attempting to wean. She is just shy of 4 years old, and frankly I've grown pretty tired of nursing. I don't like the feeling anymore - at times when she is suckling I find that the feeling makes my skin crawl. I try not to let these feelings be apparent to her, and usually just try to cut things short. We have successfully night-weaned at this point (just recently, believe it or not) and b/c I work full time she doesn't get anything during the day. When I come home, though, she is all over me for it. I try to put her off unless she seems really agitated or upset by it.

But I think she gets the idea that I'm just not into it anymore, and that makes her sad. Has anyone else gone through this? I tell her sometimes that my "boobahs" don't feel well, that sometimes they need a rest, but we can cuddle and hug and that I still love her. This doesn't seem to satisfy her insatiable need to still nurse.

Please help; I am really to the point where weaning is something *I* want more than she does. I have always believed in child-led weaning, but I'm coming to my limit. Any advice? How do I help her get through this, emotionally?

[kohlby]

Is there some way you could still nurse her - but barely? My DS wasn't nightweaned until a few months after 4. (Well, actually at 22 months but he woke every single night asking until I gave in - over a year later! He just wasn't ready though I was!) My son will be 5 in May. He's still allowed "emergency breastfeeds." Knowing that he could get these made the weaning process very easy - and it had been a struggle until then. If he gets hurt then he can breastfeed. I do try to see if something else works, and it does more and more often. He's happy since he knows he can still breastfeed. And I'm happy since the emergencies are all of 10 seconds and only happen about 8 times a month!

[Marina]

Kohlby, I *do* give in, all the time! We do ABCs, nursery rhymes, counting to 10 or 20... all these things to put a time limit on things.

So it's not like I'm cutting her off, cold turkey. But I think she senses that *I* want to be done, and this hurts her somehow? The other night when I was nursing her before bed, she could have gone on FOREVER. I finally said, "Okay, let's do a nursery rhyme and when we are done, it's time to close your eyes and go to sleep". She started to cry. Not in a temper-tantrum kind of way, but in a very sad, plaintiff manner. I asked her why she was crying and she said, "I don't know why I can't just have boobah". In other words, it upsets her that she no longer gets unrestricted access.

Perhaps too much too soon? As I said, we have only recently *successfully* nightweaned. It's only been about a month or two. We go over the rules before bed: "Boobah just before bed, and then in the morning, but not in the night". And she KNOWS this, and gets it, and abides by it (she never used to!!). But now, too, I'm restricting her in other ways -- "barely" nursing, yes, but it still seems to affect her.

[kohlby]

Which is tougher - ending nursing sessions short or skipping the session? With DS, I told him if he didn't stop when I told him, then I wouldn't want to nurse him. But if he made it easy, then we could continue breastfeeding for a lot longer. He knew he would get more if he cooperated. It doesn't mean it was easy, but at least he understood!

How is she in public? To cut DS down, I was on the go constantly from sunrise to sundown. I found that he accepted no's for breastfeeding MUCH better in public. It was tiring and took weeks and weeks - but it worked! It would have been less tiring to just nurse him but I needed to cut him down.

[Marina]

Actually, she hardly ever needs it in public anymore. And she is perfectly willing to wait until we get home if she DOES happen to ask, wherever we happen to be. Unless she is really upset or hurt, we don't tend to nurse in public these days. Very very rare.

Hmm. Which is tougher? Skipping the session, certainly. If she is bent on nursing, there's no distracting her.

I don't know, she has her good and bad days. This morning I told her that I had to get ready for work, I was very busy -- so if she wanted to nurse we had to count to 20. Or ABC's. (I give her a choice on what she'd like to do) She chose counting to 20 and she was fine with it. Other days, not so much. I guess it's a gradual process?

What I wonder about is this new belligerent behavior. Do you think it's related? Very annoying at times, sort of a "I'm the boss around here" attitude. Or is this just developmental, regardless of the weaning process? It seems to have snuck up on us at the precisely the same time.

[kohlby]

My son has been "spirited" and stubborn since birth. I do think the attitude is developmental but that doesn't mean that it's still difficult! With my son, I made sure to not work on partial weaning while he was going through something else that was difficult. For example, he had huge potty training issues - not being poop trained until 4.5 years old. I did cut him down in there but only only he was stress-free from those problems. (The problems with it started at 3.5, when he finally pee trained the first time). Just like us, they have good days and rough days. With DS, I often felt like I was taking two steps forward and then two steps back. But eventually, we ended up actually going forward. It was definately a long process!

Since she is 4, she can follow rules of time to nurse better. She may not like it, but she could follow it. Maybe tell her it's nursing for a song only before work and stick to it. (Unless she's sick). Maybe let her nurse at 7pm for a song again. Teach her how to read the digital clock so she knows when it's 7. Maybe setting specific song times will help her know what to expect - and make her get used to it and fight it less eventually. The wiggle room would be for when you think she really needs it and it's not a time - like she's sick, hurt, other things going on, etc.

[Marina]

I love that idea!

Right now we don't have any sort of consistency. But I think you're right: at 4, she DOES understand and has shown that she can follow the rules (even though she can put up a bit of a fuss about it).

"Spirited" and "stubborn" -- definitely two words to describe my young 'un. I never thought we'd get this far with respect to weaning. Nightweaning was an undertaking we went through numerous times; we always gave up in hopes she'd be ready at some point in "the future". Our first attempt at nightweaning was at the age of two. Lo and behold it took almost two years to accomplish our goal! And it was as if things just "clicked" for her at some point in her mental development. She would never take "No" for an answer in the night, and we tried every "method" available to womankind on this one.

Thanks for your insight. It is good to know others have gone before me. ;)

[Firemom]

My dd nursed until she was almost 6. At 4 we were down to naptime and bedtime nursings. This was tolerable for me. I had to cut out the morning one, because it was much to hectic for all of us. She was in preschool and her brother was in school also. Some mornings i was walking in the door from work trying to get them ready for school.

So if you can tolerate 1 or 2 nursings a day and get her to stick with them, it might work to both of your advantages.

[Marina]

Yeah, it's getting her to stick with them that might be the issue. And me, too. Sometimes I don't mind the downtime of nursing when I get home from work. Other times, as I said, I just can't stand the thought of it. I think, though, that if I make a point of saying "7 p.m. and 7 a.m.: these are the times we nurse" and have a ritual associated with it, like a song (as Kohlby suggested), that really might work.

She's shown recently that she can handle NOT having it (when she wakes during the night now, she doesn't even bother asking, she just snuggles up and goes back to sleep without it. This is MAJOR progress from just a few months ago).

Firemom, what sort of routine did you have when she was older? Past 4 years old, I mean? Did you have a ritual? How did nursing FEEL to you when she was that age? I'm just curious, since how I feel at this point makes me think I could never make it to the 6 year mark.... (God love ya)

[Firemom]

Marina

I have had the skin crawling get off of me feeling LOL It used to come and go. don't expect things to happen overnight, it may take a few weeks to months.

Basically if I didn't want to sit down and nurse, I would tell her we can do it later. She was and still is a pretty easy going accepting kid. She knew down the line she would get to nurse

[LianeV]

I nursed one of my daughters until she was six. Weaning was such a gradual thing. Her last nursing sessions were six weeks apart. Morning nursings were the first to go, bedtime the last. By four we made a big deal about her really cool room and I'd nurse her to sleep in there and most nights she stayed all night in her own bed.
I had the crawly skin thing sometimes, too. I think it was worse at PMS time. Deep, meditative breathing helped. Sometimes, I just had to find something more interesting for her to do. I noticed she wanted to nurse when she was bored, so tried to have lots of things going on to keep her busy. She was never demanding. I never limited length of time when she nursed, but often suggested we do something else she found more interesting.
She got an intestinal virus once and couldn't keep anything down. She wanted to nurse a lot and I let her. No Pedialyte. Nothing else for a couple of days. She didn't get dehydrated, was much better by third day. Ate nothing but my milk the whole time. She tapered back off pretty quickly. She had not been nursing on a daily basis when she got sick.
One day I noticed she didn't nurse the whole day. Soon, she's just nurse a few times a week, then less and less until she quit on her own. I was newly pregnant. She crawled into my lap to nurse, took a couple of draws, pulled back, looked at me in shock, ran to the bathroom and spat into the toilet. She came back out with her hands on her hips and said, "What IS that yucky stuff!?" She tried once more just to see if she would be allowed, I think, after her sister was born. The novelty had worn off, she barely nursed and was glad to let little sister take over.
Sorry, so long-winded. Hope this helps in some way.

[Marina]

I was newly pregnant. She crawled into my lap to nurse, took a couple of draws, pulled back, looked at me in shock, ran to the bathroom and spat into the toilet. She came back out with her hands on her hips and said, "What IS that yucky stuff!?" ...
Sorry, so long-winded. Hope this helps in some way.

LOL, are you suggesting I get pregnant!? :hugegrin:

Always helpful to hear of other's experiences! Thank you for sharing.

Firemom, PMS is right! It always happens just before, or during my period. I'm going to try deep breathing. Teeth-grinding isn't working. ;)