I want to dry up my milk

[jennyhazard]

My daughter will be 3 in May, sleeps with me, and most nights, nurses EVERY HOUR. I'm going insane. She gets bored when I have low milk, so I thought I might try drying up on purpose. Today I wore my tightest sports bra. Do you think this will work? I'm really ready to wean. Cabbage leaves? Any other ideas?

[Jacksmommy]

Cabbage leaves, benadryl, sudafed, sage tea - all will help dry up milk. A tight sports bra isn't the best idea. You could end up with a plugged duct or something. If your daughter is still nursing frequently and you have a lot of milk, I would really recommend you start reducing nursing sessions gradually before doing anything too extreme. I'd hate to see you end up with mastitis or something.

[KerrySmithIBCLC]

No, binding your breasts is not recommended, as it can cause plugged ducts and infection. The best way to dry up your milk is by simply eliminating a nursing session every few days, and taking the gradual approach.

Would partial (night) weaning make things more easy for you to handle, rather than completely weaning? If so, I would really recommend attempting the technique designed by Jay Gordon, MD. You can read about it at his website:

http://www.drjaygordon.com/development/ap/sleep.asp

At 3, my daughter was also waking to nurse every 1-2 hours all night long. I did the technique above and after four nights she was mostly sleeping through the night, and we had stopped nursing from bedtime until the sun came up the next morning. I continued to nurse her during the day until she weaned a year later, and I found that just night weaning made breastfeeding a lot more bearable.

[jennyhazard]

Thanks for the suggestions. Yes, I'd be happy to just night wean her--I always figured I'd nurse her until she was at least three, if not longer--I nursed my son until he was 4 1/2. But she's a different kid and a rough nurser from day one. I noticed this morning that she loses interest if I don't have much milk--she stopped nursing this morning and said "Mommy, you need to take a walk and make more nursie"--when I've had low milk before I've told her that I could make some more if we went for a walk outside, just to give me some time without her sucking on me! She's smart. During the day, she's perfectly willing to delay nursing and is very reasonable about assuring me that she'll let me sleep and let my nursies rest. But at night she turns into this demon, like a heroin addict being kept from her fix. It's scary! I'll check out that website about night weaning--thanks!

[KerrySmithIBCLC]

Wow, your situation sounds SO similar to mine with my daughter (I also nursed my first child, a son, until he was 4 1/2). She was just SO much more intense with nursing than my son was. At 8 1/2 she is still super intense. It's just her personality. I understand the need to just have her STOP at night though. Night weaning really did help us, and as I said above, she went on to nurse for another year before fully weaning (I did find the night weaning did really cut back on her nursing in general).

[jennyhazard]

Kerry, I read the website you suggested, and loved the general message and tone. And it did help me to reconsider total weaning. However, I had to laugh at some of the advice! Nurse Lily for a while, but lay her down awake?! Is he freaking serious?

In the middle of the night, she falls immediately asleep when she nurses and would take my nipple off if I tried to disengage her. If I pop her off, she wakes up and screams at the top of her lungs again. She also tries as hard as she can to get my shirt up so she can nurse and gets really mad if I don't let her--kicking screaming mad. I'd need some sort of nursing/chastity bustier or something to keep her out.

But in general, the website helped, as has your advice, and I appreciate it. We had a good night last night--slept away from my husband and son, and when she fell asleep I slipped out and slept on the couch and she slept all night without waking. Of course, she was really tired from screaming at the top of her lungs for--literally--two hours as we drove home yesterday afternoon in a van full of college students from a field trip and I refused to stop driving the van and nurse because we had to be back by a certain time. I'm pretty sure she convinced the entire van of women to NEVER breastfeed, although I kept trying to tell them that she usually wasn't like this, and that my son was NEVER like that...

[Jacksmommy]

At 3 is when my ds started sleeping through the night on a regular basis. It was at that age also where I could tell him that he'd had enough nursing after 5 minutes or so, and he'd let go and turn over and go to sleep. I'd nurse him whenever he woke and wanted it, but I didn't just let him stay there all night. He was okay with it. I nursed him completely to sleep at bedtime - just not completely back to sleep when he woke in the night. During the day I didn't limit his nursing.