how long will i pump?

[patronus]

dd is 6 months. i plan to extended bf and look forward to it. however, i'm not looking forward to extended pumping.

i work full time. dd is in childcare about 9hrs a day. i pump once in the morning at home (on one side while dd nurses on the other) and twice at work.

i'm mentally prepared to pump for at least a year, but how much longer after that?

can anyone give me an idea of how long they pumped under similar circumstances?

[Xerxella]

I only work 2 days a week, but I just stopped pumping at work. DD is 15 months old. I nurse at 5 am before I go to work and 5 pm when i get home. Then we nurse to sleep at about 8 pm. We've night weaned, so that's it. On days I don't work, we nurse at least 2 more times during the day. I guess my milk supply is just lower because I don't feel any full discomfort on work days.

That being said. You can pump as long or as short as you want.

If you're still nursing frequently at night you could go the whole day without pumping and your daughter could go the whole day without milk. Think of it as reverse cycling. 6 month olds "can" go the whole night (9 hours) without milk, so why not the same 9 hours during the day. (But, honestly, I wouldn't recommend this. But, just letting you know there are lots of options.)

[Heba]

I stopped expressing at work when ds turned one. We continued breastfeeding at other times for another two years.

[emilysmama]

How long should you pump? For as long as you can stand it. Every drop you give your child is a precious gift, and pumping is inconvenient. It's not easy, and every extra day of pumping you can manage is wonderful.

That said, I was extreme. I pumped until my dd self-weaned at 3 years of age. But I didn't do it with a goal in mind. During the first month of my dd's life, my goal was, "just one more pumping session, and then I'll quit if I want to". As she got older, it became, " just one more day of pumping, and then I'll see if I want to quit". And then suddenly, it was three years later.

[MacKinnon]

I stopped pumping around a year. I didn't need it to be comfortable any more and DS wasn't really taking much from a bottle/cup anyway. We continued to nurse for two more years and weaned shortly after his third birthday!

[patronus]

thanks for your replies ladies! i'm really hoping to nurse well beyond a year but would love to quit pumping at work shortly after a year. sounds like it may be possible.

[Lit Chick]

I stopped pumping at about 1 year, and DS self-weaned about 6 months after that. I would have nursed longer if he wanted, but I was SO glad to stop pumping.

[Ambyrkatt]

I think I stopped pumping for DS at 14-15 months. He was eating enough solids to get full off of a meal and he was going to grandma's house while I worked, so she was willing to feed him on demand rather than structured meal times (I much preferred this at that age), so it worked for us. His evening/nighttime nursing patterns didn't seem to change, but he wasn't night weaned yet anyway. I think he was around 2.5 when he stopped nursing at night and then he was a little over 4 years old when he weaned completely.

HTHs!

[LindsayK]

DD stopped nursing during the day at 10 months. I worked full time, and so I figured I'd stop pumping after DD turned 1 year and tried her on cow's milk. At 14 months I stopped pumping at work. My period came 1 week later, then another 2 weeks after that, and another 2 weeks after that. My supply completely crashed (which I didn't realize), and DD stopped nursing at 15 months.

So just a warning - some mamas do just fine dropping the daytime pumping, while other's supply is drastically affected.

[patronus]

Originally Posted by LindsayK

DD stopped nursing during the day at 10 months. I worked full time, and so I figured I'd stop pumping after DD turned 1 year and tried her on cow's milk. At 14 months I stopped pumping at work. My period came 1 week later, then another 2 weeks after that, and another 2 weeks after that. My supply completely crashed (which I didn't realize), and DD stopped nursing at 15 months.

So just a warning - some mamas do just fine dropping the daytime pumping, while other's supply is drastically affected.

thank you, because i struggled with low supply early on, i'm paranoid about my supply. i certainly will be cautious.