4 year old weaning, but I am still producing milk ?

[eatyourveggies]

My daughter turned 4 years old at the end of February this year. She has begun to lose interest in nursing and it does not appear to be something she needs emotionally anymore either. But... my body is acting odd and it's really starting to confuse me! For one, my breasts seem to think they need to KEEP making milk. My daughter hadn't nursed in about 1.5 weeks, and I suddenly woke up to sore breasts and a feeling of fullness and I could feel the milk coming in. I tried cabbage leaves which seemed to help, but I didn't do any today and now the feeling is coming back again.

It feels like it used to when she was younger, and then she would nurse and my breasts would feel okay again.

My Midwife said that my body doesn't produce milk like it used to, and that since my daughter has been decreasing in how many times she nurses for over quite some time now - that weaning should go smoothly and I shouldn't "need" to do anything as far as milk-reducing teas, etc.

Um. Yeh.

Well, when she was a baby I had a hard time with frequent plugged ducts etc.. so I am just kinda scared of that now since my body seems quite content on continuing to produce milk despite the fact that I have a 4 year old, not a ravenous new-born.

And on my right breast, it feels like one of the ducts is enlarged.

Another odd thing is this happened last month at my cycle and now my cycle is about to start again and it's happening again. So I am wondering if it's cycle related? Does that make any sense to anyone? The rest of the time my breasts feel normal, no feeling of milk coming in etc.

It's just confusing me, shouldn't my body slow down on milk production? The way my breasts feel, I *want* her to nurse. I asked her yesterday morning and she said yes she wanted to nurse.

She hasn't since though, but she hasn't asked. I feel it counter-productive for me to ask her to nurse, since if she wants to she'll certainly ask. She seems to want to wean, so by me asking her I feel like I am stopping the process? And she is 4 years old.. so it seems like a good time to wean.

[milkybean]

My son has been sloooooowly weaning since he was a late 4 or early 5.  I've kept an ongoing journal of it (thought it was ending far earlier than it seems it has, and didn't want to miss The Last Time), and YES the milk keeps on being made (at least in me), and YES it's heavily influenced by my cycle.

This has been a very long process (he's nearly 7) and about a year ago there were a couple months of buying cabbage leaves...I was in pain!  And a few times I've gotten a bit freaked feeling around..omg what is THAT?  And then a week later he'd ask to nurse, the milk would get flowing, I'd sort of massage the lumpy area, and it would disappear.  Aha, it was milk.  (and he never complained about the taste, even though it had been like that for a few weeks, so...)

As he's gone longer and longer between nursings, those areas take longer and longer to replenish, and it's all much less affected by my cycle. 

But I bet that if I'd said "yes" to him tonight, if he nursed long enough, the milk would have showed up.  Since he's this old and is trustworthy, I believe him when he tells me I'm still making milk. 

So yeah, you probably still are.

And cabbage leaves, when really cold, work nicely.  I didn't want to do a tea b/c I could tell that this process was going to be awhile, and I didn't want to do anything purposely against him.  But the cabbage leaves were very necessary!  (and when she does nurse, I'd recommend massaging the painful parts, see if the milk can be released for sure).