Weaning for IVF?

[bleuelephante]

So, this is definitely not "child-led" weaning, but I wasn't sure where else to post. We have some fertility issues, and my endo has said that I'd need to wean before starting any treatment. I haven't even gotten my cycle back yet and baby girl is 11 months now, so perhaps I need to wean also to start my cycle up again as well. I'm not planning to try to wean until after 12 months, but I honestly haven't read a thing about it and I feel like I should have planned for this in advance. The reason I say I should have planned for this is because she doesn't take a bottle, and she won't use a sippy cup and maybe I should have worked harder to try to get her used to those things. So I can't just give her milk in a bottle. She uses a straw cup even though most of it she spits out because she thinks that is fun. Should I put breastmilk in the straw cup to try to replace some feedings? I haven't pumped that much either (another thing I should have done to prepare). I have a little bit frozen, but I hate pumping so I never built up a stash, should I try to do that now? I'm not sure I can give her cow's milk either because when I've given her cheese in the past, she breaks out with ezcema, so I'm afraid to try to give her cow's milk. But, if I wean, she definitely needs a breastmilk substitute, right? I don't want to wean, I love breastfeeding, but we'd like another baby and it seems wise to try sooner rather than later. I'm just looking for some advice on how to start.

[skycheattraffic]

Your baby is still sooo little. Is there a really big time crunch for baby #2? Many moms get their cycles back between 12 and 18 months while nursing. Would it be possible to revisit IVF in say six months? Kids grow and change a lot between 12 and 18 months and since you love nursing I wouldn't rush right now. I'm not trying to discourage you but what if you wean at 12 months and can't get pregnant anyway for another year? The way you talk about nursing, I'd bet you would regret weaning. I have a 20 month old nursling and honestly I can't imagine parenting her without nursing. The time when babies start walking and talking is often very difficult because they are excited about this whole new world opening up for them but are often very very frustrated by their lack of skills to explore or communicate as effectively as they want to. I can empathize with the desire to grow your family and I'm very fortunate to not have fertility problems. I urge you to think long and hard though about weaning at this age and what that would mean for the toddler years before you take the plunge. I just finished replying to a mom who weaned at 12 months (following medical advice) and now she is trying hard to get her toddler to nurse again.

I'm sorry I don't have much practical weaning advice. I'm expecting baby #2 in July and when I first found out (DD was 18 months) I felt really guilty. I felt like I was disregarding DD's needs by jeopardizing our nursing relationship (I've read that many toddlers self wean during pregnancy). I hope I'm not a complete downer, I'm just hoping to help you see this from another angle before you make any big decisions.

[bleuelephante]

Thanks for your thoughts! I actually just got my period last week, so I'm happy about that. I'm still nursing and haven't done a thing to try to wean yet. I am reconsidering when I should start. I don't feel ready myself, but am worried about waiting to try to have another baby since I know it might not work on our first fertility cycle and could take several. I think I'll wait another month and then try little things to maybe encourage weaning, but not anything sudden. I don't know how I can stop nursing to sleep, so maybe I'll try to just lessen it during the day and feed her more snacks in addition to her meals to see if that helps. Yes, I totally understand what you're saying. If I weaned and then didn't get pregnant soon anyways, I think I'd really miss it. But, we'll see, I'm going to think about it another month.
 

[Escaping]

I had to stop at 10 months also. I just switched to formula. It was really hard at first but it lessens as time goes on. I've been "pumping and dumping" just in case I can go back to nursing... If it helps, I haven't notice my son missing nursing at all, I think I'm the only one that's actually noticed it's stopped :)