25mo not wanting to nurse other than sometime right before bed even with mama offering "nummas"...

[KateDavies45]

recently, (in the last few weeks) my 25mo DD has not been wanting to nurse except sometimes right before bed, but even at those times only for a few minutes. I haven't been feeling let downs for around 7mo now and she has been gradually asking less and less to nurse. We've always bf on demand and I have no problems going longer if she wants to. I am lucky enough to actually remember MY nursing experience with my mother (I weaned at 5yrs) and always assumed my relationship with my nurslings would be the same. I know some children wean earlier than I did but to me barely 2yrs seems young.......At first I thought it was just a nursing strike so I followed what I was always told just to keep offering and eventually they'll come around but it's been almost a month now and that's looking less and less likely. My milk is starting to dry up on one side (I can only express a few drops where I used to be able to fill a cup for her if I was going to be gone at bed time so daddy could put her to bed) and I'm pretty sure the other will follow suit. (we've always been a little unbalance on which side she prefers to nurse from).

She eats a fairly wide range of solid foods and enjoys them but up until these last few weeks she's always equally enjoyed nursing before and after naps, in the morning when she woke up, and any other time she just wanted to snuggle. If she really is ready to end our nursing relationship I'm okay with that but I always pictured this going on much longer, like I said I drank the kool-aid (as the phrase goes ) from an early age and was looking forward to repeating the experience from the other side.

Basically my Question is two fold; does anyone have any experience with babies self weaning this young? and secondly if it is a nursing strike how the heck to I bring her out of it? I would hate to go along with this and have my milk dry up only to have her ask to nurse a week or two after.....

Any advice or experiences with this would be much appreciated

[jgallagher66]

All of my kids self weaned around that age. I just went with it and others might have encouraged their kids to keep going but I had similar experiences with all 4 of mine and they all weaned right around that age. I don't think that is unusual. If you want to keep going maybe others will have advice. For me, I just followed their lead and it happened very naturally and calmly. There was no trauma or crying, they seemed ready so I just let them go.

I'm nursing number 5 now. He's a year now. I'll do the same with him, just follow his lead. We'll see where that takes us.

Good luck with your little one. I hope someone else can help you with the other part of your question.

[skycheattraffic]

You're doing all you can: offering the breast in a no pressure way. The rest is up to your DD. Some kids are naturally ready to let go earlier than others. You can keep nursing for months or even years with just one or two sessions a day. The fact that she's cut back doesn't necessarily mean she's about to wean. I understand the difficulty in feeling like she's done too soon. My 22 month old has cut down to just nap, bedtime and a session or two overnight. I'd love to nurse her at least until her third birthday but I also must accept that it's out of my hands. Whether your child self weans at 2 or 6, know that you've done your very best and provided the comfort and security of the breast as long as she felt she needed it. CLW is ideal even when it happens before we are ready for it. Hugs to you and good luck with everything.