What would you do?

[kcmb0886]

I’m currently nursing my three-week old son, and my five year-old (almost six) is very interested in the whole thing. He found two dryer balls last week and put them in his shirt to pretend to also nurse his little brother, and told me little brother was cluster-feeding. Yesterday, older brother was really concerned whether I was eating enough to continue to BF the little. But of course, I expected that eventually my five year-old would want to try nursing (he’s been weaned since he was six months) again since his little brother gets to, and lo and behold, he wanted to have me pretend to change his imaginary diaper last night and then he wanted to be breastfed - not for pretend. I doubt that he’d get anything out if I let him try, and I offered to give him “Mommy Milk” to try on a spoon, but I know that lots of Moms continue to nurse even their five and six year-olds. Would it have actually been all that weird to let my five year-old try to BF? If he asks again, should I let him? What would all of you do?

 

[LoraLoo]

Personally i would not not let a child of 6, that hasnt been bf for 5.5 years, drink from the breast.
I had a similar conversation with my now 4 year old and told her she could taste it from her cup, to which her older siblings all 'urgh'ed at... and that was the end of that, she never asked again!
I dont think there's anything wrong at all with extended bf but i myself would not feel comfortable with restarting after such a break. It is of course, your decision ☺

 

[noon_child]

Totally a personal choice...no right or wrong.

 

[jessmke]

Personally I wouldn't, but that doesn't mean it's wrong if you choose to try it out. My DD stopped nursing at about 13 months old when my milk supply tanked due to my being pregnant with her brother. It wasn't until DS was maybe 6 or 8 months old that my DD started to show an interest in nursing, she said a few times that she wanted some of mom's milk and layed in my arms. She clearly had no idea what to do and started giggling and then ran away. If she actually tried to latch I probably would have stopped her, not because I think there's anything wrong with nursing a toddler, but because I felt sort of weird about it and I can't really explain why. Now she likes to just pretend to nurse her dolls, and she likes to come and stroke her brother's head when I'm nursing him. She really likes to drink expressed breastmilk which she used to get quite frequently when her brother was younger and I pumped more, she gets very excited when she sees the pump which makes me feel sort of bad that I wasn't able to nurse her for longer.

 

[annio84]

i don't think it's weird but i'm not sure he'd really know what to do after such a long gap. i'd be scared of my boobs being bitten.

 

[kcmb0886]

Thank you all for your input. My son did ask me again if he could have “Mommy milk” the other night. Initially he said he wanted to nurse so I explained he might not be able to get anything out that way because babies’ mouths are meant to but bigger kids’ mouths can’t as easily, and he eventually agreed to just try some on a spoon instead. He said it was okay. He then asked for more milk but said he wanted cow milk instead, so I don’t think he was too impressed.