Breastfeeding Beyond The First Year(Part 1/3)

BREASTFEEDING BEYOND THE FIRST YEAR (Part 1/3)
It may pose a unique set of challenges, but overcoming them provides dividends for your baby, writes a mother who shares her experience

By Anita Daubars | Reprinted with permission from Today’s Parents Magazine

WHEN I was expecting my first baby, I had been keen to try breastfeeding my newborn. However, I never thought that my breastfeeding story would turn out the way it has.

I exclusively breastfed my daughter until about six months of age, then began introducing semi-solid food to her. It was around this time that we discovered her allergy to dairy and wheat products.

After taking food containing these ingredients, she would throw up continuously for many hours, and be irritable and fussy. She would also refuse to nurse or eat any other food. After a few hours, she would begin to nurse but would still refuse solid food.

This refusal lasted for many days after each allergic response; during this time, she relied on breastfeeding for her nutritional needs as well as to comfort her. As we identified the specific suspect foods and avoided them in her diet, her allergic episodes became fewer.

Breastfeeding continued to fulfill a large part of her dietary needs. My daughter’s first birthday passed but weaning her felt arbitrary and somewhat odd.

My faith in breast milk’s ability to nourish my baby in the gentlest way, my wariness of triggering further allergic reactions, together with nursing being able to meet my baby’s intense need for closeness motivated me to continue breastfeeding her for as long as it felt ‘right’ for us both.

Most babies do not have such allergic tendencies, and for each individual family, breastfeeding, extended or otherwise, takes its own shape and style.

Nursing mothers whose babies have passed their milestone first birthdays and who continue to find breastfeeding a fulfilling way to meet their babies’ needs face a unique set of challenges.

Those who have resolved early problems with baby’s latch-on technique sometimes find that their baby’s latch becomes more relaxed as she grows bigger, and they begin to have sore nipples once again. The mother then needs to reassess her nursling’s latch and initiate a better latch. The same applies for the nursling’s position.

Nursing toddlers tend to engage in ‘nursing gymnastics’, wriggling and squirming during nursing. They comfortably get into a myriad positions to breastfeed.

Mothers often have to emphasize to their toddlers to stay properly latched on throughout nursing. Toddlers also tend to be busy, distractible people.

Yet, continuing to nurse after the first year sustains the emotional connection between mother and toddler and serves as moments to touch home base and reconnect with their mothers between their outbound exploration trips. Many toddlers settle on having shorter breastfeeds.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), breastfeeding should continue at least until age one, and thereafter, for as long as is mutually desired by mother and child; extended breastfeeding provides significant health and developmental benefits for mother and child, and there is no upper limit to the duration of breastfeeding.

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Source: Breastfeeding Beyond The First Year(Part 1/3)