Gotta Cut Down

I'm in a really bad breastfeeding cycle. The DD is over a year now and I have been taking her to my bed to nurse her almost every night when she wakes up (which is usually within about five minutes after I've finally put my head down on my pillow for the night). I am too tired to sit there and soothe her in her crib, and yet I really don't like nursing for six hours straight, which is what often happens once she ends up in my bed. There are times when I'll soothe her back to sleep without taking her out of the crib or else sometimes I'll entice her with a bottle (please don't let her teeth turn black, please don't let her teeth turn black... well, she's only got two right now anyway). And sometimes I actually pull her out, nurse her, and then stick her back in the crib but none of those methods are very rewarding because she'll usually just wake up again in a matter of minutes and demand more attention -- i.e. me getting out of bed once more. Between constant up and downs or just being sucked on all night, I choose the latter. She's not so into the pacifier anymore, so it's hard to just replace my real live breast for a synthetic one like I used to.

There are a couple of plausible solutions to this problem. The first, which I implement on weekends or vacation days, is to send DH in there. He 'aint got no milk to give her and therefore he can get her back to sleep without tempting her with a breast. Sometimes this backfires, though, and I can hear her screaming becoming louder and more desperate until finally he brings her back to sleep with me.

Plan number two is simply to implement sleep training. I don't know if either of us has the resolve to do this on any sort of regular basis, though we all know it's potentially a small sacrifice for a big reward.

Solution number three is just to start weaning. It may be time. She doesn't seem interested, but I guess she's not the only one making the decision about it. I'll keep all of my faithful readers posted.

Enough

DD, God bless her, recently decided that the only way she will agree to be soothed is to nurse. I think that part of it is that she's been with 2 different caregivers recently besides me, which is a routine we're going to be starting for this school year. Or it might possibly be her new way to stake a claim to mommy. She is highly competitive with her brother over my attention. When they're both playing independently --or together, for that matter --and he gives her a swipe or even if she just has her own little fall, she'll come crying to me to be nursed, and it's very hard to get her to let go of me after that. It's not that I don't love holding her and it's not that I don't feel privileged to be soothing her, it's just that it's not always easy for me to stop whatever I'm doing to sit down and nurse.

I'm considering quitting nursing altogether. In some regards, I think our lives would be easier without it. Then at least my husband could comfort her on some nights instead of the job always falling to me (though he does try, to give him credit.)

Also, I've pretty much sworn off nursing bras for now. The ones I own are terrible-- I should really do a blog post on that alone. I've been wearing my normal ones that actually look presentable under a t-shirt.

The funniest thing is that, as a nursing infant - a suckling-- she wasn't so into it. I mean, she was not nearly as enthusiastic a nurser as DS was. Now all of a sudden she wants it constantly.