The Benefits of Extended Breastfeeding
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At age 1 year and 1 month, Gavin is still nursing strong. It has always been my intention to nurse him until he turns two or until he is ready to wean on his own. But recently, I have discovered the extra benefits of nursing him into toddlerhood (which I presume begins when a child turns one).
Since he became mobile, Gavin’s been climbing more things, getting into drawers, and squeezing into all sorts of nooks and crannies. It also means he’s been bumping his head, falling down, and hurting his fingers a lot more. More often than not, he usually doesn’t notice when he’s bumped his head, or slammed his fingers in the drawer, unless it really, really hurts, or he’s already feeling tired and irritable. If he doesn’t react, I’ll usually pretend I didn’t see anything. But if he starts howling, I’ll try to comfort him as best I can. One of the biggest benefits of extended nursing is that when I can’t console him with hugs and kisses, offering him the breast is great for soothing those inconsolable tears.
Another benefit of extended nursing is something I’ve only recently really started to comprehend. Since around about the nine month mark, Gavin has been extremely difficult to feed and we’ve had to employ all sorts of creative tactics to get him to eat his solids. Until now, he’s only really eating one to two real meals a day – the rest of the time, he’s just nibbling. Even then, the food he usually eats is mostly bread, cheese, teething biscuits and noodles. We’ll try to feed him anything else that he’ll take but once he’s happy eating a particular food during a meal, we are usually hesitant to introduce a new flavour because he has a tendency to stop eating altogether if he doesn’t like the new taste. Extremely temperamental, he’ll stop eating if he gets angry, bored, restless or if you try to do something he doesn’t agree with (e.g. feed him fish when he was already happy eating chicken).
This disinterest in food has gotten many of the family members concerned, and we’ve done everything from offering him everything that he is remotely interested in to formula. Yeah, I don’t know what I was thinking. Although breastmilk contains all the nutrients a baby needs, by about 6 months, the only mineral lacking is iron. This is because the iron stores that Mummy transferred to baby have been depleted, meaning that baby now needs to get his own supply.
Since formula is fortified with iron, we thought of giving him a bottle so his diet would be nutritionally balanced, but it seemed ridiculous to encourage him to take the bottle when he was already one year old and he has been happy with a sippy cup since he was nine months old. Additionally, age one is when most babies are encouraged to start drinking from cups and from a dental perspective, the prevention of bottle caries meant that bottles were no longer a suitable medium to be feeding liquids to babies. At any rate, Gavin displayed no interest in formula milk, probably since he was already getting the good stuff at night.
Despite Gavin’s apparent “lack of interest in food”, my MIL has been amazed that he still manages to maintain his generous baby padding and that his weight remains above average for his age.
Even I, who feel that his current solid food consumption is acceptable, also wonder about how he’s managed to keep the weight up. Until the hubby pointed out that Gavin was a heavy nurser during the night when he said, “He’s practically stuck to your breast for half the night!” Well, “half the night” seems to me to be a tad exaggerated, but even I can’t deny that Gavin does nurse quite a lot at night.
And if I was at all worried about Gavin meeting his daily nutritional requirements, an article on extended breastfeeding from KellyMom has laid to rest my concerns with the following:
- “Human milk expressed by mothers who have been lactating for >1 year has significantly increased fat and energy contents, compared with milk expressed by women who have been lactating for shorter periods. During prolonged lactation, the fat energy contribution of breast milk to the infant diet might be significant.”
– Mandel 2005
- “Breast milk continues to provide substantial amounts of key nutrients well beyond the first year of life, especially protein, fat, and most vitamins.”
– Dewey 2001
- In the second year (12-23 months), 448 mL of breastmilk provides:
- 29% of energy requirements
- 43% of protein requirements
- 36% of calcium requirements
- 75% of vitamin A requirements
- 76% of folate requirements
- 94% of vitamin B12 requirements
- 60% of vitamin C requirements
– Dewey 2001
I have heard that a common recommendation to mothers whose nursing toddlers are fussy eaters that it is advisable to reduce their breastmilk intake to help increase their appetite. I would like to set the facts straight on this matter.
Sally Kneidel in “Nursing Beyond One Year” (New Beginnings, Vol. 6 No. 4, July-August 1990, pp. 99-103.) wrote:
Some doctors may feel that nursing will interfere with a child’s appetite for other foods. Yet there has been no documentation that nursing children are more likely than weaned children to refuse supplementary foods. In fact, most researchers in Third World countries, where a malnourished toddler’s appetite may be of critical importance, recommend continued nursing for even the severely malnourished (Briend et al, 1988; Rhode, 1988; Shattock and Stephens, 1975; Whitehead, 1985). Most suggest helping the malnourished older nursing child not by weaning but by supplementing the mother’s diet to improve the nutritional quality of her milk (Ahn and MacLean. 1980; Jelliffe and Jelliffe, 1978) and by offering the child more varied and more palatable foods to improve his or her appetite (Rohde, 1988; Tangermann, 1988; Underwood, 1985).
I have also heard the comment from others that nursing babies seem more clingy and dependent than bottle-fed babies. I tend to think that the clinginess isn’t due to the fact that the child is nursing, but that bottle-fed babies are forced into independence far too early. The clinginess that is displayed is a normal part of childhood and it displays the strength of a child’s survival instincts to cling to Mummy. If you follow the theory that evolution is recapitulated in infancy and realise that a child’s higher brain function does not kick in until they are much older, it stands to good reason that they would want to stay close to Mummy. An infant in the wild who loses his mother often spells a death sentence because nothing swoops in faster on an unprotected infant than the predators.
From KellyMom:
“Breastfeeding is a warm and loving way to meet the needs of toddlers and young children. It not only perks them up and energizes them; it also soothes the frustrations, bumps and bruises, and daily stresses of early childhood. In addition, nursing past infancy helps little ones make a gradual transition to childhood. Meeting a child’s dependency needs is the key to helping that child achieve independence. And children outgrow these needs according to their own unique timetable (Baldwin 1993).” Children who achieve independence at their own pace are more secure in that independence then children forced into independence prematurely.
Another common belief going around is that breastfeeding Mums are at higher risk of developing osteoporosis because their babies leech their calcium stores through breastmilk. Although I had read before that breastfeeding actually protects breastfeeding Mums from osteoporosis, I wasn’t sure about the mechanics of it. According to KellyMom, although a breastfeeding Mum experiences a decrease in bone mineral during the period she is nursing, this is gained back once the baby is weaned. In some cases, her bone density may even increase irrespective of additional calcium supplementation in her diet. So if you’re at risk of osteoporosis (my mother has it and her mother before her), then you certainly should be breastfeeding, not avoiding it!
For the full benefits of extended breastfeeding, you can read all about it from KellyMom’s fact sheet.
A common concern I have heard about breastfeeding toddlers it that it will be harder to wean them past one year. According to toddler nursing from KellyMom, “nursing past a year does NOT make it impossible or even necessarily more difficult to wean later on… Age has much less to do with ease of weaning than does your child’s developmental readiness for weaning… the age that a child is ready to self-wean varies greatly from child to child and commonly ranges from age 2 through age 4.”
Children generally self-wean when they no longer have a need for it either nutritionally or emotionally. Weaning occurs over a period of time, with your child decreasing the number of nursing sessions one at a time. Anything more rapid than this is usually indicative of a nursing strike. Things like Mummy’s pregnancy can affect weaning, too. Some children self-wean partway through the pregnancy as the taste of breastmilk changes due to the pregnancy hormones. Others may continue tandem breastfeeding with a younger sibling. Whatever it is, you can be sure that your child will self-wean when he is good and ready. Until that time, rest assured that you and your child will be reaping the benefits of nursing past one year.
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21 Comments on this post
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Clytia said:
Thanks for the info. Am worried about my eight-month-old girl’s lack of iron too.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:36 pm -
figur8 said:
You’re welcome!
) I try to get Gavin to take his iron by feeding him fortified cereals (whenever he was willing to take it), bread (he prefers wholemeal to white!), and whatever scraps of meat he will let me feed him. Since he still only has two lower teeth (the upper two aren’t out yet), his ability to eat a full range of solids is still limited. I find he still manages okay with small pieces of meat that I tear up for him (I started with the really soft stuff like mince).
So far, I find that this has been enough for his iron intake. I guess the key to remember is that they are still babies and their iron needs are a lot less than ours. All the best!
March 5th, 2008 at 6:23 pm -
Chelsea said:
Sorry for the late comment, just wanted to say good for you! You’re doing the best thing for your little boy in so many ways. My son had a very strong gag reflex so he wasn’t able to properly eat solid foods (none at all!) until he was over a year old. He is now 3, eating all kinds of foods, and one of the healthiest kids you’ve ever seen. I kept nursing until he was a little over 2 and we were both ready to stop. Good for you for doing the research and sticking to your guns!
June 9th, 2008 at 6:06 pm -
figur8 said:
Thanks! I think so, too!
I think it helped that I knew other nursing mothers who were breastfeeding their babies beyond one year. The support has been an enormous motivator to keep me going.
If there is one thing I could share with another mother who is just starting out breastfeeding her baby, I would highly recommend getting in touch with other mothers who are also nursing. The misinformed negative advice of loving family members can be very discouraging.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:57 am -
Christina said:
Heh no wonder I am always hungry and looking like a stick these days. Everyone is telling me I have lost weight. Must be the rich fat milk I am making for Jack.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:32 pm -
figur8 said:
Heh… I think body type has something to do with it, too. I seem to have stagnated at a weight that is still above my pre-pregnancy weight…
June 13th, 2008 at 5:50 pm -
Stacy said:
So glad to hear you are breastfeeding over a year. My daughter just turned 1 year old and I am still nursing her. I go back to work after being off a year in 2 weeks and am a bit concerned about the nursing issue. I have tried whole milk with her but she hates it and she really doesn’t like using a sippy cup that much. I am scared to death she won’t get enough fluids during the day. Anyway, glad to hear you are sticking with it. I have decided to also, despite my family members making comments that I need to wean her now.
June 20th, 2008 at 2:28 am -
Melissa said:
Stacey, my son self-weaned at 4 1/2 yoa. I’m still a stay-at-home mom, so i can’t respond about going back to work. If you can pump, get a bottle that simulates a real nipple the best. It’s wonderful that he doesn’t like formula (if you can pump). Don’t be in fear. Rest assured that whatever you can do is going to be the best for your child.
I’m easily persuaded by people who are more assertive than me. I give in easily when i’m not real sure of something/myself. However, with nursing – no schedule, on demand, self-weaned – there was no persuading me that i was wrong. It was what was right for us at that time, and no one can tell me any different. Faith comes from God telling you what to do. If God tells you something, you can have faith in it.
Phileo,
magJune 20th, 2008 at 4:58 am -
Julie said:
I’m so glad this was here, though I do have concerns about my daughter self-weaning. She’s nearly 21 months. I’m a single mom, so it’s a wonderful, very comforting habit when we get home from work and daycare to nurse before dinner…if we go out to dinner, she doesn’t “usually” mention it. Then at bedtime. If she wakes up during the night, I’ll put her in bed with me (a benefit and curse of being single I suppose (-:) which means, she’s free to nurse on demand. I’m ok with it, but someone please tell me she will self-wean and I won’t be nursing a 5 year old! It would be easier if I had someone else to hold her I think, but it’s just us.
June 20th, 2008 at 6:57 am -
figur8 said:
Hi Stacey,
When I first introduce the sippy cup to Gavin, he wasn’t particularly keen on it either. I don’t think he really knew how to use it but I persisted and I would even drink from it to show him how it worked. He eventually got the hang of it and after that he even liked the sippy cup.
The other thing you can try (since you’re going to continue the breastfeeding) is to give your daughter water or juice for her fluids. You can also try a bottle with a straw (they make non-spill bottles, too). Gavin has one and he likes using it.
Alternatively, if you want something that resembles the breast even more, there’s a bottle by First Years called “Breastflow”. It appears to be the bottle most similar to the breast that I seen so far. You can check it out here:
http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2815318
When I first introduced Gavin to fluids other than breastmilk, he didn’t really take to them either. He would drink a little but not a lot. Gradually over time, he started to drink more. I think if you persist with your daughter, she will eventually start to pick it up. She can then have cuddle time with you nursing in the evening.
Melissa,
So so true! I admit I did waver at the start with all the comments and advice from those relatives who weren’t pro-breastfeeding but I’m glad for the supportive nursing Mums who encouraged me to keep going.
Julie,
Great job raising your daughter on your own! Being a stay-at-home-mum, I’m with Gavin most of the day and sometimes find it exhausting, too. I’m glad to have others around who can take him off my hands and give me a bit of time to myself.
For what it’s worth, Gavin also shares our bed and he nurses during the night and though I love having him close to me to cuddle, there are times when I wish I could have my half of the bed to myself.
Gavin’s not there yet, but every resource I’ve read assures me that he will self-wean so I think that’s some positive news that your daughter’s not likely to be still nursing at 5 years old…
June 20th, 2008 at 6:59 pm -
Heather Kunselman said:
Thank you for your helpful blog on extended breastfeeding on demand. I’ve been critized for it, but my toddler is healthy and happy and in the 95th percentile for his age. It’s great to have the facts.
January 14th, 2009 at 5:34 am -
figur8 said:
Hi Heather! It is amazing how many of us know that breastfeeding is beneficial for our babies and yet when it comes to extended breastfeeding, the opinions are so varied. I don’t know many Mums who practice EBF and I get criticised for it, too. I think it really helps to know that there are other Mums out there and that we’re not as “strange” or “weird” as the closed-minded people would have us believe.
January 14th, 2009 at 6:07 pm -
sharon said:
I want to add my thanks for the article. I’m breastfeeding a 22-month old and showing no signs of abating. She doesn’t have much appetite for solid foods but loves “the boob” – no, is positively ADDICTED to the boob – and because of that, I get a lot of unsolicited advice from family members to wean her, in the hopes that it will increase her appetite for other food. I think there’s no guarantee that it will, and at least now I can be fairly confident that she’s getting a reliable source of nutrition from breast milk. I also find it’s a great way to soothe her toddler woes, and to connect with an active kid when we’re having a busy day and don’t get many other opportunities for physical closeness. It’s funny how we have to be on the defensive for practicing something that human moms and babies have evolved over millions of years to do.
March 28th, 2009 at 12:30 pm -
figur8 said:
I completely agree with you that there is no guarantee that your daughter will eat more even if you weaned her. I know a mother who weaned her son hoping it would help improve his appetite for solids. She found instead that he started drinking cow’s milk to replace the breast milk he used to drink so there was no effect on solid intake. I tell that story every time someone tells me my son would eat more if only I would wean him.
Yes, I love that I can reconnect with my son when he nurses. Sometimes when they are so active it’s hard to get back those moments of togetherness.
March 29th, 2009 at 3:28 am -
sudha said:
Thanks for this article, my son Aniket is 15 months and I brest feed him, i am a full time working mom and feed him whenever at nights and weekends when I am at home. With support of my loving family I plan to continue to breastfeed for a few more months. I will definitely miss it once it stops …. Best wishes
April 17th, 2009 at 1:08 pm -
figur8 said:
My pleasure, Sudha. I must say I really salute you. Breastfeeding as a working Mum is tough. A friend of mine does it, too, and I can’t imagine how I would manage if I had to work as well.
April 20th, 2009 at 5:14 am
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