All Good Things Must Come To An End

Last night was the first night I put Elise down for bed without nursing her.  I made the conscience decision not to.  I have been weaning her successfully with the exception of her bedtime nursing session.  First, we dropped her afternoon session (which she really dropped on her own), followed by her early morning session. 

When discussing the weaning process with her pediatrician, she asked me a couple of times "are you planning on nursing past 12 months?"  I wavered back and forth about my decision.  I didn't want to be one of those mothers with a 3 year old yelling "Boooooby!" in public when she wanted to nurse. 

When I was pregnant I set a personal goal to breastfeed.  I wanted to make it 6 months without supplementing formula.  Well, those 6 months came and passed.  Then 12 months came and passed with Elise never having any formula.  I thought it would be easy to give up breastfeeding.  After all, I wasn't doing it for anything other than the nutritional benefits.  But, now that the time is actually here I understand what her pediatrician was saying when she said some mothers become very emotionally attached to breastfeeding.  While I'm not sobbing and boohooing my eyes out over the process, I can't help but feel sad about it. 

Beginning the process of weaning led to mixed emotions.  At first, I was sad when Elise didn't want to nurse in the afternoon and dropped that session.  Then I was feeling hopeful, because Elise wouldn't be sooo dependent on me after she was fully weaned.  Then when I made the decision to drop her morning session I felt guilty - like I was taking away something important from her.  Something she found comfort in.  It's not that she cried or made it difficult, it was just me.  She adjusted just fine.  I thought I would let her keep her night time session until she decided on her own she was done.  We were at the point where she would nurse for a few minutes and then decided she was a big girl and didn't want to do it anymore.  So, last night I didn't even offer to let her nurse, and she didn't seem affected by it.

I don't feel guilty about weaning her anymore and I'm trying not to feel sad about it.  I achieved my goals and did what I thought was best for Elise.  She is drinking whole milk wonderfully from her sippy cup.  If everything keeps moving in this direction without regressing I will have breastfed for 12 months, 2 weeks, and 5 day.  In all that time, I never had a decent nursing bra that fit or any nursing clothes.  I should have definitely invested in a nursing bra!  It would have made my life a lot easier!

I put away all of the bottles a long time ago, since Elise quit taking a bottle around 5 months.  So, I have a lot of brand new Dr. Brown's bottles.  It's also time to pack up the Medela Pump and give it back to my cousin.  I was so thankful to get it from her after months of using a manual pump.  The one thing I know I will have trouble parting with is my freezer stash of milk.

That's 56 ounces of hard earned liquid gold.  I know I can't give it to Elise because it's almost a year old.  I guess I've just been holding on to it as a reminder of how hard I worked at this!  It's all so bittersweet.  My baby is growing up into a toddler, and this is a sure sign that she doesn't need to depend solely on me for her nourishment.  I am proud of myself and all the hard work, blood (literally), tears, and time I dedicated to achieving something that was so important to me.