Extended breastfeeding
The comments section of the article about breastfeeding a four-year-old I linked to last week was a little bit out of control. I came across a website where someone responded to many of the comments. Here are some of my favorites:
So is she going to feed her child at school? Will she be packing a bottle of expressed milk in her secondary school lunchbags? How does she get anything done with a child permanently up her jumper? Certainly there’s no way she can have sex if she is still breastfeeding! Snigger!
Translation: I have no experience of children who have breastfed longer term and have no idea how such families live their lives or how long term breastfeeding actually works in practice. I like making puerile jokes though, and I’ve definitely seen Little Britain.
It’s practically child sex abuse!
Translation: I believe breasts are for men and sex and am somewhat uncomfortable with breastfeeding because I associate breasts with sex, not with childcare.
She’s just doing it for herself! It’s the mother who needs this, not the child!
Translation: I have no idea why she’s doing it, and I don’t know anything about the benefits of longer term breastfeeding, so I’m going to assume that she is doing it for unfathomable selfish reasons. I probably also believe in early weaning so that the mother / father can regain control of the breasts instead of having to make them available to her infant child, in which case the contradictory nature of my arguments has not occurred to me and probably never will. I probably also think that breastfeeding is disgusting and/or unpleasant full stop, even though I probably will not admit it.
And my personal favorite:
We’re not in the Stone Age / Third World!
Translation: I believe that white western humans have evolved to the point where their offspring have different developmental milestones and different nutritional needs and/or I believe that white western humans have through the power of technology managed to produce food for children that is in fact better than and/or at least equivalent to the breastmilk that nature designed and that is made in women’s bodies.
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November 20th, 2007 at 12:05 am
I completely agree with everything that you wrote in your post. I am currently breastfeeding my 2 year old and my 4 month old. I never thought I would be nursing a 2 year old when I started, but he still asks for milk several times a day. I told my husband a few days ago that I wouldn’t be surprised if he was one who would hang on until he was four. At this point, I have to say that wouldn’t be my first choice, but two years ago I would have told you my children would be weaned far early than 2 years old. Who knows how I’ll feel in another 2 years.