Nursing 15 Months and Counting

I have a love / hate relationship with nursing.

Nursing is a wonderful bond.  It's super convenient when you need to get Ella back to sleep.
It's too time consuming and Ella nurses far too often. Ella loves to nurse so much she nurses more than any other kid. Too many people have seen my chest because of it.

I wanted to be done nursing all the time by a year. Weaning is really hard though so that's why I'm still going. 



Before Ella was born I was concerned she wouldn't latch. I was hoping breastfeeding would work. I was afraid it wouldn't. Then Ella was awesome at latching. The nurses couldn't believe how good she was.

Now I still never leave her. At 15 months she has fallen asleep 2 times not in a car or stroller or with nursing first.   One time was a struggle and she cried so long while Dave gave her a bottle she exhausted herself to sleep and the other was couple weeks ago when she fell asleep on Dave without a fuss but she was slightly sick and had a fever that morning. (She even already napped 3 times on me that day even though she usually only takes 1 nap a day.)

At my current pace I will be nursing forever and I do not want that. I keep trying to get her to drink milk from a cup. She has consumed an oz or less at a time on maybe a half dozen occasions the past 2 months. It has mainly been pumped milk. She kept spitting out cow's milk. Dave wants her to drink cow's milk but I'm struggling with getting her to drink at all that I don't think cow's milk will work. And he isn't helping getting her to wean. The only benefit of her ear infection last week was she actually started drinking cow's milk without spitting out.

I've done a lot of research on what other people are saying about their kids not weaning and not a single one was as bad as what Ella is now. Some were just down to nursing twice a day. Just twice a day would be nice. Most had a mom working so the kid was drinking milk during the day and not nursing. I spend hours and hours reading random blogs and reading reddit threads and other tutorial type sites. None were helpful. I mean some would have been and what they suggested were all things I thought up in my head already and that I was working to implement. Only nursing when she asks, only nursing in her rocking chair, limiting nursing time, are a couple I remember now.

If Ella has recently nursed and is signing for milk I try to redirect and sign hungry and eat and give her actual food. It only works sometimes.


I finally stopped pumping extra milk daily near her birthday.
I'm still in shock how much I leak. I leaked a lot early on and still leak. I have used disposable or reusable breast pads.  Disposable are much better for not leaking through clothes. 

I even just recently packed up my pump. I did have to pump a few times since her birthday but not much.


We tried to introduce a bottle right near 4 weeks and it just never worked.  I kind of don't want to nurse future kids for fear they'd be as bad as Ella. I can't seem to leave her ever. She always seems to want to nurse even if she doesn't need to.  If I'm gone she wants to. 

I have had some nursing progress the past few days by being out and about all day and only being home a couple hours in the morning, during nap with a few minutes on each side, and for dinner until bed. With that I am down to about 5 nursing sessions a day.  Most days have been 8 or more. When she was sick, I'd nurse 15 times or so. 

I get comments from people saying it's early to wean and comments from other people that it's late to be nursing. To be clear I want to wean for me/our family and not what anyone else is suggesting.  I really want to be able to leave the house with or without Ella, wear normal clothes, and get Ella to want to eat more and not just nurse primarily. (She does eat actual food but always just wants to nurse.)  I have probably only left Ella a dozen times total counting doctor appointments and just running to pick up dinner. It's been rough. I want to do long runs without her or go to doctor appointments without her. 

How long did you nurse for? Was anything challenging about weaning for you?