End of our Breastfeeding Journey

I’ve always planned to breastfeed my children until they were at least a year old.

Jude breastfed until about 16 months.
Noah pretty much gave up breastfeeding at exactly one year.

I was a little sad to see our breastfeeding relationship come to an end, especially after all we’ve been through, but I know is it all in good timing. When Noah turned one I also hit 20 weeks pregnant with baby 3. I noticed my milk supply starting to drop so I tried taking some herbs to increase my supply but Noah got too frustrated and didn’t want to nurse long enough to stimulate more milk.

So we stopped breastfeeding.

Honestly, I didn’t try too hard to increase my supply since he was turning one and most of his nutrition came from solid food.

We decided to switch him over to cow’s milk. I wasn’t sure he’d like cow’s milk since it took Jude a long time to like it but he took to it right away. (I was a relieved because the whole low milk supply thing was starting to stress me out.) So now Noah drinks a little milk before going to sleep (naps and bedtime) and the rest of the day he eats and drinks whatever we eat or drink. He seems happy with the new situation and only a few times has he tried to get in my shirt.

When I became pregnant with baby 3 I was prepared to tandem nurse if necessary but I’m actually a little glad to have a short break from breastfeeding. While I love the bond it brings between me and my kids, it’s also nice to not be on-call 24/7 for boob time.

How long did you breastfeed?
Did you wean or did your baby self-wean?