Lillian will be 25 months old tomorrow. I’m so happy to have made it nursing Lillian to two years old! That’s a definite goal…one I’m so proud to have reached. I have no intention of weaning her, especially since in a couple of short months she will have a major upheaval in her life with the arrival of her new baby brother.
At one point I thought Lillian had cut down significantly on her nursing times during the day. A few months ago she was only nursing when she got up in the morning, maybe once or twice during the day, including during nap, and then nursing down to sleep at night. At night it’s always been a different story. She sleeps in our bed, so she has constant access and she does nurse quite often during the night. She rarely fully wakes for it…but I always do. Really not so fun, especially while pregnant and tired and huge and uncomfortable.
I was enjoying the slightly less nursing times during the day. I have no problem nursing a toddler. Not even a very acrobatic toddler, ha ha! But with my growing tummy, it’s been more of a challenge unless I’m laying down. However, shortly after she cut down on her own nursing times, we had a sort of crisis that I’m still not sure of quite what happened.
When Lillian hit 22 months, she had a rough spell where she was resisting naps and lots of days we had to give up on her having one. Then she started having a hard time in the afternoon/early evening. She’d finish eating supper and start crying (while still getting cleaned up or even still eating sometimes) for bath and bed and nursing. Like really sobbing. She was very upset. So we would take her up for her bath and bedtime routine…where she would REALLY lose it. She would absolutely scream in the bath, like it was hurting her, even though she was begging for it. She would be sobbing for bed. So we would then dry her off and get her in her pjs, say prayers, and start climbing into bed where she would then start fighting THAT and insist on going to ride her bouncy horse, Lucky.
That was very hard spell, but thankfully it only lasted a couple of months. (We are back to naps most days, and bed without too much crisis. We decided not to bathe her every night, and that’s helping too.) During that time, there came a point where I was wondering if I was producing any milk at all, or if I’d dried up during my pregnancy. I tried self-expressing, and to my horror, nothing would come out. I felt like sobbing. (I’ve since heard that self-expressing while pregnant, and still nursing, may not always produce anything even if you are still making milk, by the way, so don’t panic if it happens to you.) Lillian kept nursing though. There were times that felt like the nursing was pulling barbed wire through my body and out through my nipples. OOOOUUUCCHH. Man, it gets painful.
After this brief period of time, Lillian’s nursing demand increased tenfold. I don’t know if she picked up on my anxiety about my milk production, or if all of the sudden I maybe have more…or if it’s changed in flavor or consistency, but whatever it is, she is asking for it a lot more lately. Ha – as I’m typing this she’s sitting in my lap nursing. Of course it’s uncomfortable. My belly is so big there is no room for her, but she makes do! 
And I have to admit, the actual nursing is a bit painful. And at night, it gets downright unbearable if she does one of her hours-long nursing sessions. A lot of the moms in the “Adventures in Tandem Nursing – Breastfeeding During Pregnancy and Beyond” book call this sensation being “touched out”. I can certainly identify. I adore nursing my precious Lillian. I am glad and honored to do it for her. But there are times I wish she didn’t want to nurse quite so much at night….Yes, I’m getting very little sleep. Yes, I’m super tired all the time. Yes, it’s hard to be pregnant with a toddler, and nursing said toddler still. It’s hard to imagine the newborn times after Gabriel is here while nursing Lillian AND Gabriel…but it will be worth it to me.
It will be a special bonding time for Lillian and Gabriel, and allow me to do something for both of them (maybe at the same time? I haven’t decided just how tandem my tandem nursing will be yet ;)). I worry about giving Lillian as much attention as she wants and needs while I’m having to give attention to Gabriel too. I want to accommodate both of them. Just a note – a lot of people claim that mothers who nurse beyond the ‘accepted’ norm of up to a year are doing it just for themselves…that they’re selfish and want to keep their little ones ‘babies’….HA! Let me just say…this mama is DREAMING of the day (years in the future, I’m sure…) where I can kick back with my feet up and a margarita in my hand while I watch my children happily playing together in the near distance…not crawling all over me, plucking at my nipples, nursing with TEETH, twisting and flopping all over me…sigh. I’m not complaining either though. This is an irreplaceable time in their lives that I’m willing to sacrifice myself for. And no, I don’t have a martyr complex either. I know it’s a hard time. But it’s one that DOES have an end in sight…even if it’s years away I have to daydream about. I do know that I’m giving my children the best possible start in life. Breast milk has antibodies unlike anything else in nature. These are custom-made for my children…for their time in life, and for the situations life finds us in at the time. Like if I am fighting a cold, my milk will produce the antibodies for that particular cold to prevent my children from catching it. Magic!
It’s not easy to nurse while pregnant. It’s not always fun. But for me, it’s completely natural feeling. I’m not going to force my daughter to stop doing something that’s always been a constant in her life, and something she clearly still shows a preference and a NEED for. I know she won’t nurse forever, and I do look forward to the day when I’m all done nursing both children. But on the flip side of the same token…I also know that one day in the future I will look back and MISS this time of nursing them both. I fully know that, and try to take all the difficulties in stride. It can be very overwhelming. I can be so ‘touched out’ in the middle of the night when I want to sleep that I feel like screaming – where I literally worry if I’m going crazy. Just know, if you ever find yourself in that situation…the feeling always passes. Just keep plugging on with what you feel is right for you and your child/ren.
Well, my adventure continues. I will do an update later, after Gabriel is here, about how my tandem nursing situation is going. I look forward to that!
