At Matthew’s two-month well baby visit, his pediatrician recommended that we start trying to wean him from nursing down to sleep, because he’s now at the age where he will make these important associations and do we want him to always need to nurse to go to sleep?
Oh, how I agonized over his sleeping for the week or so afterward. I ordered two recommended books from amazon, one of which I wanted to throw against the wall, circle it and spit three times (we are not a proponent of crying it out). The other one, The No Cry Sleep Solution, was much better, and with that combined with an article from Ask Moxie on babies and crying, I think we have a good set up going now – our night time routine is a bath, Goodnight Moon, nursing, swaddling, and depositing. It’s our system now and it really works – once we hammered it out, he really adapted well to it, and will sleep from about 8:30 (and that’s on the late side, I think; he shows signs of being tired earlier but we’re needing to finagle our schedule somewhat so we can accommodate it somehow) until 2 or 2:30 for a feeding, and then up again anywhere from 5am – 6am for another feeding. He’s better at napping now, thank goodness, although nothing with any regular frequency.
Anyway, back to the nursing. Breastfeeding is going really well. It doesn’t hurt anymore and Matthew, I think, has become more efficient at the whole game. I’ve added another pumping session and it turns out that Matthew’s voracious appetite has helped me bank about 175 ounces thus far of frozen breastmilk for when I go back to work, starting Thursday. Part of me hates pumping, but the other part of me is okay with it – there’s a certain amount of pride I feel every time I open the freezer and see the left side bulging with so many packets of frozen breastmilk, in 2 ounce little bars.
My grandmother and I talked the other day and she asked if I was still breastfeeding. “Yup, still going strong!” I said. She asked whether or not it was good for the baby – and I said it was and it was good for me too – as a nursing mom with type II diabetes, Matthew’s helping me keep my blood sugar stable.
All of the technical aspects of that aside – I really like breastfeeding. I look at how healthy Matthew is and rejoice. It’s probably the only time I’ll have when I have to slow down. And above all else, it’s the one thing I do on a daily basis since July 14th that truly makes me feel like a mother. I can change diapers until the cows come home, but the moment I put Matthew to my breast, our relationship as mother and son is solidified.
All that being said, I’m okay with nursing Matthew down to sleep for now. After a long day at work, it will be one of my only opportunities during the day to reconnect with him and to keep our relationship thriving. I’m okay with him learning that falling asleep content is a good way to fall asleep. I’m okay with the last thing he sees before he nods off into a peaceful slumber is my face.
I’m his mother, after all.
It’s been three months! We can hardly believe how fast the time flies. We see pictures of you when you were first born and it is like you are another baby entirely. As I recall your birth and how I used to hold you in the crook of one arm, quite easily, you seem impossibly small back then, to us the wise old parents of a three month old infant, who is topping all of the weight and height charts. Of course back then we marveled at how big you were, especially your head.
