While I was away last weekend, I thought I might wean Jonah, but I was on the fence about it.  Cold turkey isn’t really the way I like to do things, but he’s almost 17 months old, and the problem is, the child won’t leave me alone for two seconds.  Like his sister before him, he wants to nurse whenever he wants to nurse, as often as he wants to nurse.  And I’d like him to nurse two or three times a day at most.  All attempts to pare down the nursing had gone, let’s see…how shall I put this?  The opposite of well.   I don’t really want to be nursing a two-year-old again, like I did with Sophie.  So I went to Miami armed with a breast pump to give myself relief, but I left Jonah at home with Daddy and some bottles and cups of whole milk.  I thought, “We’ll see what happens.  Maybe when I get home, he will just be done.”

Ha ha, hilarious.  While I was gone, Jonah did not forget his love of nursing.  When we arrived home from the airport last Sunday, he immediately started trying to nurse.  He was going crazy, fussing and flailing.  I decided to have Bobby make him a bottle, and see if he would take the bottle from me.  So Bobby handed me a bottle, and after a brief protest, Jonah started taking it.   I held him while he slurped that milk down greedily

It was the first time I have ever given my baby boy a bottle.

It pretty much ripped me apart.  I don’t know why, but I was not expecting it to hurt like it did.

As I held him, and he held his bottle, I began to cry, then shake with sobs.  Hot tears rolled rapidly down my face and splashed onto Jonah’s plump baby cheeks.  He reached one hand up, like he does when he’s nursing, and played with my ear while I snuggled him close and cried.

I guess I wasn’t ready.

Later that day, I did nurse him at his nap time.  I felt relief as he nursed and cuddled me, relief that I could still have this if I wanted it, if Jonah needed it. That my trip out of town hadn’t taken this closeness away. I discovered I wanted to hold on just a little bit longer.  He is my last baby, after all.  I just don’t think cold turkey is going to cut it, for either of us.

By the end of the evening I’d decided that since Jonah will take a bottle from me (but not, as I’ve since discovered, a cup in lieu of nursing), that I am going to cut back significantly on nursing and get the weaning process jump-started.  This week I’ve only been nursing him in the mornings when he wakes, with two or three exceptions when he just wore me down. Most of the time he will take the bottle from me, but a few times he has just been adamant about nursing even after a bottle.  For the most part, it is going well – better than I expected.  I feel like, for the moment, we are both in a good place with this.

I’m thinking about one more month of nursing.  I can already tell my milk supply has dropped, and he’ll be eighteen months then.  I’ve got some health-related things to take care and I’d like to be done nursing sooner than later to work on those.  So, we’re getting there. It’s nice to have a weaning plan, and it’s nice to be the one in charge of the plan.

As much as it will be nice to not be on a tether anymore, I know I will miss it.  My baby is so sweet when he nurses each morning.  And I do love him so.

Pick me up!! You can't resist this smile!

This is my darling baby guy.  At 16 months he is walking all over the place, picking up speed.

He could pick up a lot more speed if he would freaking detach himself from my leg.

You guys.  I am blowin’ town for four days, just ten days from now.  For the past three weeks Jonah has been all over me like white on rice.  He wants to nurse con.stant.ly.  I exaggerate not at all.  He’ll play for 10 or 15 minutes and come back for more.  At his most content, he’ll just toddle over and rub his face all over whatever part of me he can reach before he returns to play.

It’s driving me cray-zee.  I’m worried he’ll lose his  mind while I’m gone.  I’m worried I’ll lose mine before I go.  I’m worried that I’ll worry about him the whole time I’m there.

I wish he would wean, but he wants to nurse now more than ever.  Growth spurt?  Developmental change?  Secret plan to drive me to the brink of sanity as punishment for my plans to travel to sunny Miami without him?

I love my baby boy, so much.  I love playing with him, I love snuggling with him, tickling him, singing our silly songs.  I love love love him.

I do not love this stage he’s in.

I hope we both make it through the next couple of weeks.

I think he is trying to kill me.

I don’t know why he would want to do such a thing, since clearly my continued presence on this earth is to his benefit, but the child will not sleep.  As a matter of fact, for the past couple of weeks, he’s been waking up so very so sad at about midnight or 12:15…and then again sometime on or before 2:30, and then usually about 5.

I suppose since he is so young, he probably isn’t clued into the fact that I am a terrible sleeper and that his nocturnal nursing parties are keeeeeling me.  But really.

I’mabboutadie.

Since he and Joshua share a room, we haven’t been able to Ferber him in awhile.   Joshua bunked with Sophie for several months last year while we were trying it out, and I fear we’re going to have to put him back in her room again soon.  But the Ferbering has never seemed to stick with Jonah.  Blargh.

Well, Sophie started sleeping really well when she was about 15 months old…and Jonah is 13 months…so hopefully I’ve got at least eight weeks of fight left in me!  Until then, there’s coffee and Mountain Dew, right?

And at least he’s a cute little killer!

But seriously I’M DYING HERE.

How did it come to pass that my baby no longer fits snugly in my arms?  It seems like yesterday that his little body barely spanned the width of my chest when he curled against me to nurse.

Sleepily he reaches out with his left arm and grabs my hair, running his hand the length of it.  He pushes my face to the side so he can get to my ear, makes a grab at my earring.  Recreational activities, fighting sleep while he nurses.  Funny baby, I am still his favorite toy.  I am wearing my glasses tonight and he gets them about half off of my face before I can pry his fingers off of them.  Giving up, he turns his attention to his own ear – like his older brother, he plays with it when he’s tired.

I kiss his face and stroke his hair, I kiss his little fingers and bury my lips in his chubby cheeks.  I love my sweet baby boy so much it hurts.  Just yesterday I was complaining as I was pumping out a bottle of milk so Bobby and I could go out, but I will be sad when he weans. He’s my last little nursey baby.

How did he get so big? He will be 13 months old this week.  Soon he will be too busy to cuddle his mama, to play with my hair, to want to be mine and to want me to be his.

He unlatches himself and gives me a milky, sleepy smile.  I squeeze him tight, kiss those pink cheeks again, and gently place him in his crib with his bevy of blankies.  He rolls over, gripping one tightly.

Good night, baby mine.  Try not to grow too much tonight while you sleep.

(This is why I often refer to myself as functionally retarded.)

Little baby Jonah has decided that he only wants to eat off of my left side when nursing. About once a day I can con him into eating pretty well off my right, but that is not going to cut it!  I don’t want to be grotesquely lopsided, and I don’t want my right side to dry up!!

To complicate this matter, my left thumb injury (which makes my whole left arm hurt) is pretty painful at the moment and since Jonah ONLY wants to eat off the left side…it’s not as easy to “rest” my left arm (which is a joke anyways, I mean really, I kind of need both hands and arms at this point in my life.)

So.  When my left arm withers up and my right breast dries up…I am going to be one lopsided- looking mother!

I want to go on “Extreme Makeover: ‘I’m just Jacked Up’ edition”.

But seriously, how do I solve this nursing problem?  I swear I’ve got the same flavor coming out of both sides!!  Any advice??

So that’s why we are posting today, during World Breastfeeding Week, about the “I Breastfeed Because” campaign from Ameda, a company that makes great breast pumps and provides allll kinds of support for nursing moms.  To spread the word about  how important and wonderful breastfeeding is, Ameda has launched a new website at I Breastfeed Because and is encouraging all moms who did or do breastfeed upload a short, 20-second video about why you breastfeed. Here’s mine:

For every video, comment or tweet shared, Ameda will make a donation to the Human Milk Bank Association of North America (HMBANA), a non-profit association of donor human milk banks established in 1985 to set standards for and to facilitate establishment and operation of milk banks in North America.

And, every mom who uploads a video will be entered to win the grand prize of a $2,500 nursery makeover or one of 25 secondary prizes — $50 American Express gift cards. Woohoo!  So go check out the site, share your story, and enter!

And tell us, if you breastfed – why did you breastfeed?  We’d love to know, too!

And in the interest of FULL disclosure, we are posting about this fully for the love of breastfeeding, and because the campaign was brought to our attention by one of our loyal readers, Cara, who works for Evenflo headquartered here in our area, the parent company of Ameda.  A cause we love & support + a reader we can support, + a local business we can support = perfection!

He’s nearly 15 months old, and I know I should be prepared for this and ready for it to happen, but quite honestly I’m not. It makes me sad to think that he’s getting so big and that he’s not an infant anymore. I logically know this is true, but still, he is my baby.

We’ve been down to just nursing at night and sometimes in the mornings (when I’m trying to get a few more minutes of shut-eye), but lately Sammy hasn’t been nursing in very long stints – something much more exciting is always going on around him, and he’s soon ready to crawl off to find a ball or play with his sister. And the number one sign he’s just not that into it anymore – he doesn’t point and squeal at my laptop the way he used to when he wanted to nurse. (What? He thinks my laptop is somehow related to the nursing process, since it’s omnipresent when we sit down on the couch. Is that not normal??)

Tonight he was super tired and ready for bed, but I wanted to nurse him to sleep. I don’t normally do that, but tonight I wanted to pay attention, to make sure I remembered this night if in fact it turned out to be the last time he nursed. So we sat in the rocking chair in his room as we’ve done so many times before, and I just stared at him, trying to burn his soft little baby face into my memory. I want to remember everything about him.

He is my baby.

I pumped for the very last time.

And I am so relieved.

No more packing and unpacking, or washing all of the 9000 parts every night. No more schleping the pump back and forth to work anymore. No more trips to vacant parking lots in the freezing cold because there’s nowhere in my office to take care of business. No more business trips with a van full of colleagues wondering why I have a heavy Trader Joe’s freezer bag on the way home that I didn’t have on the way there.

No more worrying that I’m going to be pulled over on my way to and from work and have to explain why I’m half naked.

So yeah, I’m relieved.

I have been counting down the days, really, but now I’m surprised to find I am kind of sad about it in a weird way. Sammy will be a year old on Thursday. He’s not a baby anymore. And while I’m planning to continue to nurse him when we’re together, he no longer relies on me when we’re apart.

I’m just not sure I am ready for that.

January: I scare the meter reader and deal with mystery turd #1

February: Emily has a good laugh at my expense. Or lack of expense.

March: Emily and I hit the brand-new IKEA store in our area. And ALMOST buy the correct items!

April: Emily pops out baby Sammy, and more importantly, I don’t have to wait any longer to know if it’s a boy or a girl. GEEZ.

May: A kid on Kate’s t-ball team makes the best blog fodder. EVAH.

June: Emily smokes crack, and is therefore a much more fun mommy than I am.

July: Mystery Turd 2: Electric Boogaloo! Nancy Drew tries to solve the case.

August: An old lady pisses Emily off. Watch out, Grandma!

September: We got a hurricane in Ohio. It was WEIRD. And windy.

October: I FINALLY wean Sophie at 23 months. Oy.

November: Emily and Oprah are like twinsies. And also 83-year-old ladies are smart.

December: My lady business is perfect. (According to my OB-GYN. I’m just sayin’.)

I had way too much fun putting this together. I must say Emily and I crack me up! So…at least that’s one of us…I hope you all reminisce with me and have a laugh too!

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Let’s make 2009 a great one!

Because seriously, talking about running gives me HIVES. I can’t run a BLOCK, people, much less a 5K. And I don’t want to. When it comes to exercise, I prefer not to. BUT I also don’t want to be obese and die young, so I do Pilates. Um, at least I did until about a year ago. The time has come to get my butt in gear because now that I’ve finally weaned Sophie, I’m no longer burning those magic milk-making calories. And, I only have 60 days until BlissDom ’09 (which you all really need to attend!! Emily and I will both be there, and for some reason they are letting me speak. Say what??) at which I need to look HAWT, so…

…Monday I am back on the Pilates wagon. And maybe in nine or ten weeks, when Emily runs a 5K, I will no longer have a muffin top. Or stretch marks. Or that giant wrinkle on the right side of my forehead.

One can dream, right?