All Good Things Must Come to an End

It's something that I know I must do, but I dreaded doing it. It's too late to turn back now. The deed has been done. You're now 25.5 months old and the last time you were breastfed was on Saturday morning (17th May 08). I'd been slowly dragging the feeding time and now you're totally weaned. Feels like something has been lost, but I know that you've lost nothing from being fed for so long. I have no regrets at all. I never planned to feed you for so long, I didn't even have a plan for breastfeeding initially. But coming to work, and meeting all those "moomies" who were a source of great support and information motivated me to keep going. We've all stopped breastfeeding our first born ever since (some are starting on number 2), but still keep in contact through lunch or even updated on the blogs.

Well, daddy and I have been thinking of slowly weaning you. At around 20 months, we tried to introduce you to other forms of milk. We tried several types of milk powder and you rejected them EVERYTIME! Ah Ma said that you refused to take the fresh milk after that. And would only take it after she showed you that she's poured away the formula and gave you fresh milk, would you take the fresh milk. I guess taking fresh milk was better than not taking anything at all. It made our trip to Japan easier too.

After Japan, you refused to take EBM and mummy went cold turkey expressing milk. From 2 times daily at work to none at all. Then you decided that you needed to feed the moment I come home from work. Everyday you would come to me the moment I reached home and insist on a feed. After a while I finally managed to persuade you to drink milk from a cup. A few days later, you didn't ask anymore. So that meant your first feed for that day (after I leave work) would be at night.

The moment I lie down on bed, you'd ask to be fed. After a while, I managed to convince you to wait until your favourite Chinese show to start (at 9.00pm) and we'd go down to take your "cold nennen". Right after that you'd happily say "Ok, nennen" (i.e. mummy's milk). That was the routine for around two weeks, when we tried to stop the feeds before you went to bed.

Wah.. that was a toughie! I had to toughen up and let you cry(quite a bit!). Many a time I wanted to just give in than to hear you cry and cry. But I had to do it. Even daddy said that he wanted to just give in at times. But it took you 4 days and you got used to it. So, the new sleeping routine was for us to cuddle up in bed after turning off the light and you'd drift to sleep quietly.

So one final one to stop was the midnight/early morning feeds. That seemed to be quite simple. Like I said, I just refused to let you feed when you wanted. Instead I offered you water and you'd tell me no batu (no water), and give up and go back to sleep. Luckily not much protest this time.

One good thing is that eliminating the night feed also mean you slept right through the night without waking up. The only time you'd wake up was to "request" to be moved to our bed. The moment daddy or mummy put you on our bed, you'd continue sleeping without a fuss.

So far you have not complained. But you will occasionally put your lips on my tummy or touch me and say "Mmm... mummy nennen got" and you know the reply from us will be "No more" and you will insist with a grin "GOT!" You even said that one of the morning's at 6am. I think you were sleeping when you said that! Haha..

And so ends our breastfeeding sessions. I will definitely miss those times.