How long did you BF and why’d you stop?

I'd love to know how long you breastfed your babies, particularly your firstborns, for, and why you stopped.

I'll go first -- Emma Rose was breastfed exclusively for 6 months, then breastfed/solids with the occasional bottle of formula until about 9 months. I knew that when she was about 11 months I was going to have to go away for a weekend without her as I had a  personal obligation, so from 9 months I tried to express so I could store up enough milk so she could have expressed bottles while I was away.

My plan didn't work very well as in almost two months of awful, exhausting expressing I only managed to get out enough to fill about four bottles! She breastfed right up until I left, but her interest had been waning for a few weeks, as the solids were really more what she wanted.

When I got back from the two days away, she wouldn't have a thing to do with breastfeeding, no matter what I tried. All she wanted was bottles. I tried to express for a couple of weeks so that she could at least have expressed breastmilk, but was only getting an ounce or two a day with the pump (and I was using an expensive, hospital-grade Medela electric pump at that). My nipples were cracked, bruised, and bleeding from the pumping, I was miserable, and Em wasn't getting near enough to guzzle from what my boobs were producing, so I stopped. The end.

My goal was to breastfeed her for a year, and I made it 11 months. I think if I hadn't needed to go away at that 11-month mark we probably could have gone for longer, but overall I'm happy we made it to almost a year!

Wow, I don't think I've ever told that story before! So go on, share yours...

Andrew was till he was 3 weeks old exclusively, and then a mixture and BF and formula till he was 5 months and then he went onto formula. The main reason for that was that i was going back to fulltime work and he was going into daycare. And I also had supply issues with him, I didn't have enough milk for him to grow.

Josh was a little different, I exclusively BF him till he was 6 months, at that stage we introduced a bottle of formula a day as I was taking him away with me to a band contest and if he needed feeding and I was on stage the person I had to look after him could easily feed him the bottle. He started at about 8 months to refuse the breast and just after 8 months he was on formula all the time. I wanted to feed him till he was 1 but I think that going away and having the bottle hindered that.

I breastfed Chloe for around 3 and a half months. It started out okay, she latched on and fed fine when the colostrum was there, but as soon as my milk came in it all went downhill. She would latch on and off and on and off, and scream like she was in pain and get really windy, and power-chuck all of her feed up, so I was feeding her for what seemed like the entire time as she often needed "re-feeding" after throwing everything up. We discovered she was much better on a bottle of EBM, so for the first 3 months I mostly expressed which was really hard work. I tried to BF her for about 3-4 feeds per day and the other few feeds were expressed milk, but sometimes she would only have expressed milk if I was too exhausted to try and feed her. It would take around 2 hours to feed her and she would need topping up afterwards with EBM anyway. Everyone told me to stick it out as it got easier after 6-8 weeks, so I stuck it out (I was determined to BF her). However things just kept getting worse, and after expressing for several months my supply started to dwindle. I tried to BF her more and express less but she would just scream and arch her back after a few mins of suckling (apparently my flow was way too fast for her and gave her wind probs). I saw a lactation consultant 4 times and we tried postural feeding etc. but nothing seemed to help.

I decided to stop expressing at about 3 months, and just did 2-3 BF per day and the rest formula. It was all we could both handle. By the time we reached 3 and a half months, Chloe got tonsilitis and stopped feeding altogether, and I was too exhausted to keep expressing while she was so sick and screaming constantly, so that's where it ended.

I gave it a good go and tried my hardest. My midwife offered a lot of support and the Plunket nurse said she's never seen anyone with that many problems BF stick with it for so long (I left out about the cracked nipples/thrush etc. as just about everyone has those probs it seems). So I didn't feel so bad about stopping, especially as she reassured me that the most important period for recieving breast milk was the first few months. Not that I had a choice about stopping unless someone was to have taken over care of Chloe so I had time to pump more while she was sick.

I should mention that I was convinced I had PND until we stopped BF, and then things really improved for both Chloe and I. She started napping (as she had a nice full tummy) for more than 10-15 mins and we weren't feeding for what seemed like 22 hours a day. We were both a lot happier.

I'm determined to give my next baby a good start too, and will also try to BF for as long as I can. I'm a bit apprehensive though, I doubt I could have BF Chloe for as long if I already had children to look after. However I'm hoping that the next bubba will be built a bit better and be able to handle my hugely fast milk flow!!

Rico I BF till he was 11.5 months.  He started solids at 4 months, and then I started weaning him off the breast around 7 months, and he would have formula once a day, and I gradually increased it til he was fully FF.  I always had it in my mind I would BF til he was 1 yr old.  I started weaning him at 7 months to get him used to the formula, and also so he wasn't so reliant on me for milk. 

 

I did the same with Gia.  But I haven't started weaning Jett, and I'm not sure when I'll start either,  mostly likely after he turns one.

DD1 exclusively till 4mths when solids were introduced and she continued to BF till 15 mths when she self weaned on holiday in AKLD and has never touched milk since.

My first took to bf so well. She was one of those kids that was born knowing what to do. She fed exclusively for four months, then solids and breast till she self weaned at 9 months. I was devastated cos I wasn't ready to give up. It was around the time we'd started introducing a little formula in a cup as I was gearing up to go back to work and Gem needed to go into daycare.

Cam self weaned at about the same age and I'm guessing for the same reasons. I think they just found milk out of a sippy cup easier than the breast. He was a much more difficult feeder as he had quite a bad tongue tie and I really wasn't as upset when he gave up (after all I'd been pg or bf for 36 months!!) and was pleased to have my body back.

I only BFd Bailey for a few weeks and then i struggled to express while trying to get him to latch on ...until 4 months then i gave up.

I breastfed Astin fully until 8 days old when i realised he was hungrier than usual and i didnt quite have enough milk so topped him up with formula. He went through stages of having more formula during the day then more BF during the day then at 6 months he self weaned.

Im hoping to fully BF baby #3 until it is 1 year old.

I breastfed for 3 weeks, then we discovered that my milk supply was rubbish and the quality was equally rubbish.

Apart from one day when I was in hospital (at 3mo) I breastfed Michaela exclusively until 5mo, she then started on solids and I went back to work fulltime.  For the first 2 weeks back at work I tried to express her daytime feeds but I couldn't stimulate let down without her so we decided to put her on formula during the day and I continued to feed her morning, late afternoon and night as well as expressing a bottle (sometimes more) every afternoon when I got home.  Somewhere between 10-12 mo we dropped the late afternoon feed but we continued feeding morning and night until about 14mo when she became disinterested in sitting still for her evening feed.  I decided to drop that one and she didn't even notice. We continued having the first thing in the am feed for another couple of weeks until it became obvious she wasn't really taking any milk, just coming for a cuddle, so I dropped the morning feed too (but kept the morning cuddle)

Well....
I didn't really want to BF, and was only going to do it for 6 weeks or so..but when I found I was one of the tiny tiny number of women who are physically unable to BF, I was gutted. I had had no change in breast size through the whole pregnancy, no leakage or anything ,then no milk at all. DS wouldn't latch on anyhow, would arch his back and scream and fight away from me, it was very distressing. I stayed in hopsital for a week, on the big breast pump hourly to try and get anything (ten mls/20mls tops) and Jake was on a naso gastric tube being fed anything I could give him, and after 4 days, formula. I went on the Domperidone tablets and after about 3 days we had some luck getting milk in. I stil needed to be on the breast pump often to try and stimulate my body into making milk on its own. However, Jake wouldn't latch and was still on a NG. We tried him on a bottle and he was happy with that, so we were able to go home, and I had to keep expressign milk and taking the tablets, which I did. Jake was fed EBM and havign formula top ups for 6 weeks, then at one session with my wonderful LC, he latched on, withthe help of sheilds, and we were away laughing. I had to continue pumping and taking the tablets for the whole 10 months I fed him. He self waened at 10 months, mostly I suspect as I had returned to work and he was havign a bottle more often and it was less work for him to get the milk from the bottle instead of mummy. I had intended feeding him till he was 1, but I am stoked that I got that far considering all our hurdles. Incedently I had made a deal with myself that I would have expressed and bottle fed for 3 months if he didn't latch on,

Before Charlotte was born, I had some appointments with the LC to put a plan in place for feeding her, and to ask that my records be marked that I wasn't to be discharged until feeding was established.

Once again, no change in breast tissue size or leaking, but we had decided I would go the domperidone route again if I got no milk.

However, joyously (it was like winning lotto) after 3 days, my milk came in and how! we had no problems feeding and no problems with milk this time around, My LC said it was becasue of the dedication I put in with pumping etc last time around.
I am delighted to still be feeding Charlotte and plan to "give it away" when she turns 2.

Looong story. Sorry!