3 years of co-sleeping & breastfeeding....good-bye?

As I deal with the emotions of having a 3 year old, we are in, yet another, transition period in our life.   Maybe tomorrow I'll post about how I'm feeling about how my life changed 3 years ago...but, today, I'm going to share with out our new adventure!

For quite a while now, Miss A has been telling me she's going to quit having milk on May "thirtya". As  we approached the date, we kept asking if she knew what was coming.  I kept asking, are you sure?  When are you going to quit having milk?  Her response was always, May thirtya.  Always.  And, guess what tomorrow is? May 30.

I've been dealing with my daughter saying she's going to stop having momma's milk on her birthday.  And, now that I'm in school and working night shift, I am SOOOO tired all the time.  She likes to have milk for nearly an hour before she drifts off.

In sense, I was getting desperate.  I needed help.  My husband agreed to help me.  The past two nights he's taken Miss A to her bed.  Just like that.  There were 5 seconds of tears last night, none the night before.  She just fell asleep.  Now, she did wake up both nights.

But, Miss A fell asleep in her bed without milk the past two nights! Wow!  And, tonight, she's spending the night with her grandparents, so no milk tonight either!

While I am very excited about this transition, it saddens me too.  We starting our nursing relationship when she was less than an hour old.  I've had bleeding, cracked nipples; delayed milk production; decreased milk production; engorgement; leaking milk; plugged ducts; and mastitis.  Yep, I'm pretty sure I experienced every breastfeeding issue there could be.  Oh, did I say biting?  Because she bit!  Every new tooth caused Miss A to bite me.

I pumped for over 15 months.  When I went back to work, as a nursing manager of a mother/baby unit, I couldn't listen to the babies cry or I'd have to go pump.  Pump, pump, pump.

While I don't think she's totally done, I think we're headed that way.  I'm ready.  I'm more than ready.  I think Miss A could totally do fine without milk.

Just like every parenting transition, it may or may not be smooth.  Only time will tell!

What to do....

Two nights ago, Little A decided she wanted to stay up late. Really late. Well, let me start with how it all began...

I got home and started dinner. Greg got home. She kept saying "bah, bah, bah" (as in bath...so it sounds more like baa, I guess) while standing at the bathroom door. See, she is really a genius. So, he decided to give her a bath. Wo -- did we mess up the routine. Then, we nursed for a bit, because, like any genius child would have thought, nursing comes AFTER bath...not BEFORE we all eat dinner! Then, after a very brief nursing session, we all have dinner.

After this, she finally does settle down. I get her to sleep finally, around 8:45 or so. I take her to her room, where she promptly wakes up AS SOON AS I MOVE HER! Back to nursing, back to sleep, back to the room, awake, back to nursing....and so on and on! It was finally around 10:30 when she finally went to sleep. I go to bed to read at this time. I had just dozed off when my dear Greg came to bed and wanted to chit chat. Dear husbands. Little A wakes up about an hour later, I'm awake, Greg's asleep. The irony.

Last night, we had nearly the same experience. Of course, due to my fatigue & sheer exhaustion, I had spent part of my day researching sleeping in toddlers. I began wondering if we should cry it out (absolutely not is my answer when well-rested!), or perhaps night-wean. We're 13 1/2 months old, it could be time for that. I was so about ready to give up last night. So close. Then, I realized that A kept grabbing her mouth/lip area. I (finally) stuck my finger in her mouth to feel the eruption of tooth #13!!! Holy smokes! Boy did I ever feel like a bad mommy! Duh, it suddenly all added up. She was refusing food and even my milk at day care. She was fussy and irritable. We gave her teething tables (wonderful) and some tylenol, had a banana, and we all went to bed...happily and peacefully.

Tonight, her and Greg had dinner (I had a meeting/dinner for work). I gave her a bath, let her play a bit, gave her tylenol and teething tablets, then nursed her to sleep. She quietly and peacefully went to bed. Of course, it's only been a little while, so only time will tell.

Can I just say what a dunce I felt like? Why didn't I feel in her mouth sooner? She's been teething so fast, I wish I would have known sooner. Anyway, at least I realized what was going on. I'm so glad I didn't let her cry it out -- whatever it is! I just had a feeling she was in pain. That's the problem with cry it out...don't get me started!

Ah, the peaceful bliss of a sleeping baby....