3y6m, 1y2.5m

Toddler is lovely, and has a milk feed almost every night, in the middle of the night, and almost never when we're awake.

I was somewhat surprised, recently, to find her feeding a toy from a pretend bottle; it's the first time she's fed a "baby" from anything other than her nee-polls.


I blame school.

Where we at?

Three years, one and a half months:
Toddler is thriving. She has a feed in the mornings, and usually one at bedtime as well - that one has a time limit of two songs. Lately, they've been "Dance to thy Daddy" and "Can your pony take us walking, Uncle Joe?"

During the day, she sometimes asks for a feed if she suffers a bop; these tend to be limited to a count of "1 milk, 2 milk, 3 milk, 4 milk, 5 milk, all done now."

Toilet training is going fairly well, as far as we can tell. Sometimes I suspect that she doesn't drink enough, but I try to remind her.

Nine and a half months:
Baby is blossoming! She plays with solid foods, even eats them sometimes, but is still clearly and definitely a milk-fed pumpkin; is that alright? Her skin is glorious, real roses and cream, or possibly peaches and cream - soft and edible and flawless, anyway. She's chubby and strong and communicative, mobile and inquisitive and opinionated, her teeth are strong and bright... and gappy... she experiments with a wide variety of foods but doesn't eat very much of any of them. She seems to like garlic and basil.

Shame.
I hid from my sisters, when they visited recently, because I couldn't bear the effort of defending us to them if they saw me breastfeeding my normous giant toggler girl. They avert their faces when I feed Baby, so I knew they'd be uncomfortable with it... Bad Feminist, No Empowerment.

I am ashamed of my cowardice.

What, teeth and all?

I was sitting in a waiting room recently waiting for my psychologist - first appointment, somewhat daunting - and I fed Baby while there, because she was hungry. The receptionist walked by - "Awww!" she said, "How old is she?"

"Gosh, seven months now, I keep thinking it's only six but it's seven now. Wow."

"And you're still feeding her?"

I was so shocked I just blurted out "I'm still feeding my three-year -old, I'm not going ot stop feeding this one."

"What, all those teeth?"

"If I'd stopped when the three-year-old had got teeth I'd have stopped at three months; she'd have starved."

The receptionist was pleasant, but it was only afterwards that I remembered that actually quite a lot of people stop before three months, because there are alternatives out there. It honestly didn't occur to me at the time.

The psychologist is very impressed with my peanut shell sling, approves strongly of cosleeping, and was flexible about working around the fact that I have a separation-anxiety-phase breastfed baby to deal with. Nice lady :)

Sick, sick, sick

Toddler is sick. Baby is sick. Baby is over 6 months old and can't handle solids. They both have head and chest colds. Twice Toddler has soothed her sore throat with a long, long feed, then coughed herself sick. Once Baby has coughed herself sick.

Nights are getting harder. I'm alone in the night with both children, because I'm visiting my mother. Toddler wakes homesick and ill and cries, whinges, shouts and kicks - this wakes Baby. They both object to the other being breastfed in the night, though neither expresses any disgruntlement during the day. We're all in one room, which is likely to be part of the problem.

The night before last I started to shake Toddler. PMS and my own illness and a screaming Toddler waking a previously peaceful Baby was too much for me. I'd wean her if it wasn't that weaning would make life more difficult in the short term.

I'm so so tired of this. She's two years and 10 months old now. Baby is six months old. Sometimes I love feeding them, together and seperately, and sometimes I'm just too tired and I hate them both.

Perhaps it's PMS - my cycle appears to be coming back on a 7-days-of-21 routine which I can't handle either.

Demand Feeding

I'm ill, and Toddler knows it. I don't demand-feed her anymore anyway; I only feed her when it suits me, really, like any other request she makes of me. Now, that means maybe twice a day, when actually she'd prefer to nurse up to six times. It's only because I'm falling down on the job in other ways, though.

Baby is having her six-month growth spurt, so she's hungry! I'm told I fed her three times last night, and I don't remember any of it; I am very tired. Her arms and legs and neck are in rolls of muscle and fat, and then her little ankles and feet are so slim and dainty looking! She's outgrowing the 6-12 month clothes now, at five-and-a-half months. She's sitting up, looking interested in our food, demanding to nurse when we eat, trying to reach our plates at dinnertime.

I think soon it'll be time to give her a slice of carrot or banana and see what she does with it. Perhaps it'll blunt those teeth of hers. Ow.