Weaning

A few years ago I visited a very close girlfriend of mine in Colorado. She had just weaned her 18 month old son and was rearing to go out with me and live it up for a night. I remember thinking about weaning and nursing and how it all seemed so far away from me then. That was in June of 2002...here we are just over 3 years later and I am in the middle of weaning. I firmly believe in respecting the needs of your children and honoring the ever-important parent-child attachment bond. I never thought I would actively wean Sam. I imagined him weaning himself in this beautiful, idyllic fantasy. Of course, that was all before the months of nipple twisting and public boobie snuggling. There was no public boobie snuggling in my fantasy! So here we are actively weaning. Matt has been great. He puts Sam to sleep at night with no fuss from Sam and he has been taking night wakings successfully too! So where does this leave me? I feel as though I am not needed in that department anymore...a good feeling and a hollow feeling. I feel like I am being used for my boobies, not the milk, the boobies! Ugh. I can comfort Sam to sleep with little songs and gentle touches... I miss nursing even though we are not completely weaned, I miss the long nursings where Sam would take in the fantastic milk that all of us mothers make; where I would feel the let down and the rush of Prolactin after...I miss that. I haven't had that with Sam for a long time. I know it is time to wean. I look forward to being done. I can't wait to comfort Sam with only little songs and gentle touches...no boobie snuggling.