It is going to be a long week.

So, I have my mom in town for the week and I am thrilled. It is great to have her here but I am saddened by a comment that she made on her first day. This morning after breakfast Taj looked at me and said "nee nee please" and my mom looked at me and asked what that meant. I told her that he was asking to nurse to which she replied "Don't you think it is about time you knock that off? He is almost 3." I told her that it has been shown that a child will naturally wean between the ages of 3 and 4 and that I wasn't comfortable with forcing him to wean before he was ready. Her reply was "Well, maybe but come on we aren't living in a 3rd world country." I quickly ended the conversation with a "Well, he doesn't really nurse that much any more any way." This his hilarious because my almost 3 year old nurses more often than my 1 year old does. He practically nursed through an entire play date the other day.

So after this very brief conversation I have felt really uncomfortable nursing him around her and so I feel like I have been brushing his needs aside all day. At one point when he asked to "nee nee" I told him that we would nurse later and he throw himself on the ground crying. So, we didn't nurse before we went off to my older two's soccer games and at one point he was begging and trying to pull my breasts out of my shirt right there on the side lines. We had a quick talk about being patient and I promised that he would nurse before nap. So after we got home him and I went upstairs to nurse and the poor child seemed so frantic, like I better take what I can get now because I don't know when I will be able to do this again.

It was a long evening and can I say uncomfortable one. When you have two kids nursing on a daily basis and then all of a sudden just one, hello very full breasts! Finally it was time for bed and the poor child nursed for almost an hour. I can not go another 9 days like this, I need to figure out what to say to her and also how to not push aside Taj's needs because I am not feeling comfortable in a situation. He is only 2 1/2 and this is not his problem, he just wants to know why all of a sudden I am not allowing him to "nee nee" whenever he would like to.

Any good words of advice would be really appreciated right now.

Thank You

So this week we went along with Perry to Des Moines, Iowa where he needed to travel for work and we decided to add a little family time into it for a mini vacation. Because he was there for business I was left alone with the kids for a huge portion of the time. Every time we ventured outside of the hotel room I kept hearing "Are they all yours?" "Boy, you have your hands full!"over and over again. As if I wasn't stressed enough being in a strange town, on my own with four kids did they really think that these comments were helping?

Well, on our last day there I decided I was going to try an Art Museum with the kids. About 2 minutes after we walked in, Taj walked up to a painting and touched it. This sent the woman right over to us telling my two year old that he was not allowed to step off of the carpet. This sent my two year old into instant tears (She was not mean, she was just doing her job and Taj is really sensitive when being corrected). So I grabbed hands and walked right back out the door. We got outside and I took a deep breath and thought, "No, we came all this way and Zola and Ajay really want to do the treasure hunt. Everyone else thinks I am overwhelmed, maybe I am and we should just go back to the hotel."

Instead of listening to all of the negatives in my head and heading straight for the car, I decided to get some fresh air in the rose garden behind the Museum. Let the kids run around and maybe they will be ready for a quiet space after that.


So, after about 30 minutes of running around in the hot sun I decided we were ready to try this again. We walked to the van and got the stroller which Taj willingly crawled up into and Peylyn was in the Ergo. We walked back to the main doors and went in. We went back to the lobby to get the treasure hunt board and start all over again. We had to go past the woman that had sent Taj into tears earlier and he waved and said hello. So at this point I am thinking, ok we can do this. Then an older lady walks up to me and I feel myself stiffen and wait for the inevitable "Gee, do you have your hands full." comment. But it doesn't come...She looks at Peylyn in her Ergo and tells me "Of all of the babies I have seen being carried around next to their moms heart like this, I have only seen one that was crying." I replied with "At her first whimper, I am able to nurse her without even breaking my stride." She hugged my shoulders and told me to keep up the good work. It was all I could do to hold back the tears.

Being a mom is challenging enough, why do people feel the need to point out the obvious? We need more people like this woman telling us what a great job we are doing. Though I will never see her again, I hope that some how she may know how she really turned my day around. It was her praise that not only got me through our trip, but we had an awesome time searching for pieces of art and learning new things.

I even was relaxed enough to let out a loud laugh that rang through the entire place when Zola commented on how small the penis was on a particular sculpture.

First Time for Everything

I just had to write because I felt so empowered today! For the first time (not counting nursing at a local cafe that is VERY breastfeeding friendly) I nursed both of my children in public today.

Well, now that I have volunteered to be a co-leader for our local Holistic Moms Network chapter I went to the mall to meet up with the other leaders this morning. The play area was in full swing as I was nursing my 5 month old Peylyn. No big deal, I breastfeed her no matter where we are.

This morning though something was up with Taj and after I nursed Peylyn I handed her to the woman I was with so that I could pay some extra attention to him. He immediately climbed up on my lap and started saying "nur, nur." I tried to distract him with the slide but he wasn't falling for it. So I gave in...

This is huge for me on two accounts: first, we haven't nursed in public since he was about 18 months old. Mostly because when we are out he is so distracted by what is going on around him. The other thing is, I wasn't sure how comfortable I was with it. I nursed Ajay (#2) until he was 2, but at some point between a year and 18 months I was not comfortable nursing him outside the house. I guess I was a closet nurser and maybe I was with Taj too, but honestly he rarely ever asked to nurse when we were out. Second, I have never nursed both so publicly (in a place like the mall where you know not everyone feels as passionate about breastfeeding as I do). Honestly though it felt great! My worst fears had not come true, people did not cover their children's eyes, no one ran screaming for the door and after just a little while Taj was happy and went off to play. I don't know why I have not just feared nursing an older child in public but also showing people that yes I am nursing both of my children.

When Taj was asking to nurse this morning, the first thing that popped into my head were the words of a woman I had just met the other day. Last week I was at a babywearing meeting (at a local & VERY pro-breastfeeding cafe) and I had just nursed Peylyn and Taj came over and began to nurse and a woman sitting across from me told me how beautiful that was and that I was giving her hope that she could do the same for her toddler and soon to be born baby.

Is there a greater compliment than that? I love that by being so open about what I feel is right for us, I may be giving another woman the encouragement that she has been looking for to tandem nurse too.