Listen to Your Inner Voice by guest blogger Dina

My name is Dina, I live in Germany, I’m 30 years old and gave birth to my wonderful Matilda on April 13th in 2013. I knew I wanted to Breastfeed but never gave it much thought because I thought it would just work out fine.

The consulting in the hospital wasn’t good at all. No one showed me how to latch and unlatch. I fed Matilda every breast for an hour per feeding; I did not know that it would hurt my nipples in a way it did. I was struggling for 8 weeks, got infected nipples and it didn’t seem to heal. I lost a lot of tears, pumped the hell out of my breasts and started crying every time Matilda got hungry. My husband was so supportive in many ways. At some point he offered to feed Matilda formula so I could get any sleep. I got angry, even though I knew, he just wanted to help. The midwife system and care taking is very good in Germany and my midwife ruby was so positive that my breasts would heal and I could become a Badass Breastfeeder. I went to laser therapy and it finally worked for me. I exclusively breastfed Matilda for about 6 months before I started to wean her.

Matilda is a very strong personality and just wonderful the way she is. I can’t even find words for the love I have. I carry her a lot and she also sleeps in our bed so I would consider us attachment parents.

The reason I am writing you this email is that I decided a few weeks ago that attachment parenting isn’t always a good solution for everybody. Including myself. The people I met during my motherhood and my friends that already have kids are doing their parenting work different in a lot of aspects.

But it seems to be common to wean your baby as early as possible. Some of the mothers are kind of in a competition to stop breastfeeding by a certain age or at a certain time like “I am not going to breastfeed after 6 month” or “I think it’s disgusting when they can talk and demand the breast” or ” it took us 4 weeks to end breastfeeding, she missed it at first but now she’s over it.” And of course I am asked when I will finally stop to breastfeed. Some of the people asked obvious, others not. But it was always a topic that needed to be discussed. I nurse in public and never had a bad experience which I appreciate a lot. But all this talking about the best time to stop and the nicely put questions made me part of the silent race of the “no nursing aloud” team.

So I decided that Matilda is 9 month old and too old to be nursed during the day. My plan was to snitch out of breastfeeding in a quiet way. Keep her focused on different things.

So we had a week without breastfeeding during daytime.  But instead of feeling the new freedom every mother was talking about I felt lonely and sad. I thought I was supposed to feel that way and that I would get used to it.

I found your blog and got lost in your stories and pictures. I was going to wake up Matilda and nurse her but didn’t.  I understood that it wasn’t my choice to end the breastfeeding progress and that the feelings I had were there because I made a wrong decision for us.

Thank you for reminding me how important it is to listen to your inner voice. I decided to not give us a deadline for breastfeeding and just enjoy it.