Stopping BFing?

DS has weaned himself from nursing... he has turned down my boob severeal times and has decided to use my nipples as a chew toy.

I was pumping 4x's/day but am only getting between 8-12oz total at the end of the day.

I started supplementing 1 bottle of formula/day last month and he seems to be doing well with it.

I feel like Im doing alot of work (taking fenugreek, lugging my pump with me EVERYWHERE, waking up super early in the AM) for little to no milk.. and think 10 months was a great run!

Do I slowly dropping pumping sessions? Quit cold turkey??? How painful/uncomfortable is the drying up period? How long does it last???

Right now- If I go beyond 4-5hrs w/o pumping Im uncomfortable... (despite the fact there is barely any milk in there...)

Any tips/suggestion is greatly appreciated!

TIA

Re: Stopping BFing?

I basically quit cold turkey (did it over a week long period) when Ella was 15.5 months old. I was uncomfortable for a few weeks....it slowly got better every few days. I self expressed for about 2 weeks when I became engorged. It's been 3 months and I'm completely dried up.

There are times where I sort of ache to do it again....I miss it so much.

Re: Stopping BFing?

I just stopped a few days ago. Chloe is 14 months old and she was down to 1-2 sessions a day. She didn't seem all that interested anymore, so I took her que. It's been about 5 days and I am still pretty engorged. I do try to self express a little in the shower just to get a little more comfortable. I do miss it, but im happy that I was able to feed her for over a year

I would recommend pumping just to stop engorgement one feeding at a time. good luck!

Re: Stopping BFing?

I quit pumping cold turkey around Christmas but was still nursing at like 1AM and 4AM, then just 4AM then stopped at the beginning of February because I had a nasty sinus infection (which coincided with running out of fenugreek) and didn't want to be breathing on the baby.

I was never really engorged and never really leaked.

Re: Stopping BFing?

At 12.5 months, I dropped down to nursing twice per day. My supply was quite low at that point. DS quickly went down to nursing just in the morning. By 15 months, he decided to wean. He was nursing less and less the few weeks before he weaned. The last few days, he'd only nurse on the one side that had always produced more. I had absolutely no issues with drying up. I hadn't been engorged in many months. I felt slightly uncomfortable for a few hours the day after he weaned.

Since you're still pumping often, I'd go longer between pumping sessions and just pump to relieve any pain/engorgement. Gradually drop a pumping session (maybe every few days?). Good luck!