Felicie's Blog

My baby will be two this month and I’m having a hard time dealing with it. I’m happy that she’s turning into such a smart, healthy little girl. The problem is that every time I’m around a new baby lately “my ovaries start to hurt” (as my friend likes to say).

Perhaps there is something about that two year mark that makes my biological clock start ticking again. It was when my oldest turned two that we started trying for a second baby. I remember reading in Katherine Dettwyler’s work that the natural spacing between births is usually three to four years when children are nursed until they self-wean and no other contraception is used.

So maybe it is just nature taking its course.

It makes sense. By age two kids are becoming pretty self-sufficient. My current almost two year old, although “still nursing,” is eating lots of different foods, almost potty trained, and can easily spend the day away from me.

When I got pregnant the second time, my oldest was still nursing fairly often. I was sure that she would wean during my pregnancy and that the nipple pain I experienced at first would go away.

Six months pregnant with my nursing toddler in Port-Aux-Basques

Much to my chagrin, my toddler wasn’t ready to wean. We nursed right through the nine months. We made some accommodations: changing positions as my belly grew and shortening the length of the nursing sessions to make it bearable for me.

Also, the nipple pain was excruciating throughout my entire pregnancy. Everyone seems to have a different experience with this: some people find that the pain gets better after the first few months. I used to grit my teeth and do breathing exercises to deal with it.

I found that generally people were very concerned to find out that I was nursing while pregnant. The most common belief was that it would cause the baby to have insufficient nutrition. Since it is such a strange thing to do in our society, I didn’t mind educating people about how my body would ensure that the growing baby would get everything it needs.

While I didn’t mind dealing with friends and relatives who were concerned with me nursing while being pregnant, I found dealing the health care system another story all together. My own family doctor informed me that I would have to wean by the third trimester. My obstetrician wasn’t supportive either. By the second trimester, I started lying to them and told them that we had stopped nursing.

The worst part was a very concerned nurse in the recovery room, right after I had the baby, who told me very confidently that it was “impossible to breastfeed during pregnancy”. Really, was I dreaming for the last 40 weeks? I was just too tired at that point to tell her otherwise.

It is possible to keep breastfeeding during a pregnancy. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Check out this great resource for more info. Also the books Mothering Your Nursing Toddler and Adventures in Tandem Nursing offer really good advice.

Now I’ll get back to decorating that two year old birthday cake and trying to convince hubby to go for baby #3!