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Home › Articles › Weaning › Emotions and Weaning

Emotions and Weaning

When Weaning Knocks You for an Emotional Loop

By Jessica Woods

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Spent!-When Weaning Knocks You for an Emotional LoopMy daughter recently got her first bicycle – complete with streamers, a basket and a little pink bell. She wakes in the morning asking if she can ride before she goes to preschool. She looks so big on that bike, and as I watch her roll down our quiet street, I recognize the mixed emotions that come with any transition – pride, a little sadness, apprehension and joy.

Like the transition from a tricycle to a bicycle, the transition from nursing can be bittersweet. Whether you wean at a few months or a few years, it is not unusual to feel happiness and relief tinged with heartache and nostalgia. While you may expect to feel some physical discomfort with weaning, it's the emotional discomfort that can take you by surprise, especially when you may not expect to feel anything other than relief after weaning.

It has been said that each nursing relationship is different; thus it follows that each weaning relationship is different and brings about a mixture of emotions and reactions for both mother and child. It is probably safe to say that all nursing moms will experience some changes upon weaning. These changes may be physical or emotional in nature and can bring complex feelings of loss and sadness, as well as relief and happiness.

Different Ages, Different Feelings
Janet Wolfe-Medovic, IBCLC, of Wheeling, W.V., believes in the comments of author Norma J. Bumgarner. In her book, Mothering Your Nursing Toddler (La Leche League International, 2000), Bumgarner writes, "Emotionally, most of us at one time or another during weaning, experience a sense of loss – loss of the nursing relationship, maybe the loss of an early morning cuddle in bed, a funny kind of tug on your blouse and the like. If the weaning is rapid, the change in hormone levels may trigger a depression in some mothers...When nursing continues past 2 or 3, mothers much less frequently describe weaning in the same mixed terms. It seems that a time comes in the growth of the mother-child relationship when it is easier for both to move on and leave baby things behind."


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