Pam notes that her children don't seem to have specific memories of
long-term nursing.

Several years ago, I interviewed and audiotaped half a dozen local senior
women about their experiences with infant feeding.  The oldest woman was 100
years old (and just starting to have her mind slip in the past few months).

Anyhow, I asked her how long she breastfed her children.  Her reply was
"until they were done", as in until they fell asleep, etc.  To her, the
length of breastfeeding was a non-issue, (that is the age they weaned).  She
actually had little to say about breastfeeding, but she told long detailed
stories about her various births ie who attended, the circumstances, how
scared she felt, her emotions, etc.

This was a rural pioneer woman who had no option but to nurse her children.
My interpretation of this was that she put the proper emphasis on
experiences - ie birth is important and lifechanging, but breastfeeding
"just happened".

Perhaps it is normal that long-term breastfeed children would just accept
their having breastfed as "normal" and may not apply any superlative
descriptive adjectives to it, other than the ones they would apply to their
childhood or mom in general.

It is we, who were not nursed, or who are aware of the "extraodinaryness" of
breastfeeding long-term in our society, who seek to hear that our children
had some extraodinary warm and fuzzy memories of nursing.

Once again, perhaps we need to be reminded that breastfeeding is "just
normal" and the "minimum requirements" to nurture and raise a child.  Maby
these kids that don't remember nursing already know just that.

Janice Reynolds

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