I know of no cases of BF older children by coercion.  I know of one case of
a five year old whose BF relationship with his mother was discovered by a
babysitter.  She happened to be an employee of the daycare he went to.  She
was putting him to bed, and he didn't want to sleep in his own bed.  Somehow
he let it slip that 'Mama will just wake me up when she comes home anyway,
so I can breastfeed.'  I don't know how the sitter responded, but the child
was immediately overcome with remorse because 'mama had said he mustn't let
anyone know that she still BF him.'

The daycare staff were abuzz about it for a long time.  I heard about it
when one of the leaders on the staff, herself a long-term breastfeeder of
several children and a close friend of mine, sought my opinion.  She didn't
know how to defend this mother to the staff, who all expected my friend to
have an opinion about it.  She had many doubts about the way this mother
treated the boy, which had nothing to do with BF, but with the way she
interacted with him while leaving and collecting him, and the way she
related to staff who cared for him.  But she refused to issue a blanket
condemnation of anyone who BF longer than 3 or 4 years.  Together we
realized that the problem in the case was that the boy, a small child, was
made responsible for keeping the BF a secret.  We felt that if the mother
really meant that BF was good for them, she should have been willing to
front that cause for her son.  Note that we did not at any point take a
stand on the goodness or badness of their BF relationship.

I am troubled by the term 'closet breastfeeder'.  Personally I don't think
much good comes of practicing something we feel strongly about and keeping
it hidden, and I gladly use the parallel of closet homosexuality as an
example.  How many people have felt isolated to the point of suicide because
they never knew how many others had the same sexual orientation in common?
I hope no one has been driven to suicide as a closet breastfeeder, but as
long as we go along with the idea that this is slightly risky or not nice
and should be kept hushed up, we make it no easier for anyone else.  There
is a huge middle ground between crusading and concealing, and most of us
occupy it.  Welcome out of your closets, ladies.  Our breastfed children
need the daylight.  After all, we don't want them getting rickets, do we?

Rachel Myr
Kristiansand and on my way to get my daily dose of Vitamin D now.

             ***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html