In a message dated 10/17/01 9:07:33 AM, [log in to unmask] writes: << During my research, however, I never found any negative issues families had to deal with while extending breastfeeding. My question is are there any family issues mothers have to deal, such as jealousy between siblings due to the amount of breastfeeding time? I wounder this because I learned that toddlers whom breastfeed get more attached to their mothers rather than objects like blankets or stuffed animals (Bruce, 2000). >> Jennifer, It's nice to see that you are interested in this topic. It is definately gaining a little more attention as women are beginning to agree (at least in theory) on the one year minimim concept. It has not been my experience, BTW, that toddlers usually only nurse at night. Mine always nursed all of the time. I think that it would be wrong to say there are no negative issues that might come up while "extended" nursing or tandem nursing. I think that there is the possibility of a negative issue w/ any life circumstance or experience. For example, when I was tandem nursing my oldest two children, my 4yr son started to have a terible time with the huge quantity of milk he was able to drink b/c he had lost the ability to digest so much lactose. I had to modify his nursing pattern so that this would not be a problem for him. Now, my real response to that would be, so what? All life experiences have things to work out, to solve, to modify and so on. It isn't really a negative issue; it's just a part of life. Whatever we see as normal, we cope with. Whatever we see as aberrant, we have conflict with. BTW, my older child loved it when I nursed his sister, b/c it meant I would sit down and read to him or play a game with him. She is the only baby I ever regularly sat down to nurse and it was so I could give him my time as well. What I am saying is that the lactose issue is not one I identify with tandem nursing--I identify it as just one more blip on the mothering path, like any other unrelated to bf. Tandem nu rsing is just what happened since I had two children who needed to nurse at the same time in their lives. Jennifer Tow, IBCLC, CT, USA *********************************************** 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