> My
>discomfort stems from my feeling that I really want breastfeeding to be a
>mainstream kind of phenomenon

Indeed, both my kids eagerly went for overnights all by themselves at
Grandma's well before (in one case *many years* before) they were weaned.  A
breastfeeding  child isn't necessarily a must-have-mother-all-the-time
child.  Granted, they slept in Grandma's bed when they went...

That experience has been reassuring to divorced toddler moms who are faced
with "giving up" their 2 or 2 1/2 year old nursling for an overnight with
Dad.  Depending on the child and his relationship with his dad, it can be an
adventure, not a trauma - at the very least, in my limited experience it
hasn't been the trauma that the mother expected it would be, and nursing
hasn't been affected.  If I had been at Grandma's my sons would have
insisted on being nursed to sleep.  Since I wasn't there, they were
Grandma'd to sleep, which was also fine with them.

Diane Wiessinger, MS, IBCLC, LLLL  Ithaca, NY

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