I understand your concerns about being considered a "nut case" for
continuing to nurture your five-year-old at the breast, and for co-sleeping,
but I think it's time for all the "nut cases" to come out of the closet.
I have worked for many years, on and off, in the child welfare system (child
protective services in the U.S.). Many of the social workers are childless
young women (and a few young men) who tend to be concerned about anything
that doesn't fit into the textbook parameters. So I made a point of talking
about my own children who nursed until they were almost five and who slept
with me until they didn't want to anymore- and my children joined us for
many events so that everyone met them and discovered they were not only
normal, but wonderful kids.
Yes, some people were shocked - at first. But after a while, and after lots
of conversations, they came to accept it. And there were two great results.
One was that when those young social workers had babies, they breastfed. At
one agency, where I worked for nine years, we had a 100% breastfeeding
initiation rate (after my first year there) and many of those babies were
breastfed for years. The other result was that the workers began to
encourage the mothers they worked with to breastfeed, to take steps to
preserve breastfeeding even when there were other problems in the family,
and to do things like encouraging adoptive mothers to breastfeed their
babies. I know, because they still call me in to consult, even though I left
the agency four years ago.
There are many people who breastfeed for longer than the "typical" three to
six months and there are many people who cosleep with their children. But if
we don't talk about it, health care professionals and other people who work
with mothers and families will continue to think it's something weird or
abnormal. After all, nobody THEY know does it!
Teresa Pitman
Guelph, Ontario
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