Jeez lady, cut the cord already.

AIDS blood all over the wall!

Or maybe a better caption- "Recreating the final scene from season 4 of Dexter"

 

I was listening to CNN on the radio before and Mayim Bialik (Blossom) has a 3 year old that she currently breast feeds and she was obviously defending mothers who nurse their children as long as they want. Her theory is that they will ween the kids off the tit when they "mutually decide" that its a good time.

What I want to know is, how will a kid who has only ever known feeding to be from a breast, know when enough is enough? I mean 3 is pretty late in the game for breast-feeding. Does it take a realization that all your friends bring a bag lunch to school and you have a bottle of breast milk? Once the kid is humiliated enough, only then will they realize that there are alternatives?

I guess my point is, why leave it to the kids to decide when they have no frame of reference for other food sources? As a parent, don't you have an obligation to know when to stop?

 

This is a legitimate question: Is there any law stating that at a certain point, breast feeding becomes incestuous? I feel like there should be. I mean, can the kid walk off the stage at high school graduation and grab a quick sip before going to get drunk with his friends?

 

Real question- when do apes and chimps stop breast feeding? If only there was some sort of electronic search function that would allow me to find out for myself...

 

This may be a little off-topic but this thread reminded me of an article I read in Marie Claire (I work for a Dr's office, which is why I read Marie Claire enough to find this article.) http://www.marieclaire.com/world-reports/stay-at-home-moms

I think Badinter makes some valid points here. There is a lot of pressure on women when it comes to being a mother, and some of it isn't really necessary.

As to the topic of breast-feeding, I think it's fine for the first 6 months, but then you should actively try to ween the baby onto a bottle. But that's just in general. I'm not taking individual circumstances into consideration. If you want to breast feel your kid until they are 5, that's fine. Maybe just stop before they enter kindergarten. I only say kindergarten because that's when kids should start to be a little independent.

Then again, I don't have children yet, and I don't want to be the single girl telling people how to raise their kids.

 

Yeah, stick me in the "This woman is fucking weird and creepy" camp.

This is very fucking relevant.

 

I don't know about baby sign language, but in the Best Picture-winning film The Last Emperor of China, the titular character utters the phrase "She is not my wet nurse. She is my butterfly." Which, even by precocious child standards, is far too eloquent of a description of being breastfed to be appropriate.

 

Well, sure. Because if he does it after getting drunk, he might try to sip from somebody else's mom.

 

My aunt breastfed her kid until he was 4. I found it extremely disturbing, and similar to hookers post, mum remarked that if he's old enough to ask for it, he can have solid food.

 

For those of you joking/not joking about her breastfeeding her adopted ethiopian child... her twitter account clearly states "Advocate of adoptive breastfeeding."

Bitch just likes getting her titties sucked.

 

I'm just going to say that Li'l Bandit NEVER breast-fed. He would not do it. I sucked more milk out of the Ice-Cream-Cake-Girl's boobs than he did (yeah, I did it.)
Even when she pumped it out and tried to give it to him in a bottle, he puked every time. (I guess that might say something about her...)
She was a bit miffed about that.
However, he was exceptionally healthy, and always has been.

I don't think breast feeding is necessary. It might be "better" in some ways, but I wouldn't worry about it.

Oh, and to stay on topic: I think that kid is too old to be sucking on his mom's tits.

 

Just to put the vague notions of breastfeeding being "better" or having "nutritional benefits" into perspective:

<a class="postlink" href="http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/65/5/578" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/65/5/578</a>

Now, don't we all feel better with hard evidence from a randomized trial instead of mushy, non-specific feel-goodery?

 

Oh my, this is a topic that my friends and I have debated for years.

I breastfed both of my boys as long as I could (as long as I could keep up production). My first was 8 months and my second was only six months, kid would suck me dry and then cry for more. I strongly advocate breast feeding if possible. That being said, I have met two children (twins) that were still breastfeeding at five. I realize that breast milk is wonderfully nutritious and there is a bonding that happens when you breast feed. HOWEVER, there is a social aspect that must be considered. These kids would walk up to any woman and pull her shirt up and go for the titty! It isn't cute or funny. Also, their mom's breasts were WRECKED from years of sucking and her nipples were like leather from their teeth. Yes, she showed me and I still shudder at the visual.
These kids were seriously maladjusted, unable to sleep anywhere but their mother's bed, unable to go to kindergarden or anywhere without their mother, still in fucking diapers, etc..

I wonder what they are like these days, they must be about ten now...

 

Reminds me of the time I watched the kids of a friend play rec league basketball. One of the little brothers of one of the players (I would estimate about a 2-2 1/2 year old walked over to his mom, motioned, and she whipped out her boob right there in the gym so he could have a little fucking snack. Here this kid was, running around playing with the other kids his age, got a little hungry and practically asked his mom to whip out her boob and helped himself to his own personal snack bar. Everyone in the gym was staring. It was absolutely ridiculous. If your kid is old enough to ask for a sip from your nip, it's probably time to ween him from the teat.

 

First of all....what the fuck, Time Magazine?

With all of the shit happening in the world right now...this is the best you can do? Fuck this article and the sensationalizing of another "Who gives a flying fuck" issue. Anyone else remember how badass Time was in the 1970's and 1980's?

I am a man, I don't have kids and thus my opinion is fucking irrelevant. If you have kids, breastfeed them as long as you are comfortable. That's what the doctors say, that's what your mothers did and that's what you should do. Health benefits are endlessly subject to a billion other variables, there is no "if you do x, you will be y times healthier." That logic applies to nutritional supplements, weight loss programs, diets and it certainly applies to babies.

This might be another shiny member of the Cult of Babies which is annoying, but as far as fucking kids up....no. Not even close. The tiger mom's kids, the kid who was breastfed until he got a driver's license and the "helicopter parent's" kid will still not be as nearly fucked from the start as the welfare babies, or Bristol Palin's vaginal expulsion, or the kid whose mom was a 16 year old immigrant. Good parenting can't make a kid great, but bad parenting can and does irrevocably fuck kids up. Anyone who tries this hard to be a good mom, will provide her kid with a decent enough head start. It might not be president or go to Harvard, but we all know people with kids who are not even capable of this level of care, dedication or sacrifice. Those kids are truly fucked, this kid might get laughed at, but he'll be fine.

At some level, the mothers have to justify the enormous investment of time, energy and resources in the kid, so they inflate it's ego, importance and expectations. This is "Little Emperor Syndrome", the scourge of a lot of Asian parents. It's annoying to anyone who has to listen to this woman brag about her toddler's SAT performance, or anyone who uses the word "percentile" when talking about a kid with one hand down it's pants and the other hand up it's nose, but rarely more dangerous than that. These kids might grow up to be egotistical douche bags and Daddy's little princesses, but they are a far cry from developmentally challenged.

Finally, what do Americans have against tits? Breastfeed in public. You are feeding your child, something that I think is....kind of important to keeping it happy, healthy and while you're both in public, QUIET. If I happen to see a nipple of a mother nursing a child, fuck me for being an immature, ogling, creepy weirdo. I'm not making the obvious argument about health, nurturing or the difficulties of being a modern parent; I'm saying it's a tit, there are about 8 billion of them out there, it's not there for you to stare at and there is no point about making a big deal of it. This is one aspect of American life that is too hypersensitive: they are tits. From a nipple in public, to Janet Jackson's milkshake on tv for less than .5 seconds, to the fact that a nipple constitutes pornography in many places in the US, it's incredibly out of touch with logic or reason. I hope that eventually we become a much healthier country by not ridiculing any woman with her tits out as a prostitute or inappropriate. Topless beaches, guiltless breast-feeding and the disappearance of pointless soft-core porn all await a much more mature America.

 

One of my wife's childhood neighbors was a big proponent of breast-feeding her kids until the age of 4-5. Weird to hear a kid say, "Mom, I'm hungry" and the he'd latch on. She also was big into La Leche League. Interestingly enough, there's a whole section on breast-feeding and the law.

 

It's not such a weird thing in other cultures, apparently.

It's under "Duration of Breastfeeding."

Anyway, I think this is one more thing that repressive Western culture has fucked up when it comes to general health. I think kids should be breastfed until about two at least, just from a 'this is probably good for them' perspective, but I can acknowledge that without an indolent island lifestyle, this is nearly impossible. Wanting what's best for your kid quickly devolves into, "Eat the fucking Cheerios, you tiny demon spawn!" when you have no time and people are making you feel bad for pulling out your boobs in public.

 

She has one of those faces you just want to slap.