Warning Maureen, there may be swear words :P
Funny story...well to start with. Mark was talking breastfeeding with a couple of guys from work today. One guy was saying how one of his daughters or daughter in laws was still feeding her 4 year old and the other daughter or IL never fed any of her kids. The other guy pipes up with how selfish the second one is and how good it is to BF. I was pretty impressed with the story, given both men were in their 50's. And that Mark's contribution to the story was that the WHO recommends 2 years etc. I ask him smugly if he bragged about my efforts with the older kids, thinking I already know the answer and he says 'but you only fed J for 18 months!'. (My highlight not his)
Oh my fucking god!!!.... He still has no idea why I was in tears. Fuck me if I can get it right. I got so much crap for feeding my older boy with the mainstream circles I hung with at the time. While I am proud of my breastfeeding efforts I have always felt like a crap mother to my biggest one. My 'experiment'. I really was pretty crap at this job when he was little, but I can truly say I did the best I knew at the time. I still struggle with him bigtime and this was on top of a day I'm not particularly proud of. By the way TWO AND A HALF YEARS was how long he was breastfed!!! NOT 18 months. Another thing I am majorly pissed about. My husband didn't even know how long I fed our child for!!! Anyway despite I suspect him not really knowing why, he has apologised. It's all got me thinking because it's hit a sore point for some reason. I think I need to spend some time with my big boy, I really miss him and I'm sick of being angry with him and just yelling all the time. Maybe kinder and daycare are too much for him? I think I forget all the time that even though he is my oldest he is still only 4 years old. So all in all maybe a good thing, a wake up call..... Still pissed off that he doesn't know how long I fed him for. In fact he missed a WHOLE damn year of booby goodness that he thinks I deprived him of!
So I'd like to know...do your husbands/ partners know how long your kids were breastfed for?
7 comments:
Oh love don't be so hard on yourself. I feel the same way about my relationship with my big girl though. It's hard.
I asked hubby about the breastfeeding. For B, who I fed for 2yrs9mo, he said "ooh, over 2 years, 2 1/2 maybe?". So pretty close I guess.
For T, who I only fed for almost 5 months, he said "not long, 5 or 6 months cos you cracked the shits with it." Now THAT bothers me! I did not "crack the shits" - I struggled persevered and got really bad advice and ended up with depression.
Men. What can ya do.
Bloody Men! I think every single one of them is chronic with foot in mouth disease.
Two and a half years is a massive effort by today's standards and you should be very proud! And I agree with Sumara, please don't be so hard on yourself. You're already 100 miles ahead of a lot of other parents because of the start you HAVE given your kids - including co-sleeping, slinging and endless amounts of love, hugs and kisses.
Kids will always tend to test the mother's patience because they know that the love is safe, it's not going away. They know they can push the boundaries with you as they trust your love. That's a huge compliment to just how right you are doing... if he didn't trust your love, he wouldn't risk it.
*big hugs hun*
thanks guys!! I know you are right, best I can and all that.... I actually have tried some new strategies that seem to be working well..touch wood!!
And yeah, 2.5 years for my first baby WAS an awesome effort, hell the princess was 2 years 3 months and I still think that was good!
my DH passed the duration of BF Quiz. it helped that he knew i'd weaned DS1 early in the next pregnancy so he could figure it out that way.
it's just lucky kids are so resiliant hey, i also feel the first baby is a tester baby, a trial run, a rough copy... poor first born children. i was a first born and i turned out ok... love that excuse!!!... all us first borns are ok, so i have faith my first born will be too.
PS 2 and a half years feeding is a mammoth effort. now that i'm back at the start again 2 years seems like such a long time...
another first born here...as you know. In fact I know an awful lot of first borns, maybe we nuts stick together? :P Funnily enough Mark is *not* a first born...I'll have to analyse that hahaha!
If you are reading this I finally figgured out how to post comments. I did try ages ago and gave up thinking I had to join or something. I do read your Blog stuff with interest and wish I could make my life sound as interesting ;-) Anyways back on topic, you are a role model when it comes to breastfeeding and do a bloody good job of it all!
thanks Sara, that means a lot to me! :)
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