What It's Like to Give Your Child Their Final Feed

Blogger and mother Leanne Sexton of Mothers Groupie recounts the last time she breastfed her son.

I am a little delicate today because last night I gave my youngest son Charlie (9 months) his final breastfeed. Waaaaa! I have been slowly weaning him onto formula for a few months now but last night the feed went for all of 7.23 seconds and I knew that it was the last one. I felt an instant sense of loss, quietly shed a little tear and acknowledged that it was the end of an era nourishing my babies — potentially the last time . . . EVER!

Charlie LOVED breastfeeding and so did I — I think we would have continued until he was 5 (totally kidding) if I had enough supply. He was a natural and latched straight after birth without any fuss. I loved how he would hold my hand and stroke my face and look at me with his big blue eyes — I was high on love and hormones and never wanted it to end. It was a bonding bonanza! As some of you know I went to great lengths to push through with feeding. We were on Mortillium, Fenugreek, Boobie bikkies, co-sleeping, napping and shoveling as much food into me as possible but he would still cry for food after every feed. I guess I was never designed to be a dairy cow or a wet nurse. When Charlie was waking up every hour through the night starving I knew that something had to change and I had to start weaning him onto formula.

Some may think — what is the big deal? He's getting fed . . . you get your life back — truckloads of fine wine, date nights, sharing the early morning feed with hubster etc. . . all of that is brilliant and having a cuddle whilst bottle feeding is lovely but I will never get that special "we are in our own world" moment between the two of us back ever . . . AGAIN!

Anyhoo — we'll be fine and I know it's for the best but breaking up is always hard to do!