When to wean your baby is undoubtedly a very personal decision. Factors that may influence your decision about when to wean your baby include your baby's age and nutritional needs, your family history of allergies and your financial situation. Other things to consider include your baby's readiness for weaning and your own desire to potentially avoid using a bottle by weaning close to one year of age.
While some mothers may be going back to work after 6 weeks and cannot pump while at work, weaning your baby from the breast will include starting a bottle first. Other stay-at-home mothers may decide to nurse for a year or more and by the time they wean their baby, a bottle is no longer needed. The truth is that there are health benefits for you and your baby the entire period of time you are breastfeeding.
American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Guidelines on Breastfeeding
The AAP recommends that mothers exclusively breastfeed (without supplements or solids) for 6 months and continue for another 6 months. Some mothers decide to start supplements and start solid foods around 6 months of age. But there are good reasons to wait longer before completely weaning your baby, such as if you have a history of food allergies in your family or you want to give your baby even more immunities as well as nutritional benefits.
Weaning Your Baby to Avoid a Bottle
Some mothers decide to breastfeed until their baby can easily take other liquids from a cup. Depending on your baby's motor development, that is likely to be between 8-10 months of age. This is an easier transition since parents are able to bypass the need to start a bottle, which requires the need to wean your baby from a bottle as well.
Weaning Your Baby after 1 Year
Breastfeeding longer than one year is a good investment in your baby's health and immune system. While long-term breastfeeding is not a common practice in the US, there are many places in the world where it is not unusual to breastfeed for 2-3 years and even longer. Even if your baby is getting other solids and table foods while they are breastfeeding, the added nutritional component in breast milk is hard to match. In addition, even if your toddler is only nursing once or twice a day, your breast milk is providing invaluable protection and immunity against diseases, viruses and health problems.
Don't forget that mothers also have health benefits from long-term breastfeeding. Only one of the many health benefits for mothers is if they breastfeed a total of 18 months over their lifetime, they can significantly reduce the risk of pre-menopausal breast cancer.
Waiting for Baby's Readiness to Wean
Another factor to consider when weaning your baby is his or her readiness to wean. One of the worst times to wean your baby is right in the middle of huge transitions such as your return to work, moving to a new home or bringing another baby into your family. When your baby or toddler becomes interested in other things and can be soothed in other ways, he may be more responsive to being weaned.
Sometimes the baby or toddler just decides on his own when he no longer wants to breastfeed. Sometimes mothers are the ones who are ready to wean their babies. Unfortunately the readiness to wean or be weaned is not always mutual.
If you are tempted to rush your baby into weaning too soon, remember that your baby is only little for a short period of time. Just like every other developmental milestone, eventually he will move past a desire to breastfeed and new challenges begin.
