Nursing a toddle sure is different than nursing an infant

April 12, 2007 by Barbara.

Watching Melissa nursing Zachary brought back warm and fuzzy memories of nursing Reid (after we finally figured out how to do it). At one point Zachary was flailing his arm causing him to have difficulty nursing.  Melissa gently held his hand. I bet she didn’t even notice that she did it. La Leche League and Dr Newman talk about the “nursing couple” and when they interact so effortlessly, it sure seems an accurate description.

Nursing Reid, of course, is very different - more like learning to square dance in a grade 5 gym class. You both have an idea of what should be happening at any given time and you need to negotiate a bit to actually do it. Reid has been getting calmer as time passed. From the time she was maybe six months old, she squirmed. By the time she could walk, she was practically an acrobat, without ever having nursing. Not even when she balanced on one foot, stuck her foot in my face or decided my arm around was too restrictive. Recently, she has become more snuggly. I’m wondering if the foot-in-the-face move might come back once Reid is wearing sandals again since last year the sandals she had caused her feet to smell and I reacted with an “ooh, stinky feet” once and she giggled and that set a pattern.

As we drove home on Monday, we were singing “Hi, Ho the Dairy-oh!” and Reid asked if the cows, who give us milk, have the milk in their breasts. I said yes and that their breasts were called udders. Later, she asked if I had milk in my breasts “like farm animals”. Yep, that’s me. Like a farm animal. ;+)

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