To the moms who have survived nursing and weaning, thank you.

I was sitting on the couch staring at one of the first pictures ever taken of my now 19 month old son. His fresh-from-the-womb, bare skin warming my chest. His deep brown eyes awakened quite literally to a whole new world, yet his eyes found the only thing he was interested in seeing, his momma. 

"I miss his eyes." I said to my husband. No longer trying to pretend I was okay. 

The week had taken its toll on my heart. Just one week before our 2nd little miracle was due to arrive, my first baby decided he was done nursing.

The reality I’d never again nurse my baby boy, coupled with pregnancy hormones and multiplied by the fact my first baby was soon to be the baby no more, overwhelmed me. 

And caught me by surprise.

I never intended to be the mom who nursed her baby for 19months. It just sort of happened. My goal with nursing was to make it a year. When the one year mark came, I breathed a sigh of relief, and without a real plan for weaning, our nursing times just continued.  

Before the end of nursing surprised me with sadness, the continuation of nursing surprised me with joy. 

It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy nursing the first year of my son’s life. It’s just the joy was always wrapped up in nursing pads, nursing bras, and nipple cream. It was drowned out by the rhythmic hum of the pump and clouded with questions: Am I producing enough? Do I have enough stored away? Should I be drinking more water? Eating more lactation cookies? 

Somehow the pressures of nursing disappeared right along with that first birthday cake.

As my son grew in his independence, I grew in our enjoyment of our special time together before bed. We may have gone in a million directions throughout the day, but I always knew bedtime was coming. The world’s concerns seemed to disappear into the depth of his eyes in those 10 minutes before bed. 

Until the night I was jolted back to reality.

Maybe it was a change in the taste of my milk as my body prepared for the new baby’s arrival. Or maybe it was the only way my son could get his point across to his blissfully unaware mom.

Either way, moments after he began nursing, he abruptly stopped. And as effortlessly as he says, “Momma”, my sweet, first born son loudly proclaimed, “YUCK!”. 

Yep. 

It all came down to this.

After wanting nothing but the breast every 2-3 hours the first few months of his existence. After all the cluster feedings, comfort feedings, morning snuggles with milk, and bedtime routines.

Yuck.  

I knew this day was coming.

Yet somehow the suddenness, the finality and, shall we say, bluntness of it all was too much. 

I spent the first thirty seconds laughing at how peculiar it all was. Thirty seconds of laughter followed by sheer appall. The nerve! My appall gave way quickly under the certainty this was a normal and good transition that all babies go through. 

Then followed the night of sadness.

A night of grieving the change in season, the ending of something special. 

A night of missing his eyes. 

You know what got me through it? 

Thinking about all the mommas out there who have gone before me. 

I thought about all of you with your grade schoolers, your high schoolers, your babies who now have babies of their own, and I took heart.

If you can do this, I can do this. 

Unless you all have me fooled, I don’t think every former nursing mother is sitting up each night staring at the newborn picture of her baby and crying.

I believe somehow you’re all okay.

I don’t understand it, but I believe it. 

This isn’t the first time you’ve paved the way where my heart didn’t understand how to go.

There was/is so much I didn’t understand about motherhood. I look to you to help me find my way. 

To help me find the courage to work through and get help with the initial pain of poor latches, mastitis, and milk supply issues. The strength to get up one more time to feed my hungry baby in the middle of the night. The hope to believe tomorrow, sans breastfeeding, will begin a new season full of its own joys and blessings.  

So thank you, mom whom I will never meet, for paving the way. Thank you for being part of an extraordinary group of women who give me the confidence each day to know that it’ll be okay. 

I’ll be okay.

Even when the only word that can describe how I feel is “yuck.”