TIME magazine and breast feeding a 4 year old

If I lived in a starving country, yes, I would breast feed my child as long as I could. Since I don't and my child is able to get his nutrition from the foods we are lucky enough to be able to purchase, no, I would never breast feed my kid over the age of 1.5, maybe less time.

I'm certainly not judging that opinion because I think people should do whatever they feel is best. But I would like to point out that, although you can meet nutritional requirements through food, only breastfeeding offers benefits to the immune system. A human child does not fully develop their immune system until the age of 7. That is one of the reasons that the World Health Organization recommends a *minimum* of two years. There is more to breast milk than just nutritional content.

*rolls eyes* I breastfed both of my kids. One was 2 1/2 years old, the other 3 1/2 yrs old when they weaned. It is ridiculous to me that our society is in such a hurry to have its children grow up. Thanks to many advancements in health care, people living to be 90 and older is no longer rare. If my kids can't be babies for longer than 12 mos of their life, that is incredibly sad. 4 yrs old is hardly adolescent. Breasts are functional above anything else. If people would stop viewing them as t**s and sexualizing every part of the female anatomy, this wouldn't be such an issue. Who cares how long a mom nurses her babies, or if she never nurses at all?!? Being a responsible parent is what matters. *rant over*

I find it ironic that the one of my four kids that was breastfed the least amount of time...( 4 months) , is the healthiest of them all. He will be 9 yrs old in August and he has been on antibiotics 2x his whole life, and once was for an infected toe, so not even an illness.

My oldest daughter was nursed till she was about 10 months, and she was the sickest, so many ear infections she had to have tubes put in when she turned 18 months...

The immunity benefits I am not so sure I believe comes from the milk, I think it's more about allergies and nutritional value. I was told that the colestrum is what holds the mothers immunities, not the milk, so after day 3 of nursing.... the baby has gotten all of the immunities it will get.

While it's true that an infant gets a wealth of immune benefits from the colestrum, the milk holds immunity qualities also. But it is limited to the immune system of the mother. Like, if you, as a nursing mother get sick with say the flu...if you are nursing through this, you are passing along the anti-bodies that your body generated to fight the flu, therefore, hopefully protecting the nursing child from getting it. Also if you receive say a flu shot during the first 6 months of your child's life (when they are too young for the shot)--the immune properties will keep the nursing infant protected.

I however, have a crappy immune system, so I'm not sure what I good I did passing this on to my children. And there is always heredity and individuality that play a role. Your oldest may have been destined to be sick more based on other factors (even if not breastfed at all).

I am not going to question how other parents raise their children, but the cover of the magazine was ridiculous. I am not a mother yet, but stuff like that is the reason women who choose to breastfeed have to put up with so much crap from the rest of the world over what's appropriate and what isn't. That picture made my skin crawl.

This ^ but I did breastfeed and I am a mother.

I have nothing wrong with a woman breast feeding her child in public or otherwise. Breast milk is the best nutrition and food for a young baby. That said, when the child is old enough to climb a step stool and open your blouse and pull the breast out HE IS TOO DAMN OLD TO BE BREASTFEEDING!

Well SAID!

If we're talking about it, TIME magazine accomplished its goal, which was obviously to spark controversy and sell issues.

My almost-3 year old would throw a hissy fit if he didn't get a daily breastfeed. As long as he keeps asking, I won't refuse.

Kudos to any mother not bowing to the unfair peer pressure to give up too early.


*He's very tall for 3 lol

Great...teach him early to just throw a fit until he gets what he wants...that's smart.

I know everyone has their own opinion. . . .But I just think its gross the way she is doing it. Maybe when they get that old . . just pump and poor it in a cup or something if you must. Personally I think its too old to be breast fed

Have you ever pumped? I exclusively pumped for my 2 year old when he was a newborn. It was a nightmare. Quite simply, pumping sucks. It's time consuming and inconvenient. If I were still giving my toddler breast milk, there's no way that I'd pump. There's no telling what he'd get into during that time. :-P

How is it any less time consuming or inconvenient to breastfeed?

I personally found the cover pic to be disturbing-what are your thoughts?

What's "disturbing" you - the fact that the mother is breastfeeding a 3 year old or that she had someone take a photo of her doing it or that its printed on the front cover of a magazine?

The first one doesn't bother me at all, the other two I agree. How is that kid going to cope with the abuse he's going to get from his friends? I hope the mother got paid enough to make her feel a bit better about what she's putting him through.

EXACTLY. To all of you that have BF that long, I'll bet you don't have pictures of it, and especially don't have them circulating around the world, WITH names attached. When that kid becomes a teen, it WILL be found, and he will be ridiculed until the day he dies.

I'll be breastfeeding my son until he's 3 or 4.
I'm 19 years old, and I made that decision the moment he was born - i want to give him the best, i produce plenty of milk, why shouldn't i? it's not disgusting, it's natural. sure, not everyone wants to, and that's completely their choice, but just remember that the international weaning age is between 4-7 years; it's only because breasts have become so sexualized that we find it 'weird'.

The international weaning age is between 4-7 years old because of necessity, not option.

Most of the world isn't priviledged to the abundance of food resource that the Western World has. In that, if you have a loaf of bread and a few vegetable to last a week, doesn't it make more sense to feed yourself and breastfeed your child from your body than to try and stretch your already stressed resources between two people and not provide either one of you with the calories or nutrition necessary for survival.

I'm not knocking your decision, your parenting choice is your own. I am just saying that when I hear that reasoning from women who live in the Western World, I find it flawed and misguided.

its like saying "the international marriage age is 15" or "the international drinking age is 12" or "only 1 out of 500 homes in the world have indoor plumbing so there is absolutely nothing wrong with pooping in the streets".

Some things that "the world" is doing isn't necessarily what the Western World is doing and that needs to be accounted for when making that argument.

I refuse to drink the koolaid just because somebody tells me that everyone else in the world is doing it. Do whats right for you and yours because it is what you want to do. Good luck with your decision, my bff tells me breastfeeding helps with post baby weight loss so maybe you will lose the baby weight and some, I would love to hear the results 4 years from now.

*Like*

We live in 21st century US, where we have plenty of food available to most citizens; there is no need to BF a kid past 1-1.5 years. If you want to give it breast milk, great, but just pump it, I know most of the story was about the actual breastfeeding part, but almost everyone commenting here that do agree with giving a child breast milk, do so for health reasons, not for "attachment parenting".
Breastfeeding an infant in public is fine, but if you actually go out and feed a child in public, you're just looking for attention and debate.

The reason you see toddlers and kids still breastfeeding in places like Africa is because they don't have the option of going to a grocery store and getting food, and sometimes not even growing/raising their own.

Yeah, I get the whole "to each their own" and "what works for some doesn't work for others" and even though this doesn't affect me at all, that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to have an opinion about it or that just because my opinion differs from others, that I have to keep quiet. I agree with the OP that the COVER is certainly disturbing, but that's obviously what Time wanted...the reason I find it to be that is because of how many shots they had to take before the got the 'right' one...and at that point, the kids was either not eating anything but just had his mouth hooked on the breast, or thinking he was at an all-you-can-eat buffet. And the caption "Are you mom enough?", that just seems like they're saying if you DON'T feed that long, then any other way is the wrong way.

And yes, we're mammals, but we're not animals. We don't mate to keep our species from dying out (we're not in any danger of that for quite some time), we have babies because we just 'want one' (save for 'accidents')

All of this just fits with this modern mentality of just letting kids do whatever they want, whenever they want, and disguising it as being the 'natural' way.

I'm against Time Magazine for pitting mothers against each other. And doing it on Mother's Day.

Well said!!

Why is it disgusting? That's stupid.

hum because he was to big! And the way she posing it looks gross! I beleive in breast feeding but it comes a time to stop and i think that was time to stop. I feel they took a beautiful thing and made it gross..

it's natural to breast feed your baby, I dont know why people do over dramatic things to get people fired up an talking. I also think by 4 years old a sippy cup should be provided.

Pump it and put it in a cup...you wouldn't keep giving a 3-7 year old milk in a bottle

because it would ruin their teeth. We shouldn't be deciding how long to breastfeed for based on the limitations on a bottle.

At my job I see lots of 3-5 yr old still getting a bottle.