Weaning (From the Breast) with Love / 19 Months Old.

Hi. Wow, 19 months of breast feeding is amazing. My girls didn't want to nurse past 12 months. If you are wanting to dry up your milk, the best and fasted way is to put raw cabbage leaves in your bra. This will make you leak so be prepared. Otherwise, you just do not stimulate your breasts at all and it will dry up on its own. This is a more painful process but will work in a week or two. Good luck!

Pump to relieve pressure, drink sage tea, use cold cabbage leaf compresses. If you go through depression from the dip in hormones, try taking St. John's Wort or Motherwort in a tincture.

You can pump and store or "wean" yourself. If you are still becoming engorged during the day, and you want to stop it from occuring without storing more, time will help. Typically, your body produces the most when the baby wants to eat. If you have consistent feeding patterns in the day, and you are becoming engorged during those times, and its painful, express a little (until you are comfortable) and then stop. Your body will get the cues from your daughter, as to when to produce. After about a week of not nursing or excess pumping, your breasts will cease becomin engorged (or leaking) during the afternoon.

Hi Beata - well the main questions would be: do you want to stock and store milk to continue to feed her? How long and how often? Will you introduce other milks or have you already? If you just want to stop altogether than do nothing and you will dry up in a few days to a week. If you plane to supplement or want to stock/store than you can pump and store in the Lamsinoh plastic milk bags especially for breastmilk storage (these are waaaay stronger than the gerber ones) for i think up to a year in a deep (committed) freezer, up to 6months in a traditional freezer. Then you can pull bags as you need them - to add to cereal or other food, hurricane protection & backup, or put in a sippy cup.Thaw in bags in fridge overnight or in a bowl of water. hope this helps!