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Go Ahead! Nurse That Toddler!

© Shawna Smith

The phrase “Extended Breastfeeding” conjures up many different images, depending on who you talk to. There are many people who actually object to a toddler being nursed; they offer as explanation that if they can “ask for it, they’re too old.” However, this is just not the case. If you used that kind of logic with all food, you could never feed your child anything once they learned to talk. How absurd!

Extended breastfeeding is popularly defined as nursing beyond one year. (That alone amazes me – they’re still babies at one year!) I can’t tell you how many people have told me that I should have weaned my daughter at 12 months to cow’s milk. Why? On the morning of her 1st birthday, was a cow somehow magically better able to nurture my child than the very milk designed for her? Why should my daughter drink breastmilk from a cow when she can have breastmilk from a human? She’s not a cow!

But I digress. Let’s discuss the physical and emotional benefits to breastfeeding past one year, the way babies were designed to nurse.

One of the reasons for weaning that people give is that the milk doesn’t have enough nutrients. This is simply not true. Research has shown conclusively that second-year milk is not much different from first-year milk. Going beyond, into the third year, breastmilk still provides ample amounts of protein, calcium, fat, and vitamins – all essential to a growing toddler. And the nutrients in breastmilk are obviously going to be much easier for a toddler to assimilate than those in cow’s milk or toddler’s formula. It makes sense, nutritionally, to continue breastfeeding rather than switching to either artificial alternative.

Of course, breastmilk also still provides powerful antibodies and immunities to disease. I can give you a firsthand illustration of this. Recently my husband and I contracted strep throat, which is highly contagious. My 17-month-old breastfed daughter did not get it, despite the fact that she is in constant contact with me. The doctor told us that it was directly because I am breastfeeding her, and she is receiving my body’s own antibodies to the infection. (In fact, we actually got the strep throat AGAIN after finishing our first course of antibiotics, and our daughter has still not caught it! Thank goodness!)

Studies have shown that the immunities in breastmilk actually become more concentrated right around when a baby starts walking (and coming in contact with more germs), so that older children who nurse less will still receive high levels of these disease-fighters. You certainly won’t find cow’s milk or formula that will provide the immune boosting substances found only in breastmilk.

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