no more nursing

Ezra quit nursing about a month and a half ago, around the beginning or middle of April when he was ten and a half months old. I wish I had written down the date.

 He was my best nursing baby. But once he finally got the hang of solid foods, he started slacking off in the nursing department. That boy just wanted to eat, the more the better. My supply went down and down until I worried he was dehydrated based on my pitiful diapers. So I started supplementing out of the two grocery bags full of pumped milk in our freezer - I could force him to take a bottle, but not to nurse. (After my babies don't need the late night feeding at 10pm, I let them sleep and pump instead. So I'd been pumping since he was four or five months old!)

But on that day in April he just up and quit, preferring the bottle. The little punk. So I began pumping in the morning and at night to try to avoid formula, for the health benefits of breastmilk and because free is a whole lot cheaper. Pumping twice a day was getting old quick. I only did it for about a month. 

On Monday May 12th Terry and I had rented a Redbox movie (47 Ronin - meh). I was pumping near the end of it since it was getting late. Terry remarked how it would be nice when I could quit pumping entirely and be done. I agreed and said how I'd only go another couple of weeks so I'd have enough milk to last. That, plus, I was sort of hanging on to the whole idea. Even though Ezra was done, at least I could still pump. 

Well wouldn't you know that the very next morning, after I had gotten up early as usual to have time to pump and gotten all ready, my pump would not start!

 My first thought was that I guess this means I had to be done. Perhaps God had been getting me ready the night before. Then I remembered that we had an adaptable plug that perhaps would work. I searched and searched, found it and plugged it in. Nope, it wouldn't work. So I had to admit that I was done. I sent out a commiserating text to some friends asking them to rejoice and weep with me. Ha! :(

So it turned out that I did not have enough frozen milk to get us by until Ezra turned one. Thankfully a friend gave me a can of formula she received for free. Then we bought another one for $5 off.

On May 20th, my milk ran out. 

And we took pictures to commemorate the night. How silly. But I'm sad he's so big! And I just wanted to be able to remember the details about my last baby growing up. Sniff sniff.

The last bottle of real milk.