Travelling Far Before Weaning

By then your baby will be 9 months and it will be an entirely different situation then he will be eating foods by then and your milk supply will start to dwindle a little so you will not need to pump as often so i wouldn't worry about it but how bout taking him with you my sister who has four boys and breast fed all of them has always had a baby attatched to her in baby byorne and has traveled all over europe she never let it stop her. And as far as you not being yourself yet no mother is the first three months you are still in a daze you should start to feel like yourself soon and will hopefully start to get a full nights sleep soon!
Take care and don't worry you'll be fine and your baby will be fine!
From H.

If you can pump for at least 10 minutes when you have the time or when you are engorged, that should be enough to relieve you and keep your milk going. You don't have to use the electric pump every time. Use hand expression which can be just as effective. Try it out before you leave and see how you do. By the age of 3 months, your baby will probably return to the breast, if that's what you want. It might take a little time but if you want him to nurse at the breast, he will sense that. Once he starts nursing at the breast again, your milk supply should beef back up.

Hi S.,
I know you already responded, but I thought I'd add my 2 cents since I didn't see these comments in your advice. I definitely say go for the trip! If you are still breastfeeding at that time, I would bring an electric pump and get a plug adaptor kit for the power issues for the country you are going to. (unless you have a manual one that works very well).

If you will be drinking wine or other alcohol, this dehydrates you and so does flying. You will want to work hard at staying hydrated while there and especially on your flight home if you want to keep your milk supply up. Also, your son will have started solid foods by that time, so that will decrease his nursing and your supply as well. I travel a lot for work and I did this successfully until a trip when my daughter was 10 months old. I was working long days on that trip and couldn't pump as much as I would have liked, and when I got home she weaned herself - she found it a lot easier to drink enough from the bottle than from me.
Go and Have fun!

Are you travelling w/ you baby too? Europe is so open about breastfeeding. It is hard to tell how ready your baby will be to wean at that time. A lot is based on his cues too. I thought I could plan everything out myself. My son is 3 and a half. He just needed to breastfeed longer than I thought he would but I have gone w/ his cues too. Every baby is uniquely different w/ their own set of needs.
If you are going without your baby you will want to prepare him for the separation. He is still an infant. Books that I found very helpful were available from most libraries or ordered through bookstores and recommended by La Leche League. They, La Leche League, have great information too online at their website. If you can, going to a meeting of theirs may help you and your baby to prepare for this. That is the most important part, having your infant ready for an elongated separation with ability to satisfy his needs and soothe & comfort himself through the bottle and with a caretaker who knows him/who he is comfortable with.
I understand your concern with your husband feeling that you are being lost with caring for your son. It is part of the readjustment in the relationship w/ him too. Maybe you can find a way to do something that you used to do together while baby is asleep or if you have family or sitter who you trust w/ you baby to watch him while you are out together? Also, maybe Dad can do some things uniquely w/ the baby to form your relationship as a threesome-?
Good Luck!

This is an ideal time to travel WITH the baby! You're a family now and should be together. Baby will travel free and is pretty low maintenance at this age. You won't have much fun leaving your baby behind.

I think you might find that by February, your son might have a difficult time with you being away for so long (a week), especially if you are still breastfeeding. A quick weekend trip away would be more manageable for you and for him. He will be much older by then and much more aware of his feeding/nursing routine. Also, if you are traveling for fun, I doubt you would want to stop every 4 hours to find a place to pump, and you would have to pump for a long time each time if you want to keep up your supply. In my opinion, it would be a surefire way to have him weaned by the time you return, if that is your goal by then (and mommy and the comfort of her boobs vanishing for a week is not a method of weaning I would recommend). If you want to go, bring him along! Otherwise, I'd say that you'll be putting him under a lot of distress while you are away....

So I am going to assume that you are b/f exclusively and not pumping and giving bottles? Do you think that you could start to do this too, maybe at 6 months, give a bottle of pumped milk a day until he gets used to having a bottle? Also, have someone else feed him so he gets used to getting the bottle from someone other than you. Have you ever tried pumping and bottle feeding before? I started this very early with my twins so they went back and forth from breast to bottle very easily.

As for your husbands concerns, I can see that if he he isn't involved maybe he feels left out? Another good reason to pump and let your husband feed the baby. I really feel for husbands because they are not involved with the pregnancy and often they are left out of feeding.

Why not take the baby?

Hi! I went to Europe on a school trip (I'm the teacher, not a student!) when my daughter was 9 monhts old and I was breastfeeding. I was very nervous about it as I knew I wanted to (try to) breastfeed for the first year. I, too, got a lot of advice that said "bring the baby" but it was not practical. I was going to take an electric pump but wasn't sure how the current converter would work with it. I ended up just taking a handpump and using it whenever I could. I never had a lot of trouble with engorgement and the breastfeeding was always pretty easy with my daughter, so I'm sure both of those factors helped. Anyway I used the handpump for 10 days - the "oddest" place I pumped was the bathroom of the Louvre museum!! - and everything worked out fine. I had milk stored up in the freezer for when I was gone, so you want to think about that if you haven't already. I did feel like my supply wasn't as much as it usually was, and we did have a little trouble when I first came home. My daughter was just starting to get teeth, and I think because my supply had lessened some she was having some difficulty and there were some biting issues. But after about a week we were back on track and we are still happily breastfeeding at the age of 13 months. So my advice is this - if it's something you want to do, both the travel and the continued breastfeeding - you'll be able to work it out. My daughter didn't display any negative behavior towards me when I came home or anything, just the sucking/biting problem. It wasn't super easy to keep up with the pumping, but I made the time to do it because I knew I wanted to continue. If you have any questions, feel free to message me since it sounds like you'll be in about the same place I was when you go. Oh, and I was gone for 10 days. Good luck and have a great trip!! And don't feel guilty at all - I figured going at nine months (when she wouldn't remember) was better than going when she's a little older and would remember that I left :-)

Will you want to be gone from your baby for a week when he won't be a year old yet? Why not take him?

you can totally do it. I used to travel across the country every other week (and be gone for a week) for work while I was still nursing. it's not fun, but it's doable. get yourself a good electric pump (one that takes batteries so you can use it on the plane too, oh the fun of pumping in an airplane bathroom!), and establish a regular pumping schedule. This is key! you should try to pump at the same time every day to keep up your supply. I was actually able to freeze the breastmilk and bring it back for my baby, not sure if that will be an option for you. hotels (at least in the US) are pretty accomodating about that stuff and may let you use their industrial size freezer for a nice deep freeze, so the milk can last on its way back to the little consumer. I stored the milk in the little ziplock breastmilk bags, which works out pretty good, and brought it back packed on ice. airlanes have no restrictions on carrying breastmilk, even if the baby is not with you!
If you don't plan to bring the milk back, then you just have to pump & dump (sad, but still good, as you will be able to go back to nursing when you get back).
Make sure you have enough stored for the little guy before you leave, so pump extra when you can for a few weeks before your trip, so that you have at least a week's worth in the freezer for while you are gone.
If you are on vacation and plan to be out and about all day, that may prove a challenge in terms of finding a quiet place to pump, so just make sure you know where you are going every day so you can "map out" a places to pump. going back to the hotel 3 times a day may not be a good option.
As for the baby going back to the breast after a week of the bottle, my daughter never had any problem with that.
Have fun!