We have just left World Breastfeeding Week behind and right now they publish an article in a Chilean press a lot of reasons for mothers not to breastfeed beyond two years, offered by a midwife, a neonatologist and a psychologist.
There are so many myths that comment and so many mistakes that I found interesting to give a replica. At this point I doubt that anyone believes what they say, but because they are health professionals there will always be those who grant them a minimum of credibility. One of them, the most surprising and I had never heard, is the one commented by the midwife, who explains that "the adequate rest of the mammary glands of the woman must be taken into account".
Should mothers' breasts rest?
Says Yasna Bastías, matron of the Family Health Center of Santa Sabina, who breastfeeding should end at 2 years because milk loses its immunological and nutritional properties over time and why you have to think about the adequate rest of the woman's breasts, who are working since the gestation period. Adding those nine months to the stage of breastfeeding would be producing without rest for three years and adds that so much work will not cause serious illness to the mother and, nor will it bring a significant benefit to the child, it is better to quit.
As you know, breast milk does not lose its properties, never, just as a cow's milk does not lose them even when they spend the day producing milk to be packaged. He doesn't lose them and that's why he remains the best option for a child, his mother's milk. If a mother wants to stop breastfeeding at the age of two and start giving her cow's milk, or if she took both and now she will not breastfeed, there is no problem, but if a mother decides to continue breastfeeding, it will always be better for be giving a human child human milk, which is also that of his mother.
With regard to the rest of the mammary glands, I had never heard it, I imagine that because it is absurd even more can not. The mammary glands are there for that, to produce milk that can be taken by babies of each mother and, if anything, it should be explained to mothers that they are currently too "rested", because it is known that the older a woman breastfeeds the risk of breast cancer and the lower the risk of Alzheimer's disease, for example.
They are for that, women have mammary glands throughout life and it turns out that they only work for a few years. Other organs such as the heart, the lungs, the kidneys or the liver, those that deserve a rest, that work every day for a lifetime.
Prolonged breastfeeding causes nutritional deficits and learning problems
Roxana Aguilar, neonatologist at Guillermo Grant Benavente de Concepción Hospital, says that "Prolonged breastfeeding can cause small nutritional deficits and learning problems, due to lack of healthy eating".
What is recommended is to give breast milk exclusively for the first six months, then start the complementary feeding, with milk still the most important food until the year, that from the year the breast milk is one more food, eating everything the rest, and from the two years that the mother and the child do what they prefer, because it can continue being the milk that the child takes, as another food or to stop being it. This, of course, is if we reduce breast milk to food ... but we all know that it is more than that.
If a child does this, if he feeds according to the recommendations, It makes no sense to say that there will be no nutritional deficit or learning problemsBecause we are not talking about giving exclusive breastfeeding until two years or more, we are talking about giving breast milk, instead of giving cow's milk.
One could also say that giving artificial or cow's milk more than two years is dangerous, because of course, if you only take that ... but it is not said, nobody says it, because it is assumed that at two years a child eats many more things.
If there is a new pregnancy, breastfeeding should be suspended
Look that I thought this was over, well no. They comment that "Uterine contractions are stimulated with the nipple suction, so it should be suspended to avoid complications in this new pregnancy". A myth that It has already been proven false, since breastfeeding and pregnancy are perfectly compatible. Oxytocin receptors in the uterus are not active until the end of pregnancy, so it is not necessary to stop breastfeeding for that reason.
In addition, they add that the transient hormonal alterations that are produced by breastfeeding "They are also another problem that can affect the parent if the breastfeeding process is not completed in time". That they are not alterations, but logical hormonal changes necessary to produce milk and that not, they don't generate problems for the mother, whose body is prepared to "endure" those changes. It would only be necessary for nature to have foreseen that a mother feeds her child while generating serious problems for the mother.
Beyond 2 years, breastfeeding is not a critical period for attachment
Says the child-youth psychologist at the University of Development, Mary Jane Schilling, that "After 6 months of life, breastfeeding is not the only way to form a bond with the child". This is obvious, in fact it is not even the only way to form a bond before six months. There are many ways to create a bond with children and breastfeeding is a great way to do it, but not the only one.
To this he adds, then, that "beyond 2 years, breastfeeding is not a critical period for attachment, because it was already consolidated in the first months of life", from what I extract, seeing the general tone of the article, which comes to say that "do not give more, that you will not contribute anything more at the link level". And no, it is not a critical period, certainly, but there is nothing wrong with doing so either. If the link was already established in the first months, it doesn't hurt to continue feeding him, let's see if now it will turn out that having a good bond for six months is enough for a child.
Breastfeeding a baby beyond two years is no longer a matter of giving him the best food, or thinking about whether we are linking more or less, it is already a custom, a moment between the mother and the baby that yes, that still has benefits, no, that has no harm and that should continue to be done if the mother and the baby want to do it.
Having as there are in Chile health professionals fully aware of the need to support breastfeeding mothers and very capable of helping them in whatever it takes, it is hard to understand what they have found with professionals who continue to explain ancient myths, outdated and that in addition They are able to add myths that, at least here in Spain, many of us did not know.
