Breastfeeding Blog Hop: Breastfeeding and Holiday Challenges

My husband and I are transplants to Pittsburgh–I grew up in Central Pennsylvania and Corey is from metro NYC. So holidays for us mean travel to stay with extended family. Obviously, loading up two kids and driving 6 hours is going to be stressful. One of my kiddos is a nuring baby, and I know lots of nursing mamas go through the ringer at holidays…

I hope this isn’t too obnoxious to admit, but my extended family is pretty awesome about breastfeeding. I don’t really have any breastfeeding holiday challenges!

When my first son was wee, my nephew was just a few months older and my sister and I took great joy in sitting around nursing together. My mom took pictures. We joked about nursing each other’s babies.

Now, I have a wee nursling and my cousin does, too. We already had fun nursing together at a family birthday party in May. How fun will it be to nurse our slightly-older babies at Thanksgiving? Which baby will pop off more frequently?

cousins celebrating at Christmas

My cousin Meredith (opening some baby Toms) and I (clapping) were very pregnant last Christmas. This year, we’ll nurse our babies on that same couch at Thanksgiving!

I think it all comes down to the fact that my mom and aunts and sisters and cousins (lots of women in my family!) are just really supportive people. If someone’s doing Weight Watchers, we all eat lighter fare. If someone’s been scorned by a lover, we’ll unfriend him on Facebook.

If someone decides to breastfeed a baby, we all ask her if she likes ice in her water.

It helps that we don’t have a lot of boundaries in my family. Thus, it’s really not that odd for one of us to pull out a boob in the middle of a conversation about incontinence. It also helps that we live far away, so there are lots of willing hands to help my older son use the potty or get his meal if I need to nurse my baby. These folks want to get their kid fix in while they can!

I will say that, despite an abundance of helping hands when we visit our families, I find it hard to get in a nap while we are traveling. I am just so happy to see everyone and catch up! Who could sleep? Since I’m up nursing my six-month-old many times throughout the night, this makes for some long days. But, then again, I’m not getting up for the day at 5am with my three-year-old, because he’s off watching television with his Ninny.

I’m looking forward to the trips home for the holidays this year. Just remind me I said that when I’m complaining about packing and getting the house ready for my departure!

What about you? Have you found the holidays to be supportive? Leave us a comment and tell us your experiences!

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