Link to the Channel 4 programme's website...

http://www.channel4.com/health/microsites/F/family/parenting/qa_breast.html

Veronica believes, that children should decide for themselves, when to stop breastfeeding."

Veronica, is fucked up in the head, her children, as a result, will most likely be as well.

This particular manifestation of oral imprint, is rare, though not so much in primitive or in an unmodernized segment or group. Bet this woman tends to keep her kiddies under watchful eye, 24/7, not many social contacts, and can just bet if most met her, they'd see the tweaK, but not be able to call it anything but, "Jeez, that woman and her poor kids."

Veronica's oldest is chubby in the cheeks, too. Mom probly' came running every time she cried, and put the goddamn nipple in her mouth as a cure-all.....

Hello???!! Babies have different cries, not all of them mean hungry!!!! These poor kids will turn to putting things in their mouth, when life gets life-like...... but for now, safe in la la la la land, with whack-job mom!.......(where in the fuck is this woman's dickless wonder of a husband!!??)

It's fucked up.

Oh jeeezus, it does get better..."Scientists believe...(love that lead up to disaster) that extended breastfeeding, can produce higher IQ's.......Choggie believes, that fishing with dynamite, can produce a higher that normal haul, whilst fishing!! Fucking experts!!! Common sense be damned, the results are in!!!!!

This needed to be on the Evolution in Action channel.......

I think it's 50/50 with the collective choice Choggie. The first thing I thought was definitely 'What the fuck?' but it could easily fit into either.

Mental.

*nsfw (for those that might get in trouble for a boobie shot at work)

as an advocate for BF'ing, this goes WAY beyond what is considered normal and healthy for a child. listening to your child's, sometimes subtle, clues will alert you when they are reading to wean themselves .... animals do it, as do we. i BF my children and they certainly reaped the benefits health and intelligence-wise, but this young child is no longer getting those same rewards.

allowing her child access to her breast for comfort is damaging as her child is not learning to comfort herself. i feel it's actually selfish on the mother's part ... keeping her child from self-actualization and awareness.

This video has been marked NSFW (called by gold star member LadyBug)

Breast milk is made for humans... it stands to reason that breast feeding children longer than the western culture recommends is quite a bit healthier for them.

strange

c'mon . . .the act of breastfeeding is nsfw?

There have been feed-ins at Starbucks and airports recently for attitudes like . . . .GOOD LORD ALMIGHTY!!!!!THAT'S A TEN YEAR OLD!! MY EYES!!!!!make it go away!!!! MAKE IT GO AWAY!!!!

There is really funny clip from the show SCRUBS concerning this exact subject matter. Mothers, when your child is old enough to articulate how much he enjoys the breast, it is time to break those ties.
(*dashes off to find Scrubs clips)

Absolutely agree with you, LadyBug. My wife BF our two kids until they were about 2. Our youngest stopped just shy of that and it all worked out fine. Our kids almost never get sick and I am sure there was some good immune system boosting going on there somewhere.

nipples not big? at T minus :29 I thought she was mouthing a vienna sausage.

my kids BF until 2.5 or so... and it saved my youngest daughters life I am sure

I think our society's a bit messed up over this. We can't look on this seemingly well adjusted family without disgust, but we can go to the store, buy some other animal's breast milk that has been forcibly expelled by giant sucking machines (along with some other fluids) and we'll drink that with coffee, thanks very much. Make mine a double!

lmfao rick ... that's why i chose my words carefully and did not say that breasfeeding was nsfw .... but a passing glance from someone at work my not realize that's what is going on ...

old_spider ... i absolutely agree that breast milk is by far healthier than anything else an infant or toddler can receive ... but there is nothing more that an 8y/o child is getting from breast milk at this point in her life ... it's actually psychologically UNhealthy.

I think you're too old when you start asking for it to-go, like in a thermos.

My son bowed out of BF at around 9 months, lost interest. This woman has MAJOR separation issues, and has done a wonderful job of wrapping it up in modern new age ideals to make it sound as if we are the people with issues. ...sigh... but to each their own.

...

Milkior? I think I just found my new LiveJournal user name.

I knew a family that had two kids, 5 and 7, who were both still breast-feeding. And I'm sorry, but the entire family was fucking weird. Maybe I'm drawing a syllogism, but just sayin' is all.

For more 'late breastfeeding is creepy' goodness, please see

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=647584428

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

What a great Sift. I agree that the kids seem pretty well-adjusted. Much more so than the ones I see in the candy-aisle at K-mart.

FTR my kids both breastfed until 2.5 years. I tasted it- and found it too sweet. Like melted ice cream.

For a species whose infants are born the most vulnerable and take the longest to reach physical maturity, we have evolved a culture which seems to negate these needs and are all to keen to remove babies and children from our beds, breasts and home environments.

This family is incredibly brave to expose the most intimate aspects of their life, considering how abhorent their choices would be seen by the majority. Their choices do not deserve the virulent attack from Deputydog, Choggie et al.

These kids are going to be warped by this way-overlong breastfeeding business. The mother says "well I'll certainly stop before they go away to college" but she's missing the point -- it's already way past time.

She also misses the mark when she's talking defensively about how much society loves breasts otherwise, cleavage and so on, "but they'd give me a hard time about this" (total paraphrase btw). That's about sex appeal, whereas this is about raising your child. Hell, the girl who's still suckling is nearer in age to pubescence than she is to her birth.

none of you actually know the "truth" about the best age to breastfeed. just thought i'd remind you, seeing as some people seem really really sure about it.

Persephone, it more than deserves the attack.

Deputydog,

If you had breastfed a few kids to at least the age of 2 (WHO recommends this for optimum child development) you might have more compassion for these people, because you would appreciate the benefits of an extended breastfeeding relationship and not feel so threatened by such a 'different' choice.

Fascinating sift.

The "truth" is 2.5 years. I am not going to cross dag's wife. Will take my pink diamond away.

I am glad that the discussion is getting away from the ad hominems of "she's mental" and "those kids are screwed" and I think that persephone has a very, very valid point when he/she/they point out that there is a whole baby industry built on telling families that only certain ways to raise children are correct and that if you don't purchase certain products or la leche it for 20 years . . .well . . .your child will certainly die.

This mother's behavior and her willingness to televise it is certainly socially aberrant. It reminds me of nudists in a way. I don't want to go so far as to say that they are stupid, mental, or damaging the kids, but at the same time, I don't want to see a guy without pants when I go to get a bagel in the morning.

I agree with ladybug that the health benefits at this late age are nonexistent and that this whole story reflects more on the mother's need for connection/attention than the needs of her children.

And the "mango" girl is so cool.

Persephone, who said I feel 'threatened' by it?
This woman clearly needs to let go and encourage her children to stand on their own two feet. The kid's nearly 8yrs old and is still being breastfed - just because it's still physically possible doesn't mean it's the way forward.

I'd also hate to see the stick her kids probably get at school.

Bad parenting in my opinion.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

For these kind of human traits - I always try to imagine what would be *natural* without any cultural or societal influence for humans. If there was no stigma or shame attached, would humans breastfeed to a much later age? I think the answer is yes.

In primal societies - a woman would be almost constantly lactating, providing nutrition for whoever needed it in her brood - an artificial age limit would just not be in the picture. If a 12 year old kid was sick, going back on the breast might be the only medicine available.

It's amazing - woman carry containers of repenlenishing high-energy food on their chest! What an incredible adaption.

I know for a fact that in New Guinea a woman may breastfeed a runt piglet if the sow does not have enough nipples.

What I'm saying is - try to step out of your Victorian influenced Western mindset of "what's right" and view breastfeeding as feeding, not sexual peversion - no matter what the age or situation.

Dag, I pretty much agree with what you're saying there and I don't disagree with the fact that it's 'natural'. The problem I have is that we aren't a primal society, these kids are gonna be faced with problems as a result of this facet of their upbringing, whether it be in school or later life. I think it's short-sighted of the woman to encourage or even bow down to her 8 year old's demands when she's well aware of the society we live in.

I don't think we need to talk about nipple-starved runt piglets in polite company, but good points nevertheless.

The phrase "bow down to - year old's demands" is one I have heard often over the years from people concerned that we were going to 'fuck up'our kids.

Many of Dag's and my parenting choices, including breastfeeding to age 2.5, carrying our babies around in a sling most of the day and having them, as toddlers and now older children, sleep in the bed with us, attracted negative comment from family and 'friends'.

I'm happy to say that these comments have died down now that people have been able to see over time that we haven't 'fucked them up'.

It's easy to target this family for breastfeeding until 8, because it really is extraordinary, but what's frustrating is that you could just about substitute any age in that phrase and someone will use it to condemn others for their choices.

As a society we're so hung up about what's appropriate for all manner of human needs at specific ages. Don't forget that breastfeeding provides for many needs other than, (thank you Dag) "feeding".

It is just as important as an emotionally nurturing tool, like cuddling a crying baby, or like the plastic pacifiers that most people are willing to stick in their kids mouths, but it's a lot more soft and pleasurable! And no, I don't feel that being a human pacifier is in any way degrading!

I can also say with certainty that if I wasn't feeling run-down when they were 2.5 and instigated the weaning period myself, they would have both been content to feed for much longer. The fact that they were both able to walk and would approach me several times throughout the day to feed, is a pretty strong indicator that it's something they really needed.

All the negative comments essentially stem from human society's most fundamental problem, which is people's inability to separate wrong and right from their subjective ideas of icky and nice.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

Uh-oh, Mrs. Dag has outed herself. ;-)

I also think that a lot of the sexual fixation on breasts comes from males who were weaned too early. (I'm a rump man myself - what, too much information?)

In Central Asia, we never had a question of how long you should breast feed a child, the child usually stops on their own.

Rump here too.

There's an classy bit about a grown-up breastfeeder in this post by gluonium

http://www.videosift.com/video/Little-Britain-season-2-ep-1

starting at exactly 17min in.

...Is it wrong that this gave me a boner?

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

SaNdMaN, I suspect you are a victim of premature weaning.

Wierd, though, isn't it! I'm too young for kids of my own, but my little sister stopped at about 11 months, and I thought that was normal.

Oral Imprints-We all got em. Some got the extended version, through the attached mom, running with teat whenever precious cried-some got hardly any,left to cry and cry, while perhaps Mom was working and day care took the reigns early, or she was turning tricks for crack in the next room..
Orality-Why do adults put things in their mouth for comfort??
Why are there an inordinate amount of obese in the United States today, in contrast to 30-40 yeas ago??
Parents have become quite out of touch with the fundamental dynamics of child rearing....the direction of societies in the past 100 years has affected this loss of basic, natural, common sense awareness-Try to imagine, taking you and your family in a time machine, back to sayyyy, 1855, to a larger town or city in a western culture. You would not find passive/aggressive hoards of meatbots, and whining kids controlling their parents....or a mystic surrounding serial killers, or socially anemic children, sitting on a couch all day killing heavy equipment or zombies, or folks who think that everyone should be nice and not hurt anyone's feelings ever, or a compound built especially to house teens that are entering the system, ready for prison by twenty......ETC ETC ETC

THE NIPPLED ONE'S DAUGHTERS - BUT ONE SYMPTOM, OF A GREAT TRAUMA-
Wonder if Rome just prior to oblivion and the dark ages, had a similar level of insane sensibilities??

now THAT's breast-feeding

I am feeding both my children -19 months and 6 months at the moment and plan on doing so until they self wean.

I find it interesting that so many people are disgusted and replused by feeding an older child, but (i'll bet) none of you actually find drinking the milk of a differnt species, that was never intended for human consumption when created fine. Just because it comes to you in a sterile plastic container with a picture of a nice smiling, waving lady on the front does not mean it never came from a smelly, sweaty dirty cow in a padock somewhere and was created for a baby cow.

How can you say that those children are not receiving benifit from the milk they are recieving? It is far better for them then cows milk.

I read through the blurb in a baby and todler cookbook I have and breastmilk contains
*protien
*fat
*essential fatty acids
*carbohydrates
*vitamin A
*thiamin (vitamin b1)
*riboflavin (vitamin b2)
*niacin (vitamin b3)
*vitamin b12
*folic acid
*vitamin c
*vitamin d
*vitamin e
*iron
*calcium
*zinc

Many of those are not found in cows milk, as baby cows don't really need to be to clever, they just need fatening up.

I could go on about this for ages....

Just got to add... the reason we drink cows milk isn't that scientists have found that it is a nutricinaly superior, it is that we can easily farm and make $'s off cows and it wont kill most of us if we drink it!

It is NOT the normal thing for us to drink, we just do it because it is excepted that we do, and that it is what our parents used to put onto our cereal in the morning.

mf22, where were you, 9 months, 2 weeks ago? Your support would have been much appreciated then! I still appreciate it. Hang around, there's more where this one came from.....

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag.(show it anyway)

*promote for the great discussion.

Promoting this video back to the front page; last published Thursday, April 5th, 2007 1:18pm PDT - promote requested by dag.

kinna burned on the latest few rounds of heated discussion are we dag???....What you need is a big juicy titty!!!!(*sings Aussie lullaby gently in ear and rocks in unison with draws)

Tags for this video have been changed from 'wtf, holy moly, child, mother, please no' to 'wtf, holy moly, child, mother, please no, milkior' - edited by calvados

It may be nutritious but parents still control what a child eats. A list of vitamins and minerals from here to Estonia could be met with normal food.

I had a friend who was breast feed until he was 5, and although it is nutritious, and sounds great tasting, he is kind of messed up in a lot of ways.

First of all he is obsessed with woman's breast, of course straight men are, but his obsession is to the point of sexual deviance.

All of his relationships with woman have failed because he needs mothering, constant comforting, constant reassurance, and lashes out like a brat whenever he doesn't get what he wants.

I'm not saying the breastmilk itself is responsible, but I think the type of mothering that leads to prolonged breast feeding could be. Kids have to realize that they can't always get what they want. The world isn't going to give them everything they want and sometimes parents have to help them understand that.

And I know you may wonder why a child shouldn't be able to seek all the solace he/she needs in its parents. That's fine, give your child solace, but don't give them empty solace without preparing them for real challenges that might lie ahead. Weaning a child is not cruel. Whenever something we love is taken from us it is upsetting, but we get over it by finding new ways, both internal and external, to satisfy our needs.

That old friend of mine has ridiculous expectations of his would-be partners, expectations no self-respecting woman would ever met. I feel sorry for the woman who one day bends backwards for him.

I'm a father of three (4, 3 and 1.5) and have seen within the extended group of mothers that the few that practice attachment parenting tend to be doing for reasons other than what they truly think is best for the child. In a large number of cases it seems to stem from the mother having an inability to let go, or deriving to much self worth from the children needing her. This, I'm sure, is not the case all the time, but certainly seems to be the case more often than not in those that we know.

That's not to say that Western society in general hasn't swung a too far the other way, and kids are born and then chucked into full time child care almost as soon as they can, but in a large part that tends to be driven by financial pressures and the need for both parents to go back to work. (yes, you could go on and on about priorities and well, do you really need $X to live comfortably etc. etc... but that's another discussion).

I just feel that the attachment idea of thinking that babies/toddlers are the best authority on knowing when they should sleep in their own bed, or when they should ween, or when they need to start using a toilet are all a little bit of ascribing a tad too much knowledge onto them that they don't really have. I think some people have the problem of putting an adult mindset into a child and thinking that they have this amazing innate knowledge which I just don't think they do.

Kids need boundaries, kids need rules, kids do feel most happy when they know/think that their parents do indeed know best and that they are there to keep them safe and secure. Not there to wait on kids every need. (Admitted this video is only showing the breast side of things, but I would imagine that they ascribe to the belief that their kids get to decide a whole gamut of things that they really aren't in the position to).

Having said all that, will this damage the kids? Turn them into freaks? It all depends on the extent of the 'always being there for my kid' thing... the mothers who drop everything any time their kid wants anything are going to find they have a little brat that doesn't know the meaning of no. Mothers who are just very nurturing but still lay down a good set of boundaries and rules will probably end up with happy, well adjusted kids.

Everything in moderation.

Bleedingsnowman and spoco, fascinating. What is this woman getting out of keeping her eight year old child at her breast? Does she need to be 'needed' too much? And what woman would date a man who was breast fed 'til he was twelve? I think a degree of the sexual aspect was removed by showing us a woman with daughters. Children definitely have an innate sexuality, albeit innocent. Hopefully.

Ohh controversial topic!

All I know is that even chimpanzees reject their young when they're too old to breastfeed. Mother usually pushes the baby off even when the baby is screaming and crying.

So I'm guessing it's a natural thing. And What this woman is doing is unnatural me thinks.

"But she is not my wet nurse. She is my butterfly."

Great discussion. Just a few thoughts:

- would anybody consider it a good idea in general that children decide themselves what they eat and when?
- when weaned at an early age adults don't remember being breastfed, but if one would be able to remember, what would that do to one's sex life?
- "they don't care that they are stretch-marked and saggy..." doesn't that sound at least a bit sick?

Interesting that you think that your mate that was fed til he was 5 is "kind of messed up in a lot of ways." because of the way he was fed as an infant/child... are you saying that all men who are obsessed with the breast must have been fed for an extended time? My hubby was formula fed after 4 months and he LOVES my boobs, and still gets much guidence from his parents and hates making big decissions without their approval... whereas I was fed for 4 1/2 years and have been bought up to be very independant from my parents, and also don't have any sort of sexual perversions.

There are many people (especially men) who "needs mothering, constant comforting, constant reassurance, and lashes out like a brat whenever he doesn't get what he wants" regardless of how they were fed as a child/ how long they were fed for. There are many aspects of their upbringing that would influence that.

I just wanted to point out what minerals are found in breastmilk, I realise that they are found in many foods, but it was more because of the comment "but there is nothing more that an 8y/o child is getting from breast milk at this point in her life" Infact, next time you have a nice cuppa, it would certainly be much better for you if instead of reaching for that carton in the fridge I leaned over your coffee.....;)

"they don't care that they are stretch-marked and saggy..." Pregnancy tends to do the stretch mark thing to your boobs... not feeding. I had a stillborn first up and after her my boobs were alot saggy-er then pre-pregnancy days, and (obviously) I didn't get to feed her. I don't think (and my hubby aggrees) that they are any more saggy now and I have been feeding for the past 19 months. Oh, and I have never had a stretch mark and I doubt that they would come because of feeding for a long time, you would be more likely to get them when your milk comes in (in the first few days after having a child) and it feels like you have watermelons on your chest.

Persephone - 9 months ago I was 3 months pregnant with my Daughter and probably hanging over a toilet bowl feeling sorry for myself and trying to keep a 10 month old boy out of mischeif. Don't worry though, if I had read this (wish I had)I certainly would have posted back then

I wonder why everyone is scared to death to admit and accept the controversial?? yet affectionate gesture of this woman towards her children. I think society should have a limit on objecting to individual decisions matters of an intimate nature. If a mother feels that she needs to show her love for children by extended breastfeeding even if others consider it as abnormal I don't think there is anything sinister involved in it. It's just a matter of opinion. One might wonder why am I defending this seemingly sick action of a psycho woman but it's not like that. I have personally known at least two extraordinary breastfeeding moms who extended the natural activity to almost unusual limits by normal standards. One continued breastfeeding her daughter till she reached the age of 13 and another did the same with her son as well as daughter till they were 13 and 12 respectively. When these children developed their own social circle and started spending more time with their friends the urge to breastfeed naturally subsided and so far there have been no observable negative effects. I wonder if people will like to scrutinize such people's lives under a microscope and blame the slightest thing out of place as result of whatever they don't feel right about, in this case, extended breastfeeding. Do people who have a normal upbringing, education and circle have not been known to become victims of some psychological aberration later or make a mess of their lives, so what should be held responsible for that?? I think it is purely subjective to hold breastfeeding responsible for abnormal psychological development in such children which is nonetheless unproven so far.

*documentaries *promote

Promoting this video back to the front page; last published Wednesday, January 16th, 2008 5:38pm PST - promote requested by jwray.

Adding video to channels (Documentaries) - requested by jwray.

I can see it now, the new line of pokemon, featuring milkior "I CHOOSE YOU MOLKIOR!"

I think it's weird, but I doubt the children will be any different because of it. Unless they decide to start hiding it.

>> ^persephone:
The fact that they were both able to walk and would approach me several times throughout the day to feed, is a pretty strong indicator that it's something they really needed.



Something they need, or something they were used to?

Children don't have a damn clue what they need.
They do, however, know full-well what they want.

There is nothing to be gained by breast feeding your child that long. (8 years, from the video)

There really isn't anything new I can bring to the table here, but I just wanted to say that what this woman is doing is appalling, and I am convinced that it will be detrimental to her children in later years.

most *unnatural video in the nature channel.

"It's better than mango".... hahahaha

someone add this to femme and sexuality TIA

I think our society's a bit messed up over this. We can't look on this seemingly well adjusted family without disgust, but we can go to the store, buy some other animal's breast milk that has been forcibly expelled by giant sucking machines

Right on! It's no suprise that human milk is better for humans than cow's milk. There's nothing wrong with extended breastfeeding between consenting people.

What a great Sift. I agree that the kids seem pretty well-adjusted. Much more so than the ones I see in the candy-aisle at K-mart.

I see so many kids in grocery stores being abused by parents who threaten to abandon them or hit them.

creepy

Creepy is just an all-purpose insult used to express xenophobia and ignorance on the part of the person uttering the word.

Dag, I pretty much agree with what you're saying there and I don't disagree with the fact that it's 'natural'. The problem I have is that we aren't a primal society, these kids are gonna be faced with problems as a result of this facet of their upbringing, whether it be in school or later life. I think it's short-sighted of the woman to encourage or even bow down to her 8 year old's demands when she's well aware of the society we live in.

All those resultant problems, if any, would be the result of the baseless social stigma, not the act itself.

Nowadays when I breastfeed it's usually combined with tequila and a lemon, and it's usually not my mom... usually.

K, I know that this discussion ended a year ago, but in case anyone ever reads this I have to point to one thing that makes no sense to me whatsoever. Several people have said that continuing to breastfeed a kid for comfort is destructive because it teaches kids that they can "get everything that they want" and that they won't learn to "comfort themselves," etc. Wait a second. Why is comforting a child with breastfeeding different than giving a child a hug? Kissing her, stroking her hair, rubbing her back, cuddling her, giving her a mug of hot chocolate or a bowl of chicken soup? If your 7-year-old comes up to you asking for comfort, I really hope that you don't tell her, "No, you're way too old for that. Comfort yourself. You can't get everything that you want."

[redacted]

9 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.