Breastfeeding Our Toddlers: A Full Term Nursing Series

“It’s not like they wake up on day 366 and everything has changed. They wake up and you do the same thing you did the day before. You just go with it. Did you nurse on day 364? Then who says you have to stop on 365? No one. Baby doesn’t realize that they have aged to the point of no more nursing. We make our kids grow up too fast, nurse that baby full term!”

“Normalizing breastfeeding, especially extended breastfeeding, isn’t going to happen over night,” McCain says on her website. “The more it is talked about and the more it is seen, the more it will become the norm. Breastfeeding is a huge passion of mine, as I nursed both of my kiddos during the toddler years. While not everyone is able to, or wants to breastfeed, the more that we work to normalize it for future generations, the better. Women are still told to go sit in a bathroom and feed their baby. It is 2017. That is unacceptable. My hopes with this series is that more eyes will be opened to see just how natural and beautiful it is to nurse beyond infancy.”

“I had an appointment with my primary care doctor the same morning I took a pregnancy test and found out we were pregnant with baby number two. I went in, still slightly shocked because it took us two years to get pregnant the first time and we never expected it to happen so soon this time. The first thing my doctor told me was that I would have to stop breastfeeding right away. She listed all these reasons why, and if I didn’t know people that had successfully done it, I would have honestly been freaked out. I messaged my OB that day, asking her opinion, and she responded exactly the opposite. I’m 22 weeks pregnant now, and my OB and midwives have been nothing but supportive about us continuing to breastfeed. The changes your body goes through with pregnancy don’t make it easy to continue breastfeeding. Sore nipples, nausea, an ever-expanding belly, I find that I have to be gentle with myself. I set more boundaries for how long we can nurse, we do a lot of counting or singing songs. My daughter has become an expert negotiator, “Just one more time Mommy…””

“I think people often unfairly judge things they don’t understand. Some people will always criticize parenting choices different from the ones they made. Exposure and education are the ways to change minds.”

What an amazing gift to these brave mothers, but also to the world.

“I want to help break down stigmas and let women know that they aren’t alone,” McCain says. “I want women to be full of self-love and fight back against societies narrow-minded view of beauty.”

For her own children, she is leaving them a legacy of love. McCain has an 11-year-old daughter and 6-year-old son, who are both growing up in a world where mothers are celebrated for their innate beauty, exactly as they are. Where self-love is a legitimate act. How inspiring!

If you would like to support her work, you can find McCain’s book, which contains the first two years of work from the project, over on Amazon: The Honest Body Project, Real Stories and Untouched Portraits of Women & Motherhood.

See the full album of images and stories HERE. You can also find The Honest Body Project on Facebook and Instagram.