AP in EI?

[judecorp]

I continue to be fascinated by the beliefs of most of the people I work with. We're folks who spend all of our professional lives with babies and toddlers, yet they continue to balk at things like extended nursing, nursing on demand, time in rather than time out, and co-sleeping. My colleagues talk about these things like they are ridiculous and the parents are crazy. It drives ME crazy!

Today one of my coworkers was reading one of my assessment reports where I wrote that the child was fussing because he wanted to nurse. She said the following statements in order: Nurse? Nurse from Mom? On her breast? But he's 2 1/2! You're not shocked? You think it's okay? Don't you think it's weird?

I have three families on my current caseload that nurse toddlers over two, one of whom co-sleeps. All I can say is, I'm glad they're on MY caseload!

Comments

[buddhafly4224.livejournal.com]

i really must say... as a preschool teacher who works with 1 and 2 year olds daily, my experience has proved that nursing past 1 (latest) can really have detrimental affects on a child. i totally agree that it can provide an aspect of closness with the mother, but there is no reason a child, at two, should not be drinking out of a cup (maybe a sippy cup. nursing and/or bottle feeding causes a child to have bad teeth, to drool, and can impair speech. the one girl in my class who's mother has chosen to nurse her has late speech dev. and she drools excessively, which she should be completely beyond. she also bites. i feel this also causes a child to be held back from peers socially. in my opinion, there are plenty of other ways to have closeness with your child. if they want to feel body contact while eating, sit them in your lap with a drink and read them a book. try to see it from others' prospective as well.

[judecorp.livejournal.com]

Okay, hold up...

First of all, extended nursing doesn't cause any of those things you mention. Sometimes, poor parenting choices do. There is nothing that states that children who continue to comfort nurse cannot use a sippy cup or an open cup if they are exposed to them. Kids drink lots of things, like juice or water or whatever, that don't come from the boob. Instant learning opportunities. And "bottle mouth" is caused by poor dental hygiene, not nursing.

Drooling can be caused by a number of factors, including weak oral-motor skills, teething, overactive salivary glands, etc. (but tends to be the former). Nursing doesn't make you drool.

Nursing does not impair speech. I don't really see how expressive language development can be hindered by comfort nursing. Oh sure, when you have a boob in your mouth you can't really do a lot of talking, but the same goes for a hamburger. Speech delays can be caused by so many factors: weak oral-motor skills, troubles with motor planning, hearing loss, lack of language stimulation, brain damage, delayed cognitive skills, autism spectrum disorders, etc.

I also don't see how extended nursing causes social delays. Children learn social skills through interaction with other people and children, and unless you're nursing 24/7, you can still have lots of exposure to other people. Oppositely, extended nursing helps to establish a strong mother-child bond, and it is this stable bond that becomes the foundation and basis for all further social interactions.

It sounds like you have a bad experience with a particular child (or children) who have a number of things going on and also nurse. It's possible that these other things are related to parental strategies or actions that also include nursing, but occasional nursing does not cause these concerns.

My professional life is spent working with infants and toddlers with developmental delays. Some of the kids nurse, I would say 85% (or more) do not.