The Woes of Weaning

This week I ended a very special ritual with my daughter. I've finally weaned her from the breast and onto the cup. According to my baby book, it's an optimal time to do it. (And if the book says so, I believe it...I haven't followed anything so precisely since the instructions for assembling my IKEA dresser.) And so, we've been weaning for weeks, dropping one feeding at a time. Mother's Day was to be the final nursing session. I chose that day partly for its symbolism, and partly because it always seemed so far away.

And then it wasn't.

And now this relationship has ended. The first of many endings to come in our mother-daughter relationship, and realistically, probably not the most dramatic. I imagine other endings will hit me harder: the first time she doesn't want to hold my hand in public, the first time she spends a night away from home, the day when she stops finding my Poison CDs cool and "retro." But this is the first time I've had to let go, to grant her some independence. And for me it's a glimpse into part of what motherhood is: putting what's right for your child ahead of what's necessarily comfortable for yourself. I have to be honest: she likes her cup. She likes her new source of milk. She doesn't seem to notice that anything's changed.

But I've noticed. I miss that moment, after I've nursed her and she looks up at me with those drowsy, contented little eyes, and radiates with a smile that no one else sees. In that moment of silent, clandestine communication, I bend my head toward hers and rub her tiny nose against mine, eliciting a giggle and a smile of delight. And now, I've been replaced by a cup and a cow...and probably one of those irritating California cows from those annoying milk commercials. It's not that I begrudge my daughter her sippy cup. But it's hard to nuzzle with a baby who's chugging like a pledge at a frat party. She seems happy enough, but it's not the tender mother-daughter moment I've grown accustomed to.

Before I started nursing, I didn't know if I'd make it three months. Now it's been thirteen months, and I'm sad to let it go. But I'm trying to focus on the special moments ahead of us. The first time she lets me read her a book. Our first time baking cookies. The first Mother's Day she hands me a card she's written all by herself. One day I'll follow her lead and blissfully move on from those cozy cribside moments where we bonded for so many months. Until then, watch out sippy cup. Hell hath no fury like a Mommy scorned...