Re: Toddler Manhandling Breasts

[K.B.]

I have no advice for you since my baby is still little. But I think that is
so funny. Sounds like a typical male. I hope I don't have the same problem
in the future. Right now I find it annoying the way he licks my nipple while
he's nursing or uses me as a pacifier.
Kris
"Sarah" > wrote in message
om...
> Hello, I have a weird question here. I have a 14 month old, who is
> still nursing every 1-2 hours during day, and every 4-5 hours during
> night. No problems, except for one annoying thing: He LOVES to
> fiddle with my nipples--(I jokingly call it "Twizzling my Nizzles", in
> reference to current urban slang)constantly and pretty aggressively.
> I often try to stop him but he whimpers and gets really upset. I have
> necklaces I wear, or I hold his wandering hands, or I keep the bra on
> and shirt down on the side that's not being nursed, but he'll often
> just railroad right through and find my nipple and start fiddling,
> rolling, pinching, pulling, flicking, picking, and poking. What's a
> girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> gets upset if I try to stop him? Your experience is appreciated!
> (especially in case I might be getting pregnant again soon and not
> sure if I can take it with more sensitive nipples!) Thanks, Sarah
>

[Marion Baumgarten]

Sarah > wrote:

> Hello, I have a weird question here. I have a 14 month old, who is
> still nursing every 1-2 hours during day, and every 4-5 hours during
> night. No problems, except for one annoying thing: He LOVES to
> fiddle with my nipples--(I jokingly call it "Twizzling my Nizzles", in
> reference to current urban slang)constantly and pretty aggressively.
> I often try to stop him but he whimpers and gets really upset. I have
> necklaces I wear, or I hold his wandering hands, or I keep the bra on
> and shirt down on the side that's not being nursed, but he'll often
> just railroad right through and find my nipple and start fiddling,
> rolling, pinching, pulling, flicking, picking, and poking. What's a
> girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> gets upset if I try to stop him? Your experience is appreciated!
> (especially in case I might be getting pregnant again soon and not
> sure if I can take it with more sensitive nipples!) Thanks, Sarah


This is an issue of basic respect for you are a person. Being a mom does
nt been you get to be phsyically abused by your child. A fourteen month
ld os olde enough to understand consequences. When he does the behavior,
you put him down, say no and walk away. He'll qyuckly learn that if he
twiddles, he will not get to nurse.

[iphigenia]

Sarah wrote:
>> What's a girl to do, especially since he loves
>> doing it so much, and really gets upset if I try to stop him? Your
>> experience is appreciated! (especially in case I might be getting
>> pregnant again soon and not sure if I can take it with more
>> sensitive nipples!)

My son started doing this when he was around 18 months, which was
frustrating because by that point, he'd developed strong little hands and it
was a bigger struggle to keep them out of my bra!

My advice is this: Do not let him. If you don't want him to twiddle, do not
let him, ever. If he can sometimes do it and sometimes not, he won't get the
idea that it's not allowed. Just keep pushing his hands away gently.


--
iphigenia
www.tristyn.net

[iphigenia]

K.B. wrote:
>> I have no advice for you since my baby is still little. But I think
>> that is so funny.

Believe me, it's not funny. It may sound like it, but it's incredibly
irritating, and it's very frustrating when nursing sessions become power
struggles to keep little hands where they belong.

--
iphigenia
www.tristyn.net

[Michelle Podnar]

My DD has started to try to do this, and I just keep pulling her hands away,
and try to give her toys or other things to look at. If she get upset, the
nursing session is over. If she is hungry enough she will "get down to
business", if she is just snacking, or pacifying, she will quickly get
interested in other things.

I would just continue to say no, and divert his hands, if he persists, end
the nursing session. He will get the idea really quickly.

Michelle P
"Sarah" > wrote in message
om...
> Hello, I have a weird question here. I have a 14 month old, who is
> still nursing every 1-2 hours during day, and every 4-5 hours during
> night. No problems, except for one annoying thing: He LOVES to
> fiddle with my nipples--(I jokingly call it "Twizzling my Nizzles", in
> reference to current urban slang)constantly and pretty aggressively.
> I often try to stop him but he whimpers and gets really upset. I have
> necklaces I wear, or I hold his wandering hands, or I keep the bra on
> and shirt down on the side that's not being nursed, but he'll often
> just railroad right through and find my nipple and start fiddling,
> rolling, pinching, pulling, flicking, picking, and poking. What's a
> girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> gets upset if I try to stop him? Your experience is appreciated!
> (especially in case I might be getting pregnant again soon and not
> sure if I can take it with more sensitive nipples!) Thanks, Sarah

[JoAnna]

Sarah...

My DS was a Nizzle Twizzler ;o) and I think he only stopped when he found
out how much more affectively annoying BITING is...ugh. Good luck!

[Leslie]

I have immense trouble with this, too. If I were you I would try putting a
stop to it now before it is a strong habit. My baby is past two and he CANNOT
(I really think he can't) nurse to sleep without twiddling. I put up with it,
but I don't like it. If I had it to do over, I would have gone the nursing
necklace route before twiddling began.


Leslie

Emily (2/4/91), Jake (1/27/94), Teddy (2/15/95), and William (3/5/01)
http://www.babiesonline.com/babies/o/onemoremakesfour/

"Children come trailing clouds of glory from God, which is their home."
~ William Wordsworth

[Jenrose]

"Sarah" > wrote in message
om...
> Hello, I have a weird question here. I have a 14 month old, who is
> still nursing every 1-2 hours during day, and every 4-5 hours during
> night. No problems, except for one annoying thing: He LOVES to
> fiddle with my nipples--(I jokingly call it "Twizzling my Nizzles", in
> reference to current urban slang)constantly and pretty aggressively.
> I often try to stop him but he whimpers and gets really upset. I have
> necklaces I wear, or I hold his wandering hands, or I keep the bra on
> and shirt down on the side that's not being nursed, but he'll often
> just railroad right through and find my nipple and start fiddling,
> rolling, pinching, pulling, flicking, picking, and poking. What's a
> girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> gets upset if I try to stop him? Your experience is appreciated!
> (especially in case I might be getting pregnant again soon and not
> sure if I can take it with more sensitive nipples!) Thanks, Sarah


Okay... this is one of the times when you get to start practicing for the
time when your 16 year old whines, "But I really WANT to drive your car...."

While I do believe that nursing is a right, and that young children should
be allowed to "be babies" for as long as possible, I do draw a line at
gratuitious and unnecessary boundary violations. It is not necessary to your
son's mental or physical health for him to twiddle your nipples. It will not
damage him, at 14 months old, for you to set a gentle-but-firm limit that
says, "I'm sorry, those are mine. You may nurse. You may put your hand on
the necklace. Stop fiddling with my nipple."

It's okay if he gets upset. Just be very, very gentle, very, very firm, and
very, very, VERY consistent. Positive redirection is great, but sometimes
you simply have to grab his hand, gently but firmly, and say, "No." Over and
over and over again. But every time, no exceptions. It's hard to go from the
"never cry it out" of the first six months or so to the limit-setting that
is vital to human survival in later months, but it's a necessary transition
for both children and adults.

For me, when my daughter hit that age and it was starting to bother me, I
made myself some strip-proof nursing clothes. That is, I took non-nursing
dress patterns that fit fairly closely, and did a "flap/double slit" nursing
do (the slits are simply bound button holes. The flap is simply the top half
of the bodice pattern piece.) on them. The dress was tight enough fit around
the chest area that while we could get a flap up to nurse one side, it was
physically very difficult to get the otherside exposed at the same time.
Dresses, rather than shirts, because they COULDN'T be pushed up (if I was
sitting on the skirt....)

You want to make him happy--that's good. But it is not a healthy lesson for
a child to learn that he can keep doing things *to you* that you'd rather
not have him do, things which are uncomfortable for you and which violate
your physical boundaries. And if it upsets you or makes you uncomfortable,
he knows it... and if you let him keep doing it anyway, sometimes but not
others, while communicating that you don't like it, it will tend to
escalate.

It's never to early for a child to learn that "No means no". The corollary
is that you should only stop him or say no if you're prepared to follow
through consistently, every time. Otherwise you just teach him to ignore
you.

With my daughter, I didn't really set verbal limits about nursing behaviors
at all until she hit two... but when she turned two, I said, "Look, from
here on out, nursing is optional. If you want to nurse, treat me nicely. No
gymnastics. No twiddling. Stop when I say stop. If you respect my body, you
can nurse a long time. If you make me uncomfortable with nursing, we'll
stop. If you do it a lot, we'll wean." And then I backed my words with
actions... if it was uncomfortable for any reason (ranging from reasons like
"I'm on my period and my nipples are tender" to "she's latching and
unlatching every 30 seconds") we stopped for the next while.

But when she was younger and twiddly.... I just held her hand when it
bothered me, and did NOT let her through even if she wanted through, if it
was bothering me.

See, I'd been around nursing 4-year-olds, and kids who were 4 or so and had
weaned a year or two before... several of them were very well behaved, but
others were constantly sticking their hands down their mother's shirts to
fiddle with their nipples. I knew that it would drive me UP A WALL to have a
4-year old groping me. I don't mind nursing a 4-year old, but I do NOT want
a 4-year-old twisting my nipples, ever. So I stopped it very early. I never,
ever let her just stick her hand on my nipple for comfort--if she wanted
comfort that much, she could nurse and I'd let her, but it was not tolerable
to me to have someone sticking their hands in my clothing. Yet other moms
didn't seem to be bothered by it. I was very clear that my problem was not
with the concept in general, but simply that it was not something I was
comfortable with my child doing to me.

I didn't use "nursing clothes" at all until my daughter was a year old or
thereabouts. But from the time she was a year old until she stopped nursing
in public, nursing clothes were pretty important to my ability to set
physical limits about acceptable nursing behavior.

Jenrose

[Jenrose]

"JoAnna" > wrote in message
...
> Sarah...
>
> My DS was a Nizzle Twizzler ;o) and I think he only stopped when he found
> out how much more affectively annoying BITING is...ugh. Good luck!
>

Biting is something I laid down the law on when she was about 6 months old.
Completely involuntarily... she bit me, I dropped her (on the bed) and
"landed" downstairs. Left her there for a couple minutes, too. She only did
it twice and never bit me again because "mommy going away immediately" is
about the most profound negative consequence a child can face at that age
when they're used to having their every whim met. I think I screamed, too. I
also did not nurse her again until my nipple stopped hurting.

(Lest people worry that I left a baby on a bed unattended... the "bed" in
question was a futon on the floor of a babyproof room, the "drop" was about
6 inches and she did not crawl until she was 10 months old, so was not
mobile at the time. Were the same thing to happen with a taller bed, I
probably would have "dropped" her in a crib or playpen.)

Jenrose

[Stephanie and Tim]

"Tracy Cramer" > wrote in message
...
> On 13 Jul 2003 06:30:46 -0700, (Sarah) wrote:
>
> > What's a
> >girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> >gets upset if I try to stop him?
>
> Unlatch him, tell him he may not nurse if he's going to twiddle and walk
away.
> EVERY SINGLE TIME HE DOES IT.
>
> I'm serious, since I'm sitting here with my 3 yo who has been a twiddler
for TWO
> YEARS and I was never able to break the habit because I didn't get tough.
I just
> got used to it, and now when those moments come when I think I'm gonna
lose it
> if she twiddles one more freaking time, I tell her she has to stop
nursing.
> Twiddling is her thing for falling asleep, so I know if I put a stop to
it, nap
> time/bedtime will be delayed, but if it buys me enough time to get out of
that
> moment of insanity, I do it.
>
>


Honestly, I cannot understand this, though it has little to no bearing on
helping the OP with the dilemma. Why would you let your child twiddle your
nipple if you do not want her to? It is your nipple. I also do not
understand why, having made the mistake to allow it in the past has to mean
you allow it now. Kids habits are pretty adaptable, or at least my DS's are.
Two days twiddle free, substituting something else as a bedtime soother, and
that new soother becomes the rule. Not that he ever twiddled, but other
things...

S

>
> Tracy
> ======================================
> We child proofed our home 3 years ago
> and they're still getting in!
> ======================================

[iphigenia]

Stephanie and Tim wrote:
>>
>>
>> Honestly, I cannot understand this, though it has little to no
>> bearing on helping the OP with the dilemma. Why would you let your
>> child twiddle your nipple if you do not want her to?

It can be a really, really difficult habit to break. I am *still* stopping
DS from doing it, six months after he started up. He's very determined, has
really strong little fingers, and often gets upset when I stop him. I can
easily understand how you get tired of the battle and just say "fine, do
what you want this once, I'm sick of fighting you."

--
iphigenia, who often nurses with a hand over the other breast to prevent
access...
www.tristyn.net

[CY]

I also have this problem. Mine stems from the fact that I rarely rarely
wear a bra around the house so the things are just hanging out there when
she nurses!!

Others may not agree with my solution, but what works for me is to teach her
that touching is OK but it must be GENTLE. She has learned "gentle" from
petting the dogs and other children so I just applied it to the nipple
twiddling too. It took a few times but I just gently took her hand away and
showed her what "gentle" is and she happily complied. It took no tears, no
taking away the nummies and everyone's happy. She actually rarely does it
anymore anyway. I put lots of other stuff in the area for her to play
with - current favorite is my long hair which is often tied back, but I put
it forward as a treat. I have a long necklace and also I stroke her hands
too which she likes.

The twiddling itself didn't bother me it was the "manhandling" as you
describe that I wasn't comfortable with. She is now pretty compliant at 17
months, and does understand what I mean when I say that {whatever] hurts
mummy. So (hopefully) it won't be an issue for you guys much longer!

Good luck!

CY
"Sarah" > wrote in message
om...
> Hello, I have a weird question here. I have a 14 month old, who is
> still nursing every 1-2 hours during day, and every 4-5 hours during
> night. No problems, except for one annoying thing: He LOVES to
> fiddle with my nipples--(I jokingly call it "Twizzling my Nizzles", in
> reference to current urban slang)constantly and pretty aggressively.
> I often try to stop him but he whimpers and gets really upset. I have
> necklaces I wear, or I hold his wandering hands, or I keep the bra on
> and shirt down on the side that's not being nursed, but he'll often
> just railroad right through and find my nipple and start fiddling,
> rolling, pinching, pulling, flicking, picking, and poking. What's a
> girl to do, especially since he loves doing it so much, and really
> gets upset if I try to stop him? Your experience is appreciated!
> (especially in case I might be getting pregnant again soon and not
> sure if I can take it with more sensitive nipples!) Thanks, Sarah