How long you should nurse is often culturally specific and determined. Whereas in North America, breastfeeding your baby beyond a year is often considered unusual (or “extended” breastfeeding your baby), in many developing nations breastfeeding your baby up to age two and beyond is considered normal. To learn more, visit the breastfeeding diet website.

Many will state that you should only nurse so long as is it is convenient for you as a mom. However, considering the numerous experiments that suggest that long term nursing provides many health, intellect and other important advantages to your baby, I recommend that you may want to try to nurse as long as possible, even if it is not as convenient as bottle feeding your infant.

Breastfeeding your baby is not always easy. For mothers who work, a lot of effort will need to be put into pumping milk during work hours. Even those who do not work often find continually nursing a child to be tiring, since a baby who is breastfed will generally need to feed more often than one who does not.

Still, preparing bottles require a lot of effort as well and has additional expenses as well. Ironically, you may have to work longer to bottle feed your baby, since bottle feeding is actually quite a high-priced undertaking. Though it may seem that bottle feeding is easier initially, once you consider in the additional work hours to pay for formula and all the supplies required to bottle feed plus factor in the additional hours you may have to spend taking care of a sick child (since breastfed kids are generally healthier), you will quickly see that breastfeeding your baby in the end may be much easier.

Given the health and emotional benefits, economic advantages and the overall time savings that breastfeeding affords, I would suggest that you should breastfeed as long as possible! If you aren’t suffering from a significant illness that puts your baby at risk (such as HIV/AIDS) or are taking prescription medication that poses a danger to your child, you should try to seek whatever support you can get to assist you nurse your child for at least for a year, ideally longer.