The time has come...

Well, the time has come that I have been both excitedly anticipating and greatly dreading: C has weaned from breastfeeding. I finally have my body back under original ownership, yet I will never again feel a baby nursing on my breast. She has been physically attached to me in some way, shape or form since her conception (about 28 months ago). I never thought I would feel so emotional about something that is so "natural", so instinctive, so "normal". Why would I not want to give up a bodily process that brought me so much pain just about 16 months ago? The raging yeast infection that plagued my breasts was almost enough to push me to abandon breastfeeding C altogether. Pumping my breast - while infected, crusted, cracked, bleeding and horribly painful - because I had a nasty case of mastitis, brought me the closest I've ever been to fainting from pain. I would rather go thorough labor ten times than to have to endure that pain again. However, the pain is just a distant memory when I remember the closeness, the connection (literally) and the bond that breastfeeding brought to C and me. I breastfed A for 22 months (31 months from conception to weaning) and C for 18 months (27 months from conception to weaning). That's a grand total of 58 months (4 years and 10 months) of having another human being attached to my body out of the past 64 months (5 years and 4 months). Well, no wonder I'm having a hard time with this!!