A mother shared her response to some of the “shocking” backlash she received after sharing a post about how she’s weaning her two-year-old son off of breastfeeding.
In a TikTok video shared earlier this month, Emma, @a_mothers_tale, documented her first “week” of weaning her child away from breastfeeding.
In the clip, the parent is seen sitting on a couch while her son continues to pull at her sweater in efforts of getting breastfed. He also put his head underneath his mother’s sweater before she held her arms out to give him a hug.
Emma also addressed a lesson she learned about the weaning process in the caption of the post, which reads: “First rule or wean club: NEVER sit down!!!”
As of 17 October, the video has more than 2.3m views, with many viewers in the comments claiming that that child was “too big” and that Emma waited “too long” to stop breastfeeding him.
In a follow up video, she addressed the criticism on her initial clip and shared screenshots of its comments section, showing how people called it “ridiculous” and claimed that there was “something wrong”. She referred to this “judgement” as something quite “shocking” for her to see.
She emphasised how stunned she was by the online backlash and that her child was being weaned off of breastfeeding at a relatively normal age. According to the World Health Organisation, children are exclusively breastfeed until they are six months old. They can then continue to be breastfed “up to two years and beyond,” in addition to being given solid foods.
“My jaw was literally on the floor. Like I cannot believe the hate I have woken up to this morning,” she said. “Can we just start by alienating the fact that he’s two? Two. Two is literally age, the minimum age that the World Health Organisation recommends breastfeeding until.”
In the text over the video, she slammed the online judgement that she’s received since strategies and timelines for breastfeeding are different for everyone.
“I realise not everyone is able to or wants to [breastfeed],” she wrote. “Every experience is different and as long as [a] baby is fed & [the] mum is happy, there should be no judgement!”
Emma also further explained what kind of comments she’s received from viewers, claiming that one person reached out to her to say that she should be “locked up” for her post.
“I’ve been called disgusting. I’ve been told I’m wrong. I’ve been told I have serious issues. And I actually had somebody message me and tell me that I should be locked up,” she said.
She then sent a message to the online critics, saying: “I’m sorry but if you have issues with that video, and you are sexualising the relationship between a mother and a two-year-old child, I’m not the one with the issues, love.”
In the caption of the video, she encouraged viewers to “educate” themselves on breastfeeding and “normalise natural term breastfeeding”.
TikTok users have now gone to comments of these two videos to defend and praise Emma.
“YES MAMA! Whew I was fighting for you in the comment section,” one wrote. “Perfectly stated. You’ve done amazing!”
“You’re being bullied by people that probably could NEVER last that long at feeding,” another added. “Great job meeting HIS needs momma.”
Multiple viewers also resonated with Emma, sharing their tips for and experience with weaning a child off of breastfeeding.
“Try a tiny bit of mustard!!! I thought I’d never wean my daughter. One taste and she said no more milky,” one person commented.
“Oh mama this is so hard,” another TikTok user said. “Something that helped us was letting them ‘hold’ it but not drink the milk because there was ‘no more milk.’ Good luck mama!”
The Independent has contacted Emma for comment.
