The anthropologist Kate Dettwyler, which we have already talked about, figures the natural age of human weaning among 2 and a half years and 7 years. His thesis is supported by Breastfeeding Committee of the Spanish Association of Pediatrics in your Breastfeeding Manual for Professionals.
Dr. Dettwyler reaches this conclusion after analyzing several anthropological and ethological variables, based on numerous studies of these specialties on animals and especially on the behavior of primates.
The primates, our close relatives, wean their young when they begin to appear first molars definitive, what in the human happens towards the 5 and a half years and the 6 years.
In addition, these species, with which we are very closely related, usually wean approximately when the young has reached the middle of the beginning of the age of their reproductive maturity, which in humans would again give a figure of 6 or 7 years.
Regarding the weight reached by the breeding, many animals perform weaning when it reaches three times the birth weight, which in this case would give us an age of 1 year. However, heavier animals do it when they are quadruple the weight of birth, which would mark an age not less than approximately 3 years.
Add other data, such as the duration of breastfeeding in relation to the time of gestation. In some mammals it is true that this happens when the same time has elapsed during pregnancy, but in the case of animals of greater weight the relationship between lactation and pregnancy is greater, double, triple, even quadruple. And in the case of gorillas and chimpanzees, the most similar to humans of all our relatives, the breastfeeding lasts six times longer than pregnancy, so in humans the pattern, if this variable is applied, would be 4 and a half years.
Finally, it indicates how it has been emphasized that the immune system of children is not fully mature until after six years, which would make breastfeeding protect them until then, strengthening their immune system and sending them antibodies.
The World Health Organization recommends that breastfeeding continue, at least, up to two years, combined with other foods. Numerous scientific studies have shown that breastfed babies up to two years have a stronger health, have a lower incidence of many diseases in adulthood and even reach a higher IQ. However, there are no studies on the benefits of breastfeeding beyond two years, although nothing indicates that everything that previously provided ceases when the baby grows.
The anthropological comparatives They indicate that the duration of breastfeeding is a pattern strongly influenced by cultural issues. In the case of Western society, the idea that a child sucks with five or six years is not generally accepted, but like all cultural issues It is not a universal that we should accept apriori as true. Having a child makes us rethink many things and learn that much of what we thought before we can think about it, for him and thanks to him, again.
I tried to compile for later topics some of the customs among other human groups and surely it amazes us how, if we compare the number of human societies, prolonged breastfeeding is quite widespread among current and past human beings. And interestingly, it is one of the data that mark the form of parenting and the type of adult that society indicates as appropriate.
The mothers who breastfeed for a long time and do not force weaning they tell how this is going on in a very gradual and slow way. The shots become short and spaced, with breastfeeding and milk lasting several more years. Breastfeeding ends when the child claims it that way or simply, when one day they discover that it has been a month or two that he has not asked for even a little.
There really is no reason, if so desired, son and mother, to wean when the child turns two. Neither medical nor scientific nor psychological, none demonstrated. And one thing to keep in mind is that anthropological and ethological studies indicate that our offspring would breastfeed, in natural state, until much later.
