when to start the diet when BF?

I was originally planning to TTC in Sept when I RTW after maternity leave, and to start the diet in July.

However, I'm still BF, and AF is still on vacation! I was hoping she would have turned up by now as I would quite like to track some cycles before starting TTC, and my mum who had 4 children said that her periods started between 3-4 months after each of us.

My son is now 5.5 months old now and I know AF might not appear until I stop completely. I don't plan on stopping any time soon and would quite like to continue at least doing a morning and night feed for as long as I am able.

I'm not even having any practice cycles. CBFM test sticks done every few days say that my oestrogen is level (low) and I'm getting infertile clear CM on and off every week or so.

Last week I started taking Vit B6 in the hope that this will make my cycles resume, but only taking 20mg so don't know if it'll work.

Anyway, shall I wait until AF turns up before dieting as I don't know how long that will take? Or start the diet as planned in July and hope the witch has either arrived by then or will arrive soon afterwards?

Hi

I personally would wait until your AF returns. Mine came back very quickly with my biggest 2 boys (13 weeks and 9 weeks post natal!) but I had a Mirena put in after DS3 so I don't know about him. Everybody's different but if your baby is 5.5 months old he won't be taking lots of solids yet and your AF may return over the coming weeks as he starts to eat more. My 3 all dropped to around 3 feeds a day when they were 7 or 8 months old and were each on 2 feeds (first thing in the morning and last thing before bed) for the most part by the time they were a year old. I think Atomic used Vitex to bring back ovulation while BFing so she may have more advice :D

Kelly x

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Originally Posted by rainbowflower

I was originally planning to TTC in Sept when I RTW after maternity leave, and to start the diet in July.

However, I'm still BF, and AF is still on vacation! I was hoping she would have turned up by now as I would quite like to track some cycles before starting TTC, and my mum who had 4 children said that her periods started between 3-4 months after each of us.

My son is now 5.5 months old now and I know AF might not appear until I stop completely. I don't plan on stopping any time soon and would quite like to continue at least doing a morning and night feed for as long as I am able.

I'm not even having any practice cycles. CBFM test sticks done every few days say that my oestrogen is level (low) and I'm getting infertile clear CM on and off every week or so.

Last week I started taking Vit B6 in the hope that this will make my cycles resume, but only taking 20mg so don't know if it'll work.

Anyway, shall I wait until AF turns up before dieting as I don't know how long that will take? Or start the diet as planned in July and hope the witch has either arrived by then or will arrive soon afterwards?

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How much are you nursing at night? For some reason, nighttime nursing keeps AF away longer than daytime does. If at all possible, you might want to cut back by one feeding at night and see if that helps.

Aside from cutting out a nighttime feeding, I would try doing the vitex, I really do think that worked for me. Also, rather than going onto a swaying diet all the way, try just going onto a vegetarian diet - at the very least it's a step in the right direction.

I did believe that dieting while BF made AF stay away after DS 3, although now after DS 4 I am still not ovulating at 18 months, and I'm not really dieting either so who even knows.

zanacal - lucky you getting cycles back so quickly! that's good info about the number of feeds at 7/8 months, thank you :)

AS - until recently I'd been feeding 2-3 times each night (or worse during growth spurts/poorliness/hot weather and we've had a few of each of those lately). More recently he's been feeding just once in the night after his dreamfeed (10-11pm). For the last week he's gone for at least 5hrs each night between feeds, more usually 6-7hrs.

how much vitex would you suggest? I presume it's only to be taken until cycles resume?

wow that's a long time to go without an ovulation cycle. are you wanting to TTC at the moment? are you swaying blue?

I had success taking vitex 400 mg capsules twice a day, Af-O only (I wasn't menstruating so I took the vitex when I felt that AF-O should be...I was having practice cycles and would get PMS, just no O or AF). I also took 100mg B6 throughout my cycle. It took 2 months for my cycle to resume.

I am actually tandem nursing my older son too (he seriously will NOT wean!!!) and he only nurses at night, so I am nursing quite a bit more than the average person. I was playing around a little with Vitex to see if I could bring my cycle back again, but my husband still is not on board for TTC #5 and vitex makes me super b!tchy so I decided, why be in a hurry to get AF back again if I'm not even going to TTC. I would love to TTC again and I would sway blue for a 5th boy, but I"m about to turn 41 and so I think my window of opportunity is about to slam shut. :(

Good luck persuading DH if you decide you want to try for another Atomic :D

Just wanted to report my experience from the past few days. I am both breastfeeding my 18 month old and using a Mirena IUD. For the first year on Mirena I had no bleeding, but for the past 4 months or so I've had a monthly bleed and ovulation pains mid cycle. 3 days ago I started taking Vitex, on the first day of my (very light) period. After 2 days of my usual light bleeding I got a full-blown period, with very heavy flow and lots of cramping. Perhaps it's just coincidence ... or perhaps not! The Mirena is coming out on Wednesday and I'm hoping, with the help of Vitex, to have a normal cycle in June so we can make our first attempt in July :D

I'm not sure I want to take Vitex myself - mainly due to that rumours that it can cause MC and as I've already had one of those I don't want to take any risks.

AS - I hope you can convince your husband so that you don't have any regrets long-term. did you always dream of having lots of sons? whatever you're doing to have boys seems to be working, anyway! ;)

tandem nursing sounds lovely! I really hope I don't need to fully stop BF in order to get my cycles to resume - it would be lovely to keep it up.

Zanacal - that sounds promising for you! hope your cycles resume themselves and behave themselves really soon

Tandem has been a very very nice experience. I didn't set out to do it but it just worked out that way and I think it may have saved my sanity (DS 3 is a bit of a handful!!) Plus it was awesome not to get engorged!!!

I always wanted 5 or 6 children and expected that I would have at least one daughter in the mix, but life got in the way of that, so I had the first two boys and then we didn't have any more for 13 years before baby fever got the better of me. I wanted a boy with my first and then had no preference with my second, but I always thought that I would have at least one daughter. Even when I got pg with DS 3 I didn't have a strong gender preference either way, but I just "had a feeling" he was a girl and I must have got my heart set on it because then I had serious GD after my ultrasound. But, I got through it. Then I swayed with DS 4 and it was during this journey that I learned about the Trivers Willard hypothesis, the Maternal Dominance Hypothesis, and the blood glucose stuff; even though swaying didn't work out for me it ignited a fire and I became super interested in researching about it and here I am.

At this point, I've worked really hard to get past GD and even though there will always be a part of me that has that that desire (some days that part is bigger than others) but at this stage, I feel like another boy would fit better into our crew. When I got pg with DS 3 it had been so long that I didn't have much baby gear but now I have tons of boy clothes, crib, stroller, etc. DH, I believe, always had a strong boy preference and he's probably a better dad to boys and it may very well be that I'm more suited to boys myself. I would just love to have ONE of my dreams come true LOL, so I would really like to make it to the 5 kids range. I don't think it's going to happen but I'd love it if it did.

I guess you never know what the future holds! although it does sound like you and your DH need to have a little chat?

Oh, he knows! He's one of those that you have to just let it percolate rather than pressure him! :)

Lol, that's exactly what I've been doing re ttc - one night after a couple of glasses of wine he says 'you know you'll keep mentioning it every now and again over the next few months and I'll finally give in, I always have' ... so I took that as a yes :D

Hey, that's how I got him to agree to DS 3 and 4 - with the assistance of a little wine!!!