The Somatic Landscape of Breastfeeding and Weaning

There’s so much that happens inside a mother’s body that we don’t often talk about. The chemistry, the sensations, the quiet rearranging that takes place as we feed and then again as we stop. So much of it is unseen, yet it shapes how we feel, how we bond, and how we move through the world in ways that words can’t always reach.

We tend to hear a lot about the beginning of breastfeeding, about the latch and the milk coming in and the early challenges. But we rarely hear what happens inside our bodies as the months go on, or when it all comes to an end. If you’ve found yourself feeling strange or tender or unlike yourself in that space, please know you are not alone. What you are feeling has a reason.

The Body’s Way of Loving

When you breastfeed or chestfeed, your body becomes a landscape of hormonal intelligence. Oxytocin, often called the love hormone, flows through your body every time you hold your baby close or feel them suckle. It slows your heart rate, lowers stress hormones, softens your muscles, and brings a sense of ease that helps both you and your baby feel safe.

Prolactin is the hormone that drives milk production, and it also creates a sense of calm. It can bring on that dreamy heaviness that washes over you after feeding, when you and your baby settle together in the stillness that follows. These hormones are doing so much more than making milk. They are helping your whole body connect, to feel safe enough to love deeply.

Feeding is not just about nourishment. It is a full-body conversation between you and your child, one that happens through touch, breath, warmth, and presence. Your nervous systems synchronise. Your rhythms align. Without needing to think about it, you regulate each other. This is what co-regulation truly means, the wordless communication that keeps both of you anchored and alive in connection.

When Feeding Changes

At some point, the rhythm begins to shift. Sometimes it happens slowly and sometimes it happens all at once. Sometimes it is a choice you make, and sometimes it is made for you. Either way, your body knows.

As feeding slows down, your levels of oxytocin and prolactin start to drop. Other hormones like estrogen and progesterone begin to find their balance again. Inside your breasts, a quiet process begins called involution, where the milk-producing cells gently shrink back and your body starts to reorganise itself. It is extraordinary and also deeply emotional.

Many mothers describe this time as feeling low or teary or unsettled, even when they feel ready to stop. Some call it the weaning blues. It can feel like something is missing, a space that was once full now empty. Research shows that as oxytocin and prolactin decline, serotonin and dopamine, which are linked to mood and wellbeing, can dip too. It is not your imagination. It is your biology shifting and recalibrating from one state of deep synchrony with your child into another way of being.

Even when you were ready, your body might still need to grieve. It has known this rhythm for months or years. It has known the heartbeat of another pressed close. When that changes, your nervous system must learn a new rhythm.

Feeling It All

There is no right way to do this. Some mothers follow child-led weaning, letting their little one guide the process. Others lead it themselves, guided by health, work, exhaustion, or a quiet inner knowing that it is time.

No matter how it unfolds, what matters most is how you care for yourself as it happens. You might feel sadness one moment and relief the next. You might feel gratitude and guilt all at once. You might want your body back and then miss what it felt like to feed. You might wake feeling steady and by evening find yourself crying for no clear reason.

We live in a world that doesn’t make much space for this tenderness. A culture that tells mothers to move on, to celebrate their freedom, to get back to normal as if this ending is something simple or small.

Coming Home to the Body

So maybe this time isn’t about moving on at all. Maybe it is about allowing yourself to stay close. To feel what is here without trying to fix it. To notice the sensations that rise and fall, the heaviness in your chest, the warmth that lingers, the ache that comes and goes, the relief that softens you when you least expect it.

You can care for yourself in simple, steady ways. Nourish your body with food that grounds you. Let yourself rest. Cry when you need to. Walk outside and let the world hold you for a while. Reach out for presence, another nervous system to sit beside you as yours finds its new balance. These are small but powerful ways to meet yourself again.

You are living through one of the great transitions of motherhood and your body is showing you how to be present for it.