Coco Austin is uniting moms everywhere who choose to continue breastfeeding their school-age children.
Coco still feeds her 5-year-old daughter, Chanel, nourishing breast milk. The socialite is proud that she can still express milk from her nipples whenever her daughter is hungry.
Coco, wife of rapper-turned-actor Ice-T, recently defended her decision to breastfeed Chanel. She dismissed claims she is doing “psychological harm” to Chanel by not weaning her off breast milk.
“Chanel still likes my boob. It’s a big bonding moment for a mother and your child,” she told Us Weekly.
Coco is also proud to be a role model for women who are deemed “perverts” for continuing to breastfeed their adolescent children.
Extended breastfeeding advocate Kim Summer told the NY Post she still breastfeeds her 6-year-old daughter.
“My daughter Piper will be 7 years old in November and I breastfeed her twice a day or whenever she says she needs it,” Summer, 40, told The Post.
She said her daughter even has a nickname for her breasts: “boo boo.”
“At bedtime, she’ll say, ‘Can I have boo boo?’ and I give it to her,” the lactation specialist and birth doula added. “It’s a special bonding time for us that’s comforting, reciprocal and organic.”
She added: “People tell me I should die, I’m gross and that Child Protective Services should take my baby away from me.”
Jada Shapiro, a lactation expert, cited a study from the American Academy of Pediatrics that shows extended breastfeeding is healthy for older children.
“Research shows that children who are breastfed for a longer length of time are at a reduced risk for developing respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases, diabetes and some childhood cancers,” said Shapiro.
“The World Health Organization also found that women who breastfeed have a reduced risk of breast and ovarian cancers,” she added.
