Coco Austin is standing by her decision to breastfeed her daughter Chanel,9, until she was 6.
During an appearance on Bunnie Xo’s Dumb Blonde podcast, the model and TV personality, 46, shared that breastfeeding was ultimately a bonding experience between her and Chanel.
“It wasn’t like I was feeding her because she needed a meal. She was able to eat by a year, you know, full, like, solids,” she said. “It was more of a bonding experience and more of like, ‘Okay, I’ll give you the milk.’ But, it was more like she wanted to be around me. So I was like, I’m gonna let her stop when she wants to stop..”
Austin, who shares Chanel with her husband Ice T, said she always knew her daughter would naturally grow out of it on her own.
“She’s not gonna be 16 on my boob,” Austin said. “She’s gonna eventually figure out, ‘Okay, this is kinda strange or weird and stuff.’ And that happened around 6, … which was still [an] extremely long amount of time apparently. But in Europe, they’re doing till 7. Like, it’s nothing to them. I mean, Americans think that’s weird.”
The mom added that for Chanel, breastfeeding had become a source of comfort more than anything.
“It was mostly when she went to sleep, she wanted me to be there. So it was more of like a comfort thing with her, but I got so many people that loved it. Like, they were on my side,” she said. “I had everybody come out of the woodwork when it comes to breastfeeding ladies.”
Nevertheless, Austin said she’s glad she spoke openly about it.
“I was like, ‘Oh, this is so nice’ because I was the only one speaking about it. And I’m like, why is this so hard? Like, people have been doing this for thousands of years.”
Coco also revealed that Chanel, now 9, still loves being close to her.
“She loves boobs,” she said. “I think she’s like she’s always very comforted. She’s like sitting always sitting there laying on me and then it’s just a really nice moment because it’s not gonna be like this when they get into the teenage years.”
