A British mother is using her YouTube channel to push other women to breastfeed their children until they're as old as eight.
Sophie Emma Rose, orginially from Blackpool but now living in Thailand, has posted hundreds of videos of her breastfeeding her four-year-old son Shaye. Her YouTube channel has more than 15,000 subscribers.
In one of her videos, Ms Rose, 40, says Western society represses the "joy of motherhood" by forcing women to stick to "a certain schedule and timeline" in breastfeeding their children.
Ms Rose describes breastfeeding as "something so primal and motherlike, more than anything else".
She blames the "condition of Western culture" for seeing breasts as a sexual object, rather than a food source.
"I don't feel sexual pleasure when Shaye feeds; it's a nice sensation but not a sexual act."
In a recent video describing about how she almost stopped breastfeeding after a sleepless night, she noted "that would be upsetting for him. It would be a withdrawal of my love, a withdrawal of my nurturing and it would be a significant change for him".
She said she was given insight into how traumatic it must be for babies weaned off breastfeeding.
"Until he decides to stop I'm going to continue because that feels like the most loving thing to do."
She says her role is to "help encourage mothers to breastfeed, to help take away the shame and the fear that mothers have around breastfeeding".
"I know this is the work I'm here to do."
Shaye has also been raised on a raw vegan diet, and Ms Rose intends to home-school him.
Newshub.
