Doesn’t the flow of milk turn off automatically soon after pregnancy?
My cousin breastfed her son until he was 4.
No. Keep giving the breast sucking stimulation after pregnancy and it’ll keep going.
Nope. Not unless the mother stops nursing. A friend of my wife nursed her son till he was nearly three. We were both weirded out by that.
Never heard of a "wet nurse"?
Nerves in the nipple are stimulated by the baby nursing.
This causes the immediate release of two hormones, oxytocin and prolactin.
Among other effects oxytocin causes what’s known as the letdown response. This causes the squeezing out of the milk from glands within the breast.
Oxytocin can sometimes be released when the mother just hears a baby cry.
Prolactin is what causes the breast to continue producing milk...it’s part of a feed back system. For maximum milk production it needs to be released every two hours or so.
Constant, diligent, nipple stimulation can start lactation even in a woman who has never been pregnant. A breast pump if used every two hours can accomplish this. Women do this in order to breastfeed an adopted child. Certain hormones can aid greatly in starting lactation and are often required to initiate lactation.