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Coco Austin Defends Her Choice to Breastfeed Her Daughter Until She Was 6 Years Old
Coco Austin is once again defending her choice to breastfeed her 6-year-old daughter for however long her daughter finds it comfortable.
On a November 9 episode of The Dumb Blonde podcast, Austin told host Bunnie Xo, “It wasn’t like I was feeding her because she needed a meal,” Coco explained.
“By the time she was a year old, she was eating full solids. It was more of a bonding experience, more like, ‘Okay, I’ll give you the milk,’ but really, it was because she wanted to be close to me.”
Coco reiterated that she never forced her daughter to breastfeed, approaching it with the simple mindset of “I’ll let her stop when she wants to stop.”
“She’s not going to be 16 on my boob,” the 46-year-old told the host. “Eventually, she’s going to realize this is kind of strange or weird and stop. And that’s what happened around age six—which was still an extremely long time.”
The model, who married actor Ice-T in 2002, acknowledged that breastfeeding her daughter for so long isn’t typical in the U.S., but she stressed that cultural perspective matters.
“In Europe, some do it until age seven,” she explained. “There, it’s completely normal. We Americans think that’s unusual. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it as long as it’s just in your home.”
“To this day, she is obsessed with boobs. She’s always sitting or lying on me,” Austin admitted. “It’s just a really special moment because it won’t be like this once they hit their teenage years. I’m cherishing every moment I can with Chanel.”
The couple, who welcomed their daughter in November 2015, have both defended Coco’s choice to continue breastfeeding on multiple occasions. In 2016, Coco told E! News, “I’m kind of obsessed with [breastfeeding]. [Chanel] is six months now, but for a good five months, she was great at breastfeeding.”
She added, “I’m doing whatever I can because now she’s growing, so she needs more milk … so I have to go from breastfeeding to formula, breastfeeding to formula. But I wish she would want a little more of me.”
In August 2021, after Coco let her fans know she was still breastfeeding her daughter, Ice-T defended his wife’s actions on social media, tweeting, “News Flash! We feed Chanel FOOD… She just likes to suck mom’s boob every now and then… Me Too!!!”
Later during the podcast, Coco also spoke about her 20-year relationship with her husband.
“He has his man place. He goes out, does his job, works hard for his money. My place is to keep the house in order. That’s what I manage. I keep everything sane, so when he comes home from the streets, he can relax.”
She also noted that behind the cameras, they maintain an old-fashioned relationship. “You wouldn’t see us having one publicly, but we know each other’s places,” she said.
If their roles were reversed, she told Bunnie Xo, “I would be rough and tough, the gangster guy with style, and he would be the opposite. If he were a girl, he’d be like me—the outlandish, outgoing, crazy chick.”
“We complement each other because we’re kind of like the same person, and we know that. And we also let each other shine,” she concluded.
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