Did your DC drop night feeds on their own, or did you have to work at it?

[tinierclanger]

DS has never been a great sleeper and at 6.5 months is still feeding around 10pm and 2-3am. This in itself was quite an achievement for us! Don't mind how long he carries on with 10pm feed but would like to get rid of the one in the middle of the night. After some persistence I managed to gradually cut him down so he was only feeding for 1 minute at 3am, but then I tried to not feed him at that point and we had an awful night, and after 45 mins of crying I caved in and fed him.

Since then he had a couple of bad nights (put to bed by GPs for first time, was v upset, and then ill the following nights, and still recovering from that), so I haven't tried to do a short feed at that point again and have been letting him feed for a while. Assuming when he is better I can get things back on track and whittle it down to a short feed again, is there any chance he will just drop it on his own after a few weeks, or do we have to take the pain of the crying for a few nights? Would it be worth cuddling him back to sleep or will that just substitute one problem for another?

Any of your experiences appreciated!

[PottyCock]

Our dd dropped them naturally in the lead up to being 6mo. She has always been a decent sleeper though, touch wood. When she was 6mo she was still having one night feed and when I went back to work I decided to try and stop it. I had one night of just cuddling her as she tried to nuzzle in (felt v mean) but she fell asleep in my arms after about twenty mins and has not woken up in the night since (now 14mo). I think we were very lucky though. If I were you I would just persevere - they are all learning and if you stick to your routine he will get the message eventually.

[chandellina]

hi, well you are a step ahead of us because we've just managed to get the night feeds for our 6.5 month old down to one at 3am. (after a 10:30 feed, and he's up for another at 5:30am-6)

I'm not even sure we've cracked it yet because he still sometimes wakes at 1:30 or 2am but we ignore him until 3am.

I tried pick up put down, etc. but it didn't work and we instead are doing "cry it out."

not the best, but he will eventually get the message.

i do think my LO is genuinely hungry in the middle of the night, so I am going to wait a while before trying to drop this feed. Maybe once solids are better established ...

One friend said she dropped that feed after three nights of "cry it out." Another woman i know gave a bottle and each night cut the amount until there was nothing. Another method is to offer water ...

good luck.

[tinierclanger]

Hmm, thanks for comments, think I will bide my time for a few more weeks at least