To help me devise a sleep plan

[ookemon]

Baby is 15m
Breastfed. Refuses bottle.
Co sleeps
Bf to sleep for naps and night wakings.
Baby naps in my arms as wakes as soon as I put down.
Nightwakings- around 7x
Has never slept in own cot/ room.
Fully weaned with lots of snacks and 3 meals during day so is definitely getting enough solids.

Very very very clingy during the day and just wants boob all the time not really for drinking but just suckling comfort.

I seriously need to sort this out. I need baby to sleep in cot, self soothe and stop waking at night.

How shall I do this? Where do I start? I need a plan but feel so overwhelmed with all the info out there and am asking fellow lovely MNetters to offer your wisdom. Please help me! I'm on my knees!

It sounds like a difficult one. Do you want to wean off bf altogether? As baby is 15mo they don't need it.

Do you have any support? DP/Parents who could take baby for a weekend to break the bf cycle?

By this age my DS was still bf but only once in the morning, once after work and then any night wakings. DS did sleep alone from 6mo though. DH took on night wakings and I tried distraction during the day to gradually reduce bf, then after a weekend away he seemed to have forgotten about it.

Good luck

I don't mind continuing with bf but if it means getting sleep then more than happy to stop. I just don't know how to. Could I just go cold turkey and stop?

Dropping the night feeds is key; to start with can you try offering water during the night to try to gently night wean his. Did he sleep well before and this is separation anxiety or has he never managed even a few hours sleeping on his own?

As well as water try vigorous back rubbing while lying down or wiggle dancing to get him to sleep. You can create sleep associations with rubbing his head and singing / playing a musical toy while breastfeeding so that just doing that again helps him get to sleep. I don't think you need to stop daytime breastfeeding just to sort out sleep, you need to just get him to sleep through to start with and then work on getting to sleep by himself for naps.

Personally I would stop bf at that point - you've done brilliantly but now the costs are outweighing the benefits, if you know what I mean. I went cold turkey with both of mine, a difficult day but they very quickly forgot about it and began sleeping through the night straight away.

Dd sounds similar and it was hard going. I’m pretty convinced in retrospect that a lot of the clinginess/comfort bf was down to teething pain. She wasn’t great with teething from the first one and bf seemed to tail off naturally after the last one (about 2.5ish?)

You’ll get loads of advice on here (I never managed it to my schedule!) but I would advise managing for pain in conjunction with anything you implement.

What’s worked with my 13 month old is stopping bf to sleep at night (to start with). I fed her before bath and then dad did the rest for a few nights. I left the house so she knew I wasn’t an option. I was really worried but she didn’t even cry and I have been able to do the same the last two nights. This immediately resulted in less night wakings. Next we will try oh settling her for her first wake ups and also settling her for naps in the same way.

And I have no plans to stop bf any time soon but have stopped offering it other than for naps and a morning and afternoon snack. Not giving it to her when she has been upset was a game changer actually in cutting her reliance. Just used cuddles and distraction instead.

Could you afford a sleep trainer? They will help you turn things around really quickly.

Do you have a partner or family member who could deal with the night wakings? If your baby can't have the boob then they will soon find alternative ways of comforting themselves. Won't be easy but you can do it.

@Cornettoninja makes a really good point, the only times DS is hard to settle is when he's teething and the boob comforts his pain. Have you tried giving a dose of ibuprofen when you first take him to bed?