Not sure how to night wean...

[mamaduckbone]

...or indeed whether to at all.

My ds2 is 12mths old, still bfed at bedtime, in the morning and up to 2-3 times in the night. He was sleeping til 3 or 4am, having a quick feed then sleeping til 7 which I was happy to carry on with, until I went back to work and stopped feeding him in the day, when everything went to pot - reverse cycling I've now discovered it's called.

I'm really undecided about whether to a) keep going as I am and hope he stops the night wakings of his own accord (ha ha) b) carry on feeding him morning and night but attempt to night wean - in which case I have absolutely no idea where to start or c) give up bfeeding altogether in the hope that if there's no boob to wake up for then what's the point .

Has anyone managed to carry on bfeeding a 12month plus baby and persuaded them that they can go back to sleep at night without a feed?

I used to be able to shush pat / rock him back but as he's got older he's also become more determined and I've gone down the path of least resistance and given him a quick feed. I also couldn't bear to refuse him a feed at night when I'd been at work all day, but I'm on summer hols at the moment so have 2 and a bit weeks to deal with it before I go back.

Might have to post and run as nap time nearly up but will check back later so any advice very gratefully received, particularly re: how to go about night weaning without giving up bfeeding altogether (my ideal choice). TIA

Hi - I have sympathy for you, I am in the same boat - back to work and bf my DS a lot a night...

With my DD I went back to work when she was 7m and she was fine - bf morning and evening and when she woke (esp if ill) in the night, then around 10m we night weaned and my DH settled her if she woke in the night - by offering water and/or dummy. (also I was sure she was eating well, so hunger not an issue - and as she never really gave DH a problem going back to sleep I assume we were right here).

But with DS, 11m, it's a whole other ball game, he doesn't eat anywhere near what my DD ate/drank at this age, he doesn't take a bottle and doesn't take a dummy, so my DH finds it difficult to settle him, and I'm not certain that he isn't hungry.

Not much help was I .Will be watching the threat for any ideas...

Haven't night weaned BF baby but have done for FF baby. I would imagine you would have to be pretty firm and get your OH to offer a bottle of water, or water down formula or watered down EBM or do controlled crying (which is what we did) - I know not everyone's thing, but that's what we had to do.

I think the problem is that unless you can persuade him to drink more milk in the day he might be hungry at nighttime.

My SIL recently night weaned her BF 13 month old with controlled crying etc, she is still feeding in the day but is going back to work soon.

OP, there is a 'mini' sleep regression at this age (55 weeks developmental spurt) so it may be hard to fix in the next few weeks. See here and here.

My own theory on night weaning is that unless you can be absolutely sure your LO is getting plenty of food in the day with lots of protein then you can't be confident that the LO is not hungry at night. So if you approach the problem from the other end, that is getting plenty of fishy or cheesy or lentilly dinners down them then in my exp the night feeding stops.I did this at 8 months with dc2 and earlier with dc1.Once they were on 3 good meals a day they could be shushed to sleep at night.

Jay Gordon
here

worked on dd at 16m but agree you ahve to be absolutely sure they aren't hungry

Thanks for replies, will look into all links tomorrow...am in trouble for mnetting in the middle of romantic anniversary meal . Wish me luck for at least some unbroken sleep tonight.

PomPotty - sounds like we have similar stories, only my ds is a very good eater so I'm pretty sure it's habit / comfort rather than hunger, but the protein issue is interesting LooL00 - I'll see if there's any correlation between days when he's had more protein and better sleep.
Thinking about it, he slept 7.30 through til 3.30 last night with a v. high protein day - cheese and tomato omelette for lunch and pasta bolognaise with lots of meat for dinner. Hmmmmm.....

I'm in the same boat. 11 month old DS seems starving at night (and is almost certainly teething too) so not sure I want to night wean as it seems a bit harsh right now. BUT I'm bloody knackered and with a non-napping toddler I'm at my wit's end.

I think I'll try to get more food into him during day and reassess situation in a few weeks.

Tiredness is so debilatating isn't it, I find it so hard to concentate and motivate myself at work...

Interesting about protein, maybe I should offer him extras to our normal meals to help this. Hope it makes a difference for you mamadb.

If I'm honest I really struggle to try to get food into him... he's not hungry at breakfast having gorged on milk all night then he's at nursery during the day where he sometimes eats sometimes doesn't. On getting home from nursery the only thing he will tolerate is a really big bf, so he's not always bothered by dinner, argh.

At the moment (well last 2 nights) he's doing a little better.... going down about 7.30, waking at 10ish for a feed then he's slept til 3ish , however it all goes tits up from there with poo-ey nappies and being awake for 1-2 hours, then he wakes every 1hr-ish after that.

Anyway, onwards and upwards.... it can't last for ever, right?

oh and thanks MrsBadger for that link - I had read it ages ago, but really good to read it again

night wean imo. my DS doubled his intake of food in the day when i night weaned. he may have been hungry for a night but he is a big robust boy so i wasn't too worried. i had reached the end of the line as far as getting up all night went! i just went in said 'its night time go back to sleep.' and left. he only cried for two mintues. five times he woke up the first night. 4am was harder. cried on and off for 40 mintues but gave him water. fed him at 5am. that was my thing - i will feed you past 5am. he ate the biggest breakfast ever that morning hahaha. and the rest of the day too. next night he slept 10hours in a row! we've had a couple of lapse nights - when we went on holiday. but he is reliably sleeping 7-5 then till 7 after a feed. quite remarkable. every baby is different obviously but imo by 10/11 mo they are big enough and aware enough to know that you haven't abandoned them, its just time for sleep. i am a much happier mum too! everyone is a winner. he is also very well slept which is lovely as he is almost never grumpy, except when he wants his dinner hhaha!

That sounds like a story to inspire Ruby - thanks! Although if my ds doubles his food intake I don't know where he'll put it all - he already eats loads. Have you carried on bfeeding at bedtime?
The daft thing is I did almost exactly the same with ds1 at about 8/9 months and it worked, except he wouldn't then go back to sleep after 5 and is still an early riser now. I don't know why I'm so reluctant with ds2 - actually I do, it's because I'm at work ft instead of pt with ds1, and he's my baby so I'm soppy with him! And he's still in our room which doesn't help, as with ds1 we could put him down and leave the room.

PomPotty...just a phase, how many times do we tell ourselves that? I'm concerned that at this age I'm letting habits form that will be even more difficult to break later though...

of course you are soppy with him, and he will have benefitted loads from all those cuddles. its not unreasonable for you to ask for a little time to sleep though! i slept with DS in our room on holiday and i just did the same thing - on one of the nights he woke and i just said 'its nighttime go back to sleep' and lay very still!!! it worked. just be really boring and say the same thing each time.

i think you are right in thinking that it will get more difficult to break - only because they get more tenacious in their protesting haha! but all are different. one might be ready at 18months, one at 7 months. i tried at 8 months and it was a disaster. no one was getting any sleep. imo it should work in 1-3 nights or the baby mght not be ready. only an opinion though .

i still feed at bedtime. usually he is wide awake going down though - i often read him a story. he does protest and fuss about but i just have to be quite firm and tell him its nighttime now, go to sleep.' really not always easy, particularly if he gets upset, but if i bought him into the living room, he would probably stop crying immediately as he would think oooohh playtime so its a bit of a protest rather than distress. its time for mum knows best! he fell asleep feeding (just about) last night and i thought oh no, he'll wake up later, but he didn't! slept till 5 and then till seven woohoo.

also, my ds eats more than his 4 year old niece now!!! stuffs it in! amazing!

Well, we're going to give it a try, not tonight - both me and dh are knackered after a late night, but tomorrow. Wish us luck.

I'm going to feed ds at bedtime then dh is going to attempt to settle him when he wakes in the night. He woke at 10pm last night when I was out and settled in about 2 mins for dh so I do have hope, and he hasn't seemed starving hungry when he's woken, which he did a couple of months ago.

I think the early hours will be the toughest. I might make 4am my cut off to start with (as that's the latest he's woken, therefore the closest to sleeping through the night) then work it a bit later gradually.

He's not napping very well at the mo though so is falling asleep really heavily but sleeping particularly badly, so need to make sure he has a really good nap tomorrow.

Fingers crossed...

i sometimes feed him at 4:30 ish - I try to get him to 5am but he does get upset sometimes and lets out a wail which is hard to ignore! I give him water and he will go back to sleep for a bit, but ultimately, he still wants a feed at around that time and there is only so far you can go with them. Sroking his head is also working now - he will lie there and relax a bit more easily whereas he was thrashing about a bit before.

hope tonight goes well...

Well, night 1 went well (but wasn't until last night for various reasons)...Dh settled him within 10 minutes at 10 and 2, I fed him at 10 to 5 and he went back off until 6.30.

Yippee!

I've probably spoken much too soon though.