How to start to wean a boob crazy 13 month old (and get her into her own room)....

[legallyblond]

Any advice gratefully received!

DD was ebf (total bottle refuser even though I tried my expressed milk) and baby led weaned (not my choice but she refused a spoon). She's now 13 months and I am thinking of starting to bring it to an end for a couple of reasons....:

1. I plan to TTC from Jan. My periods have come back (rather sporadically though) so its not fertility, its just that I don't want to be bf DD when the new baby comes and, ideally, I'd like her to have stopped a couple of months earlier, when she is about 18 months.

1. DD still wakes every 2 hours for a feed at night.... and I am starting to long for a more than 2-hour stretch of sleep, especially as I now work full time again as a lawyer!!!

As I said, I work full time (DH is a stay at home dad, which I WHOLEHEARTEDLY reccommend!) so on weekdays, DD has no bf between 7.30am and about 6pm (or sometimes 7pm). But boy does she make up for that at night! Its every two hours or so... defniately more for comfort than anything else.

Re the sleeping, this may be the wrong thread, but its all tied in with bf really. DD goes to bed fairly well after a good routine and if put in the cot sleepy, she falls asleep. She loves her cot actually and is quite happy just playing in there if she's not immediatly tired. But she simply will not go back down in the night without a bf.... we have tried, but perhaps not very hard as, what with working fulltime, I really need all the sleep I can get, so I know I go for the easy option (with a bf, she and I are both asleep again within 5 minutes...) oh, and she's still in our room...

During the week, she'll go down to naps fine with DH with just a cuddle, but at the weekends, when I am around, she is VERY demanding asking for bf (she can embarrassingly say "breasty" as she tugs down my top.... not great).

So where do I begin?

As you can tell, I am a lazy mother more of the attachment school of parenting than anything else, more as a result of accident really, so I'm not really up for CIO type stuff...

Tried No Cry Sleep Solution - no joy.

Thanks!!!

Oh I could have written this 3 months ago. Little one probably tries to whip your top up straight when you get home from work right? Leaving you struggling to get your work shoes off.
Ok this is what we did. DH took him at night period! DH was quite strong on this bless him as he felt it was his turn since he wasn't working.
I was stroppy at first about it and had to hear him call out Mummy Mummy Mummy! But after a couples of weeks he now wants Dat at night (when I'm trying to give DH a break)
It's hard but you have to earn the money!

Forgot to add he's lost the bf to sleep association now just this week. It's actually more liberating than I thought it would ever be being such a strong attachment parenting type

Thanks smeared... good to know its not just me. Yes, she tugs at my top the moment I come home. She has this habit of licking her lips, grinning and saying "breasty... mum?" as she yanks down my top.... I know that DH is probably the key to the nighttime feeds, I guess I am just dreading the initial few nights. How long did it take for you?

Its not helped by the fact I wonder whether I should really be weaning DD at all.... but she has had over a year of bf and I just don't know if I can face tandem feeding.... and I am not sure how I feel about bf much older children (sorry), so if not now, when? (I suspect it would be even harder to wean DD with a newborn around... surly she'd just be jealous of the baby getting bf and not her!?). Arrgh!

I found it an issue when I took him on the tube and he was trying to pull up my top so can totally relate. I was similiar to you as I didn't think it right to go to formula after 6 months and intended to continue on until a year. However DS had different ideas. But was wondering whether to regret that decision.

We had a deal that I would take him from 5am, so I got some sleep. It meant that DH had a bit of a lie in in the morning. (DH looks down on the sleeping while the baby sleeps angle )

We did baby led weaning, so in fact, DH pointed out that he was getting was getting the same nutrition as me. DH took him to the GPs to find out how many bottles he should be getting and the GP stated as long as he was exclusively breast fed for the first 6 months he should be fine.

I think it did take a while because they miss you when you are out at work, even though he loves hanging with Dad. Funnily enough, he now lops my handbag over his shoulder, waves bye bye and walks out of the living room a lot "are you off to work now lil-smeared, bye bye".

I hope it goes ok, it is painful at first but you have given DD the best start you can. I think it is difficult to get out of the mindset of feeding on demand too and the instant comfort (or quiet) you can give.

Totally! I really am of the comfort above all else for babies mindset, plus I guess I feel guilty about no longer being a stay at home mum (but, like your baby, DD LOVES being home with dad and she has a parent 24/7, so she's pretty lucky really!)... so all that combines to make me feel guilty about contemplating weaning.

I know I could go on and on... I do love bf... but I really don't know about tandem feeding... I fear being exhausted ALL the time........ My plan always was to wean DD at 18 months (mainly because my wonderful mum bf'ed all of us until 18 months!), so I would like to aim for that I think. It means that, if I get pg fairly soon, I'll be bf during the first trimester... yikes!

My DH doesn't share your DH's view re sleeping.... he has a nap every day with DD!!! So maybe I should get him to wake up a bit more...!

Or maybe someone needs to come on here and convince me that (a) DD will learn to sleep through without me weaning her; and (b) tandem feeding is great!