How did you drop the bedtime breast feed?

[OwlinaTree]

My son is 13 months and has dropped all breastfeeds except the bedtime feed. He has not complained about dropping any feeds up to now, and although he's needed a nudge, it's always been fine.

He gets quite agitated and cries at bedtime, and the breast pacifies him. His bedtime routine is bath if it is bath night, teeth, nappy change and sleep suit, story, feed, lullaby over the cot, put down. He then falls asleep pretty quickly 3/4 nights, fusses for varying amounts of time on the other nights!

He's never gone to sleep without his night time feed, we never really persevered with a bottle unfortunately, and luckily up till now there's never been a time I've needed to leave him before his bedtime (we have had the odd evening out, honest!).

I just feel the time has come to stop now, he doesn't really need it other than for comfort, and although I could keep going, I'm aware there are some social occasions coming up which will involve leaving him before bedtime, and I want him to be ready for that.

Does anybody have any tips on how I could calm him or alter his routine to make dropping this last feed a bit easier? Or do I have to just drop it and have a couple of bad nights settling him while he gets used to it? Thanks all for reading all of this!

My advice would be to decide on an evening you're going to stop, then take yourself out and leave his dad to put him to bed - obviously you need him onside as well though! If you're not there he can't have the feed. Otherwise in my experience, you will give in for some peace. You may need to do it two nights running but if it really is just a comfort thing then hopefully you won't need any more. Do something like go for a swim or a run or to the supermarket - something that will take you an hour so you can't really return home in the middle of it (but won't be out all evening in case it's a total disaster!)

I stopped both mine at 14 months, dropping the bedtime feed last, and this is how we did it and it worked.

You could try offering the feed earlier, eg before bath time, and then going out. Your son probably won't be that interested, but you may feel better about leaving him then!

Or you could just try that, offering it earlier and earlier so it's not associated with actually going to sleep and he'll probably just stop.

Following with interest.

Good luck, OP.

I weaned at 17 months and the bedtime feed wad the last to go. We changed it from breastmilk to a small cup of milk during story time, and her grandmother and father did the first three or so bedtimes. It wad a completely easy transition, she never even seemed to notice!

We stopped the bedtime milk just after 2 years, to protect her teeth.

Best of luck!

Thank you for the replies, I could swop for a cup of milk, and maybe get dh to offer it. Keep everything else the same, but maybe offer the breast a bit earlier so I know he's getting something.

Will discuss with dh, thanks.

I let DH do the bedtime routine and he offered milk in a cup (which was roundly refused) and an extra story. At that age I went back to work two days a week so on those days ds had daddy and double story, and the other days I did bedtime milk as usual. It doesn't need to be every evening or never, your supply is well established now so you'd be fine doing it most but not every night.

Place marking as looking to do this with my dd in the next couple of months. Good luck OP, report back!

That's interesting googley, just assumed it would need to stop totally. It would be good if it could be sometimes but he's able to go to bed without it. He goes for naps in the day without a feed.

Breastfeeding does not cause tooth decay; indeed breastmilk may strengthen infants' teeth - but brush well first.

Oh yes DS was really sporadic in his last feed even though it was the last one to go.

We swapped the story and the feed around so that story/song was the last thing we did before bed. Then one day we just dropped the breastfeed. My husband did the first few so he didn't ask for it. It was much easier than I thought in the end to be honest. Good luck :)

DD was a total breast monster, never took a bottle, never liked formula, didn't even have a dummy.

We kept up with the night feeds until 18 months old. I knew she wasn't really drinking much, it was more for comfort.

One night she was so tired I just put her down, no feed, and she went straight to sleep! I was so surprised - so I tried it again the next night and the same thing happened. She never fed again, didn't ever ask for it.

She occasionally has a bedtime cup of milk now, but more often I ask her and she says no she doesn't want one.

It'll happen when your lo is ready. It might be easier than you think.

Sorry that should be evening feed, not night feeds.

Plus there's only me here, so being able to "smell" the milk made no difference to her. Once she didn't want it any more it didn't matter that it was me putting her down to sleep, she just went right off it!

They can be so more flexible then you think with this. DS will go to bed fine with DH without milk no problem and has from quit a young age. Something else we would often do when going out is put ours to bed a bit early depending on how early. Giving the milk feed before letting someone else finish the rest of the bedtime routine can work well.

Milk supply at this age is so much more flexible then in the early days you can easily miss a day or two and still go back to feeding. There are also still lots of benefits to breastmilk at this age to. Not just comfort, but nurtinal and supporting your babies imunine system to.

Well, decided to swap things round a bit, so got him ready for bed, then did a feed, then dh has read the story in his room and done the song. He's moaning a bit, but he does some nights so that's not so strange.

I'd be up for still feeding him a bit longer, but I just want to know that he would go to bed OK without me too, don't want to leave him with my mum and him just be screaming for a feed.

Yeah, that's the nice thing (one of the nice things!) about feeding a toddler - they like it if you're there but they're often fine without milk if you're not. Their brains seem entirely capable of working out that daddy can't do milk and there's no point asking! And they make their own routine and build up their own relationship, which is lovely.

I carried on until 2.9 with my second child, because after about a year it was very much a case of bedtime milk if I was there, no problem if not. Tbh, it was more an issue of having someone she absolutely trusted and knew well to put her down (which limited it to DH and granny) rather than a milk issue, once she was over a year.

OK, night 2. Did the breast feed 1st, which he was keen to have. Dh has then done sleepsuit, nappy, story and lullaby. There was mucho wahhhhing going on, Jeff just started to doze off on the boob, and didn't appreciate all the fuss! Can't hear anything at the moment, so hopefully he's settling now, fx!

He'd not Jeff!

at a baby called Jeff!

I abruptly dropped the bedtime feed when DS was 15 months and I got delayed on a train (I was back at work by then). I was frantic, DS was totally unbothered and went to sleep after a few half hearted of cows milk sips from a sippy cup. And that was the end of our breastfeeding journey. Part of me was sad that I hadn't had a chance to appreciate the last feed, and part of me was happy that it was taken out of my hands so I didn't get stressed about it.

Well, little boy went to bed with no feed tonight. Hardly a fuss really, was a bit upset, but dh calmed him with a story or two. All done in 15 mins.

I'm a bit sad about it really... Glad i didn't know I was getting him for the last time yesterday.

Feeding not getting