Breastfeeding at night

[mama0got0moves]

Hello. Looking for some advice about breastfeeding at night.

My DS is 12 weeks and is EBF, although he does take a bottle of expressed breast milk every morning from Dad.

My issue lies in that baby will only fall asleep on the breast. I then have to wait until I think he is properly asleep before I can move him to his crib, which is right next to the bed! Problem is I am so tired I usually end up dozing off before with him still in my arms! Although it feels safe enough it scares me and I also want to get him sleeping in his crib more. At the minute he will only go down in it for between 1-2 hours at the start of the night after he's already fallen asleep (on the boob) whilst me and DP are still downstairs.

I either need to find better ways at soothing him to sleep after moving him to his crib straight after the feed OR better ways at trying to keep myself awake until he's deep sleeping and easily moved.

Any advice or shared experiences very welcome!

Ta!

Is he still feeding when he drops off or is it comfort sucking? If he's just comfort sucking ( so not swallowing after a few sucks) then try getting him to take a dummy. Then he can soothe to sleep using the dummy and you can out him down whilst he is still sucking.

Might take some practise to get it to work but it's the only option I can think of...

Good idea! He's a bit hot and cold with dummies. But can usually take one if very tired. Only worry would be he'd wake up if it fell out. I'll give it a go though.

My LO often spits it out but it doesn't wake him up usually. When he starts to stir I stick it back in and he tends to Settle and not wake up completely. Best of luck!!

I would recommend getting set up for safe cosleeping (google it) and experiment with feeding lying down. It doesn't mean you can't try the crib if you're still awake (breastfeeding makes you sleepy too so it's natural that you're dozing off) but it means if you do drop off you're far safer. Don't try feeding on a chair or sofa in an attempt to stay awake as that is much more dangerous than falling asleep in a prepared bed.

What Una said. I bf for 2yrs and co slept/fed from 3 months it was the best decision I made for both me and my wee one.

I would also recommend feeding lying down - I found it really comfortable. Don't even start to worry that feeding to sleep. Now that my children are 10 and 7, it feels like such a short, fleeting time and they will not feed to sleep forever!

So I tried the dummy trick last night and tonight and it just woke him up! He's not the best at taking a dummy tbf so it's not a massive surprise. I have fed him lying down before but this means I'll def end up falling asleep and I really want to try and get him into his crib more.

Any others tips welcomed!

Firstly look up safe sleep guidelines.

Secondly I leave a dim light on whilst we are feeding. This signals to me ( and partner) he's still in bed.

Google the pantley pull off. Think it's unhooking latch in corner of mouth with little finger and closing mouth so they suckle without boob (bit hazy from DD)

However my main advice would be to go with it. It won't last forever. Soon you'll be listening to them snoring on monitor whilst you can't sleep!

Can I ask why you want him in the crib more? At this age you will get the most sleep if you bf lying down and just co-sleep. I don't properly wake up to feed, baby is cuddled in to me so when he starts rooting around I just help him latch on then go back to sleep.

Appreciate that's not what you asked!

OP I'm like you in that I don't want to co-sleep and I know it can be quite frustrating when you're looking for advice that everyone recommends co-sleeping, which you're not willing to do, so basically you get no advice you can use (no offence intended to anyone who's suggested this, I know you're just sharing what worked for you).

Warming the cot with a hot water bottle helped with our DD going down. What are you doing to try and settle him once you put him down if he stirs? I find a hand on the chest or holding her hand helps (sometimes 🙄). Although if her eyes open properly it's game over and I have to pick her up again. And we have the same issue with the dummy, just seems to wake her up, so you have my sympathies!

It's not that I'm against co-sleeping at this age. We have done it a few nights and I'm sure it would mean I get more sleep. It's just I don't think our bed is very safe for it as we have a very old squishy mattress.

Also I don't want to have to go through a period of weaning him out of our bed. At the moment his crib is a Chico next2me and he sleeps in a sleepyhead in this. I'm already wondering how I'm going to wean him out of the sleepyhead so this is enough to deal with.

To soothe him after I put him down I put a hand on his chest and shhh him whilst Ewan dream sheep plays white noise. This usually works if he is already pretty much in a deep sleep. If he's in a light sleep when I put him down he'll wake up and these tactics don't usually work. I'll either have to put him back on the boob or if he's uninterested in feeding get up with him, swaddle and sway - which can take ages.

Well (and again I appreciate this isn't what you've asked!) if you want to try co-sleeping older mattresses are fine as far as I know. Memory foam is a concern because of overheating risk, but having an old squishy mattress is ok.

Also both my DCs transitioned to their own beds with no problem, it wasn't difficult at all.

Otherwise I'm sorry I don't really have any advice! Try to resist rocking him to sleep as he's going to get a lot heavier in the next few months.

Also maybe try the Cheshire baby whisperer (book or online) - it's a multi-sensory gentle approach, so there's guidance about using music/smells etc to help babies learn to settle - you could use some of those ideas to get him used to drifting off to sleep with boob and music then try and switch to cuddle and music, then just music....

Don't put him dow as it causing a falling motion within them which wakes them or so I heard from
a sleep expert (has lots of books and an impressive array of qualifications) in a workshop I attended. Try sliding into the co sleeper when asleep hard to do if you are using a wee pod thing as well, I know.

White noise is brilliant and if you have an iPhone there is a lot of free baby sleep white noise. My wee one at 2 1/2 still listens to Ian ockwell-smiths Gentle sleep music for babies I can barely stay awake listening to it too it's lovely

I sat counting DS's breaths, it took 200 for him to be in a deep enough sleep to move. Quite boring but having something to concentrate on kept me awake