Am trying to encourage dd (17 months) to self wean - any tips?

[CantSleepWontSleep]

She currently feeds first thing in the morning (but often then doesn't eat breakfast well) and last thing at night. I'm going for dropping the bedtime feed first, and then will work on the morning one.

I'm following a technique that I know has worked for a couple of RL friends, by offering a cup of milk (rice milk as she's intolerant to cows) as well as the breast at night, in the hope that she will gradually take more and more from the cup and less and less from me. The friends have found that this has worked over a period of a couple of months.

Has anyone else had success this way? Or tried but failed?

Any other tips/advice that is worth passing on?

I'm not in any enormous rush to stop, but if it's going to take months then I think I'd rather start sooner than later. Have been going about a week so far.

I weaned my son at 2 years old by slowly reducing the amount of time he could BF for. He was showing no sign of self-weaning yet and my milk supply had almost gone, possibly because of early pregnancy, and he just seemed to be feeding for comfort. It got quite uncomfortable (my nipples would actually be white at the tips by the time he came off) and theat gave me the incentive to be sightly pushier with the whole weaning thaing than I might not otherwise have been.

Anyway, I tried to balance how upset he was with the amount of time before I cut him off and eventually he was accepting just a few minutes on each breast. From that it was easy to go to nothing and I just gave him tonnes of hugs and reassurance and settled him to sleep by hugging him, stroking him, singing him songs, telling stories etc for comfort and distraction. It was all very painless and he stopped asking for it after a few days.

That's what worked for me anyway and I must have spent at least a year worrying about weaning him - for nothing in the end!

Good luck

Thanks pastalady. So did you offer milk in a cup instead, or did he have no milk?

Has no-one else ever done this?!

Sorry for not getting back to you quicker CantSleepWontSleep.

Luckily my little boy loves cows milk and had been having it since he was about 12 months old. I gave (and still do) it to him every night, in his bed, in one of those Tommy Tippee soft-tipped beakers which the baby clamps down on to get milk from. I think toddlers are still supposed to get a certain amount of milk in their diet for quite a few years, although it plays less of an important role as they get older. She will probablly take more rice milk/solids as she takes more milk from you.

Just keep following your instincts. I know people that have had success from the just cutting off the feeding all together and having a fraught few days/week and I know of pleanty of people who have managed to wean their babies using the slowly, slowly route. You know your baby and yourself better than anyone, go for something that you feel comfortable with and don't worry.

As for your other question, for me personally, offering a large milky drink which my son could take to bed with him worked really well. It helped compensate for the absence of the feeding, filled his tummy for the night and kept his milk-intake up. Really recommend those beakers that I said too!

Good luckx x x x

Hello CSWS - I am currently doing this with my 16 month old. He now has BF first thing in the morning and just before bed. Before I BF him at bed time I offer Cows milk also in a Tommy Tippee cup.

Have been doing it for a few weeks and he's not really cut down on the BF! He has a bit of cow's milk then puts down beaker and climbs on my lap for a BF. He really loves BF so I wanted to do it slowly (as he gets very upset if he thinks he can't have.....) took me a long time to cut down to 2 feeds a day!

I'm hoping he'll slowly stop/cut down

Ah, it sounds like we're both in the same situation then MrsBond. Dd also loves bf, which is why I want a softly softly approach. I also had a tough time cutting down the number of her feeds (between 11 and 12 months) from about 8 to just 2, although I think analysing how hard it was going to be was tougher than actually doing it in the end!!

After a good few nights where she was taking quite a bit from the cup, the last couple she has reverted to more from me, but I'll keep going with the same method and hope for the best!

Thank you both for your posts, and I'll keep this thread in my watch list, so if you want to keep on comparing notes MrsBond then I'm happy to do so.

I'll be really interested to see how you are getting on CantSleepWontSleep.

I'm in the same situation with my 19 month old. She feeds first thing in the morning and last thing at night and until recently I would brush her teeth before she took her last feed. In the last couple of weeks i've been feeding her and then brushing her teeth afterwards to try and break the last feed being a trigger for sleep. This has worked out fine.

I've been trying with the cup of milk too and for the first couple of nights she took it and then a breastfeed but I think she's on to us now and she won't entertain the thought of drinking it. She's quite happy to feed it to her teddies though!

I'll maybe try the thing with reducing the length of time she feeds and see how that works out.

Hope last night went well.

How did you all manage to get down to 2 feeds a day? DD is 14 months and very, very attached to the nips. She's on at least 5 feeds at the moment with snacks in between. I try to limit her but she gets so upset! Any advice would be appreciated.

You know, I really can't remember how we got to 2 feeds! I think I might have offered her a snack instead but I see you're doing that already. I think this happend at about 13/14 months.

Hello JoyS - to cut down to 2 feeds a day I tried lots of distraction (toys etc...) and then offering snacks or cows milk in beaker. Initially I stopped feeding him when we weren't at home and then only before sleeps in day. It did take several months to go from demand feeding to just am/pm feeds!

He gets very aggravated and stropy if I try to avoid feeding - so I do sometimes just cave in. If he has fallen over and is very upset I'll feed him to calm him - but then he won't let go of the nip! (can't believe his luck ha ha)

My DD (now 3) was very different - she hardly noticed when we stopped BF. But DS is very attached.... Sometimes I feel I should just carry on indefinitely with the am/pm feeds to save the upset. When I have my rational hat on I think I'd like to stop in the next few months.

Be interested to see how other mums manage with this 'slow' approach

Good luck

JoyS - at 11 months dd was feeding 7-9 times a day, and I couldn't see me ever managing to cut her down either. She consequently was hardly eating any solids (I had a 'wits end' thread about it at the time). With the support of my local support team (h/v, nursery nurse), I cut her down to just 2 feeds by cutting out one feed every few days, making sure that we had loads of activities planned, so that we weren't sitting around at home at all. I didn't offer an alternative milk source at other times (she has water on offer in a cup throughout the day). It took a little while before her eating increased, but it thankfully did, and until her last big bout of teething she was quite happy with just the 2 milk feeds.

Hope this helps.

Is there a need to replace breastfeeds with milk feeds of any sort? When I stopped B/F, my children drank water/juice from a cup. As long as enough nutrients are being gained from solids, does milk matter when weaning? Just wondered how well solids are tolerated in relation to milk intolerance.

Thanks for the tips. I have noticed that when we're busy she doesn't ask for it, so maybe we will try planning some really busy days.