When to reduce feeds

[flowerbutt]

My DD is on 3 meals a day but doesn't really eat that much solid food at all. She's EBF on demand. On average she probably nurses 5 times a day and throughout the night. I don't know exactly how many times during the night as I'm too knackered to count but it's atleast 3. Some nights it feels like she's latched on all night and just helping herself whenever she wants.

Should I be reducing her milk feeds? I really don't know if I'm doing the right thing but it feels like she doesn't eat as much as she should.

DD is 10 months old by the way!

It’s up to you - now she’s old enough to eat solids, there’s not such an urgency to feed on demand. What we did is as follows (although DD is in a cot, while it sounds like you co-sleep?)

By 10M we were usually down to four feeds a day (wake up, post nap, post nap, bedtime) and sometimes one during the night.

At 11M I dropped the morning post nap feed and replaced it with a snack of water/yogurt/banana.

At 12M she went to nursery and I stopped the afternoon post nap feed, so we’re down to wake up and bedtime.

I made the changes above to get ready for nursery (so she doesn’t expect milk during the day). We took our time and it was a gentle process, although it felt like a big change at the time! You don’t have to make any changes if you don’t want to, but equally it’s ok to make changes and introduce a structure of it would benefit you (you matter too!). It’s worth trying out a few variations on your routine to see how you do. She might react better than you think, or react better to dropping feeds at certain times of day, or react better if you try again a few weeks later.

If you can get more calories into her during the day you might find she sleeps better at night. DD really starting eating more solids at about 11M, not sure if that was due to reduce BFing or vice versus.