I really don't want to breastfeed at night anymore (ds 11mo)

[Maveta]

I was wondering if anyone has some words of advice.. I don't really want to stop breastfeeding yet, in 2 weeks I go from working 3 days a week to full time 5 days 9am-5pm and ds starts nursery (he'll be a couple of weeks short of 1 year old).

I'd like to carry on feeding through this transition although I do see it naturally tailing off slowly after that. In theory I am happy to keep up the morning and bedtime feeds for quite a while but from now I'd really like to tail off the middle of the night feeds.

I'm tired, he wakes normally once a night, could be twice (unless he's not well when it could be a gazillion) and will not settle until I bung a boob in his mouth. I can't keep this up and work, I need dh to be able to share the night waking and well, I just want it to stop.

How do I do this?? That sounds stupid but like last night, he woke at 10pm so I gave him a short feed and back into bed. He woke at 2am and I said to dh I'm not feeding him. I KNOW he doesn't need it. We took it in turns to cuddle him, soothe him, settle him back (asleep) in his cot, when he would awake and start crying again. This went on for 2 hours until I finally gave in and fed him. I even tried offering some water in case he was thirsty but although he drank a bit it didn't settle him.

I am reluctant to offer a dummy as he used to have one and stopped using it at approx 4 months of his own accord. Would it work though? Should we offer formula? He is 90 percentile for weight and 97 for height so he's a big lad but he eats well in the day and I don't believe he really NEEDS to be feeding at night.

Any advice?? PLEASE?? I told a desperate dh this morning that you lovely ladies would have advice for us...

(I want to stress I am NOT trying to get him to sleep through the night, I know that he might wake in the night for ages, I just don't want to breastfeed him and don't know how to go about this change)

We had same problem with dd - def not hungry at night as if offered a bottle of ebm or formula was only taking a couple of ounces. Had been feeding or rocking to sleep, HV advice was controlled crying which I wasn't at all keen on (managed about 2 mins outside her door!) but found a book called Teach Yourself Baby Sleep by Andrea Grace which was great - talks you through how to teach lo to fall asleep themself . Had one horrible night but since then has been great - agree that getting her to nap in day has made her sleep better at night (and is much easier to put down for naps now). Have lent book to bf friends with equally good success. DD now mostly sleeping 7-7, but still feed her when she occasionally wakes. Good luck!

ok well he went down within 15 mins last night, I do normally feed him just before bed and I put him down half asleep so I did as suggested and fed him earlier and then read stories before bed. That bit was fine. He woke 3 times between 8pm and 6am though which was rubbish but we'll keep on for a few days teaching him to get himself off to sleep on his own.

Thing is, although he is rocked/fed to sleep, he does nap for 2.5/3hours over 2 naps and has done for ages now. So his daytime napping is not a problem at all.. well, we'll see..

Give it time Maveta - its more likely to take a couple of weeks than a couple of days for him to adjust.
Sounds like you did great for the first day.

Good luck. Sounds like you might be able to do it without a dummy. Was going to say that with DS1 I stopped bf him around a year and that didn't stop him waking... We then had to get up for a bottle in the night which was more of a faff. That all stopped when he found himself a dummy somewhere (at 14mths !) and his sleep improved from then on.
I had been really anti-dummy before but he finally slept through with one and went down for naps much more easily. Gave it up at 3 with minimum fuss (not always true I know).

Your call but if it's tough you might want to consider it, I found it preferable to hours of hand-holding and shushing. (lazy me!)

yeah I know it could take a while, that's just a bit of self deception to keep my spirits up it did go pretty well I think. I have to say I am very tempted re. the dummy as he was so keen on it before and we were very surprised when he gave it up. Dh is not so keen. We'll see. I might get one and have it on standby He often tries to steal other babies' dummies so maybe he wants one after all..

Poor you - I went through just exactly this too with both DSs. I tried the nicey nicey approach to stopping bfeeding at night, but in the end the only thing that worked was just going cold turkey! We had about two hours of crying over three nights but after that bedtimes and sleeping through were 'sorted'. Ds1 was 1year and DS2 was 18 months!

I made sure they were both well at the time and very well fed before bed time so I knew hunger and sickness weren't an issue.

I didn't just leave them to scream. I went in every ten or so minutes to let them know I was there and reassured them but just didn't feed. It's amazing how quickly they get the idea!

Actually an Italian friend of mine was 'INSTRUCTED' to do this by her italian paediatrician at 5 months, whihc I was a bit at - but her DS slept throught the night from then on.

I know it's a bit controversial and not for everyone - but it does certainly work!

ok well tonight I think we're going to go for it. And I haven't decided yet if it will be cold turkey or the softly softly approach. Am dreading it but enough is enough. He woke 3 times last night and the last couple of days feeding has been a bit uncomfortable and now I think I have thrush , it's the first time I've had it since we got feeding established and I'm fed up. I woke up today just thinking 'that's it, I#m stopping feeding full stop' but now that I've had my coffee and cereal I do think I'll give it a last ditch attempt to stop at night and carry on in the day for a while. Wish me luck!