Beaten up by my toddler

[Uptown2022]

My baby is 20 months old, and still wakes several times a night to feed and I feel totally stuck. I sometimes still love breastfeeding but she goes nuts if I don’t feed her immediately (been co-sleeping for ages so I didn’t have to get up constantly). Last night she started clawing at me and pulling my hair while crying. Her behaviour otherwise is great, sorry for the click-bait title. Desperate to start night weaning now but it’s going to be hell! Does anyone have any tips? I wanted to do it as gently as possible, lots of cuddles and give her water instead, but she flails about like a wild animal if you don’t just give her milk straight away. I’m worried only cold turkey is going to work with her.

Can you get your DH to put her to bed or attend to her? I did it gently by asking my ex to feed DC a bottle or a cup downstairs so disrupting the routine a little bit, then putting him to bed sleepy and weaned him down that way I then went away for the weekend and he just stopped asking.

Thank you @Bigfatsunandclouds agreed I think my husband might have to have a really bad few nights. Neither of us can take her crying and she’s only ever really been comforted by bf. I’m already feeling guilty about the thought of it, but I really need to stop feeding at night!

Could you start by moving her to her own room before you start cutting down feeds? I found that this naturally reduced the amount of times they wanted to feed at night.

I say this from bitter experience. I tried night weaning and still bf in the day and before bed. It just caused confusion. The only thing that worked was stopping completely. It was hard but it worked

I agree that it doesn’t work for everyone

"neither of us can take her crying" and "she's only comforted by BF" is now causing you huge problems. It's normal for kids to cry, I think you need to toughen up a bit. A short sharp cold turkey will probably be less painful all round than prolonged agony of cuddles/scratching and her not understanding why you won't BF her.

I'd also put serious effort into both of you being able to comfort her. This will make life a lot easier in the long run. Whether cuddles, a special hug, a silly routine, a teddy, please find something that works that isn't BF.

This book should help you with that as it suggests so many sleep associations for you to try