Weaning off breast

[franny8831]

My daughter is 10 months old and I’ve been EBF since birth. I’ve now decided to slowly stop breastfeeding when she turns one. I know this will be a very gradual process, so I’m trying to prepare myself as much as I can whilst juggling home life and DD1.
DD2 is breast-obsessed and has been from the get-go. I’ve been feeding her to sleep and I’m keen to stop this, but she just won’t settle with anything else. She’s also only slept through the night twice, which is fine as I know this is super common with BF, but I need to try and get her sleeping through more often and stop the night feeds now that she’s having three full meals a day.

How do I do this?! I feel powerless without feeding which seems crazy! Any tips would be welcome.

Is it feeding to sleep that you really want to stop or is it more sleep during the night that you’re after?

If you wanted to you could still feed to sleep, but have her go to sleep sometimes without being BF if you weren’t there and start to night wean at 12 months.

It doesn’t have to be cry it out. There are some very gentle methods like this one from Dr Jay Gordon.

@ExplodingSmittensI would say both, I need to know she can go to sleep without the need for me and also to night wean as I know its for comfort now and I could really do with more sleep myself with working again.
yes I do wish to avoid cry it out as I don’t think either myself or my husband could do it.

I wouldn't night wean under 12 months. I'd first starting building in some other sleep associations, so perhaps bum taps whilst she is breastfeeding. Or move her bedtime BF to earlier in the routine, then settle in another way. There is no guarantee that night weaning will reduce night wakes, that is generally only shown to be more reliable in over 18 month year olds. We night weaned at about 20 months, and it only worked by sending my husband in, coupled with a later bedtime and a short nap to make sure she was properly tired out.

Waking in the night and feeding won’t be for comfort at 10 months. Babies are programmed to wake naturally. At around 12 months half of babies still wake and need some input from their parents to help them resettle and this does not alter with feeding methods. I know this probably isn’t what you want to hear though.

I second the suggestion of introducing some sleep associations. The No Cry Sleep Solution has some good suggestions for this.

And I found feeding to sleep very helpful. I appreciate that you might not though

Don’t let feeding to sleep stop you going out in the evening though. I would leave DD home with DH sometimes a sippy cup of milk. She would often be up with DH when I got home but they both survived and I got to have a evening out.

@ExplodingSmittensthanks, appreciate the tips. It isn’t that I don’t find it useful but it’s the multi wakes that do keep me up that I’m finding hard.
I’m definitely going to look into the No cry Sleep Solution. This week I have tried to disassociate giving the evening milk in another room and also putting her down awake in her cot. It hasn’t been easy at all but she has eventually settled after 30 minutes which I count as a win.

Have they always had multiple wake ups? There’s a huge sleep regression at 9 months. Could what you’re experiencing be the tail end of that?