8mo sleep regression - possible to wean off night feeds?

[ReadyPlayer21]

I am after some advice / experience from other mums in dropping night feeds.

DD is 8.5 months and FF. We are pretty sure she's having the 8 month sleep regression. For two weeks she has suddenly been waking up for night feeds 3 times a night between the hours of 11pm-6am. Very unusually behaviour so probably growth spurt / teething / regression etc. Before that, she was at the stage of only waking once, and sometimes even sleeping through.

Her milk consumption is high. She's also 91st percentile so I'm keeping an eye. She eats 3 meals a day and has loads of milk during the day still, but still she genuinely seems hungry for milk on these night feeds so I'm baffled.

Before this sleep regression we were planning on trying to wean her off night feeds. Is that still sensible, or should we just feed on demand whilst she's going through this regression phase and hope she goes back to how she was eventually, when we can try again?

If anyone has any experience or knowledge of this I'd love to hear it. Thank you!

It’s normal for a baby to need milk over night. Milk should be her main source of nutrition until she is 1 when it should ideally continue to be source.

You sound concerned that she is on the 91 centile. Which centile was she born on?

I'm not concerned about the 91 percentile per se, but she's gone up one percentile level since birth, and I'm monitoring the milk. Her intake seems to be much much more than the NHS website and other baby sites recommend. (Though they are all really vague and unclear about amounts). My health visitor has never visited due to pandemic and hasn't responded to text or emails asking for clarity.

Eg she has roughly 1200ml during the day, and now she is waking up she's having an extra 500ml at night oftentimes. Everything I've read says their milk consumption should be going down a bit now due to food, and getting ready for weaning off milk as main source of calories after 12 months.

If she’s hungry feed her. She’s still so young and is doing lots of growing and developing. I would hate to wake up hungry or thirsty during the night and not be allowed anything (I also can’t sleep when I’m hungry!) x

My baby went through a bit of a regression recently, she’s 8 months. We have always fed on demand. After a couple of weeks of increased night feeds she stopped wanting milk in the night and has slept through the last four nights . If you baby seems generally happy I’d go with it for a couple of weeks and see what happens. Also you could offer drink of water in the night or dummy if you use them