Breast feeding and sleep training

[Kstar321]

Hello,

has anyone here got a single success story of sleep training a baby who is EBF and needs to be fed to sleep…asking for someone who is on her second baby and had zero success first time around!

TIA

I bumbled through with this with both mine. As a last resort we tried crying it out with our first at about 5 months old and it was effective after just one night although felt awful about it and had tried absolutely everything else and we were losing our minds tag teaming with him until 11pm or later. Going to bed absolutely enraged him! However as he got older, he would pull out all the stops rather than settle to sleep. Now at 7yo he is absolutely fine. Second one I could put down awake but that was because he self soothed with sucking his fingers. He became a problem settling from the day he randomly stopped the sucking habit. And now at 5 he's very very difficult settling. I think it's a myth that they don't learn how to self settle, I think they go through many different phases.

Following with interest as having the same issue with my 4.5 month old

Yes. We did a modified ferber at 7.5 mo with both DC and stopped night feeding at the same time. I knew they were just feeding for comfort and not actually having a proper feed and within a night both went from being fed to sleep (both EBF) and waking multiple times to sleeping through and putting themselves to sleep. I know we're incredibly lucky but just wanted to reassure it absolutely can happen.

How old?

Have to confess I never bothered with sleep training my 4. Never seemed the right time. Youngest is just coming up to 1 and does sleep better on the nights I don't feed her to sleep. If I rock her to sleep she tends to only wake once (and I feed her to sleep then), But 3 times when I feed her to sleep is typical.

How old is little one? One trick is to break the seal when he's just on the cusp of sleep, tuck him up in his cot and give it a minute. He might just whimper a bit and drop off or he might ramp up to full crying. If he's properly crying pick him up and nurse him again until again, he's just about to nod off. Then break the latch and pop him gently to bed. Do this as many times as it takes. And do it every single time, every nighttime, until he's reliably settling in this state without the screaming. Then gradually stretch the time between taking your nipple back and lying him down. At the same time implement other sleep associations - white noise maybe, or shhhhing, or rocking, or patting, or a particular lullaby that he'll learn to find soothing as he makes the connection between that prop and you being there for him. Stick at it. It's tempting to give up after a few days but give it a couple of weeks - you should see a real difference,

Thanks for replying all - I haven’t actually tried any form of sleep training yet. I think because it was so unsuccessful and very draining with my eldest I’m really hesitant (he went on to feed to sleep until 2.5 years 😳) they are very different children with sleep in lots of ways in that DC2 actually sleeps mostly in his crib, naps well etc, so maybe he will respond better. I’ve just very much got it in my head that the reason these techniques don’t work is that I’ve left it too late / he’s a breastfed baby!

@HolidayNanny that sounds like a good place to start. I’ll give that a go. He’s 9 months, so I’ve probably left it too late and it’s all very ingrained! But I do feel ready to give it a proper go

I started with the day time feeds. Still fed back to sleep overnight for much longer. But in the day time, I would feed her in the living room until she had finished, if she fell asleep I would sit her up to cuddle and speak to her saying 'sleep time' etc but enough to wake her again, and then take her to her cot, put her in her sleeping bag (all while calmly saying 'sleep time') and then lay her in her cot. It took a couple of days but quite quickly she stopped falling asleep on me, just fed then sat up herself ready to be put in her cot. Not sure why it worked but it did, and also did this for the bedtime feed, fed her in the living room and then took her to bed after saying good night to daddy etc.

The overnight feeds were a different story and I had to just stop them completely, only offered water and cuddles once I knew she was eating/drinking plenty in the daytime. She cried but more out of frustration as I wasn't feeding her, within 2 nights she stopped waking completely and started sleeping through the night.

Absolutely not! It might take longer but you will get there! It might be an idea to encourage an attachment with a particular cuddly, a JellyCat rabbit or similar. Wear it in your bra (yes really!) for a few hours and at bedtime, when you're nursing him have it there with both of you. Encourage him to hold it and make that connection. When you pop him down put it down with him, but sneak back and remove it after he's dropped off, for the next couple of months for safety's sake. Whatever you do though keep it as 'Bedtime Bunny' or whatever ONLY - never be tempted to take it out and about with you!