Dream, Brooking full speed ahead for the sleep training to succeed. I don't know about the hunger thing either - I thought M wasn't hungry when she was waking every 2 hours or less, but then my giant full boob on Sunday night produced 6 hours sleep, so who knows? Also, last night she woke up at 10 just as I was trying on a corset (thinking about my costume for Halloween party) and I couldn't get it off, so I tried feeding her in it (it's a waspie), which was terribly uncomfortable. She didn't like it either and woke up 2 minutes after being put down. I had to leave her crying while DH and I struggled to get the bloody corset off - I wound up cutting the strings, so she was quite awake/cross by the time I got to her. She had the other boob, fell asleep, and then promptly woke up again 5 minutes after that, so she went back on the first boob. She eventually went down at about 10.20 and slept until 3.40, hurray! So perhaps hunger really is an issue and I should be offering both boobs routinely at bedtime.
I know that with two offering both boobs isn't necessarily possible, though. M was up briefly at 5.30 and then slept until 7.30, when DH disturbed her by kissing her goodbye. We're off to Mum's tonight without him to see an old friend of hers - first night apart since M was born! So M's sleep will probably go to pot again in the strange cot.
Dream, now that they're eating, could you get an afternoon off, somehow? Leave them with your DH and a parent, or something, and go and do something nice for yourself? It's not sleep, but it would be a break, which is restful in itself. Also, you never know, having time away from the 2 hour feeding might mean you break the cycle - that they realise they can go longer without a feed, or that when you come back you have more milk than usual and so fill them up for longer.
Jaggy, hope the brownies went well! Mmm, brownies...
Thank you for your tales of bad motherhood accidental damage to the DC. I feel a bit better now - and I have learned that ceramic and direct heat don't mix!
My bloody stepmother phoned up the day before yesterday to ask me how weaning was going. I told her about BLW and she basically poo-pooed the whole idea and said I should be "loading M up with baby rice or baby porridge".
She asked what I was feeding M for breakfast and I said usually full-fat Greek yoghurt, same as me. She went "oh Too, that's not enough!" I pointed out that it kept me full until lunchtime and she said that M was a growing baby who needed more food than an adult.
Eh? She does not need more food than me - she is a baby with a teeny tiny tummy! If her tummy is about the size of her fist then it is titchy! By the way, I know yoghurt isn't BLW food because I feed her with a spoon, but it goes in and I want her to have one good meal a day. I tried her on omelette and scrambled eggs and she just wouldn't eat them. I don't have any bread in the house as I'm low-carbing and besides, I'm a bit worried about gluten so I'm not dead keen on toast for her. Dad has Crohn's disease so I just want to make sure I don't stress her little digestive tract as it matures. And my stepmother was horrified at me giving M chunks of roast lamb. She didn't choke, but I had to admit that she didn't swallow much either. But she is getting really good at eating things like broccoli and cheese and ham - last night I gave her macaroni with cheese and broccoli and she spent ages playing with it and definitely ate a fair bit, and she's moving food around in her mouth properly and really starting to chew. I don't know what the problem with egg is.
And I fed her broccoli and stilton soup the other night (again a BLW fail, but I did give her a first course of bits of cheese and ham to practice chewing with) and she scoffed that down. Oh, and I told my stepmother that I was going to go to a group on Monday which starts as a bf support group but also helps with BLW, which is run by a HV, and she said "oh good, they'll keep you right". I AM right! I am doing BLW as advised by the HVs - I'm not making this stuff up out of some ill-advised notion of my own! I am an intelligent, well-informed woman who is capable of making decisions regarding my own child, thank you very much! Thanks to MN and the internet in general, I have access to a hell of a lot more information than she did 10 years ago with my brother (I know the internet existed then, but not in our house it didn't).