Dropping night feeds

[catwhiskers10]

Right, DD is 8.5 months old, still BF and eats 3 meals a day. Typically she will have only 3 BF a day and only sucks for a few minutes so I dont feel she takes much milk. She goes to bed at 7pm and sleeps until 7 or 8am but has 1-2 BF overnight.
Should I stop giving her feeds overnight? I feel 12/13 hours is a long time for her to go without a drink and dont feel she takes much during the day but older relatives are telling me to stop feeding her at night and let her cry in her cot which to me doesnt seem fair.
She has been gradually sleeping for longer and longer periods (she used to be a terrible sleeper) and we had one night where she went 12 hours without waking at all so I feel that the feeding overnight is something she will grow out of in her own time.
Do others agree or am I being to soft still letting her feed at night?

[NellyTheElephant]

Jammers - I replied to your other thread

[Jammers]

And just to make sure we're talking about the same thing - when you say you cut out the night feeds, do you mean between 12 and 5am or between 7-7 or similar?

[Jammers]

Nelly - at what age did you cut out the nightfeeds with DC3? Did you use the technique you describe above? My DC is 5.5 months and waking twice a night - I know i can't handle this for very much longer!

[NellyTheElephant]

You can drop the night feeds if you want to and she won't suffer nutritionally, or you can let her grow out of it in her own time, it's your choice really. If you do decide to stop feeding her you don't have to just leave her to cry. You can hold and cuddle her (for the first couple of nights this might be quite hard as she'll be crying and angry and wanting the comfort of feeding), but after a couple of nights she'll probably get the message that she is not going to be fed and you'll start find that it is much easier to settle her without a feed if she does wake until after a little while she stops even waking.

I don't think you're being soft - it's up to you. Personally I couldn't have coped with still being woken 8.5 months on, but lots of people do and if you feel that's fine with you then so be it. I was lucky that DCs 1 and 2 slept through quite early of their own accord and so when I had DC3 and he showed no sign of doing so I had the confidence to make it happen by cutting out the night feeds. It took about a week / 10 days to go from 2 night feeds to none and no wakes.