16 month old DS has stopped feeding to sleep. What do I do now?!

[Bet01]

It's just taken me an hour to get DS to sleep for his nap, and the same thing has happened over the past few days. I can only assume bfing him to sleep is beginning to not work (yikes!)
DS cosleeps with me and DP on a mattress on the floor, and usually I bf him to sleep for about 7-7.30 and he goes to sleep pretty quickly. He doesn't stay asleep very long, but that's not what I'm posting about so lets ignore that for now..
But now when I bf him he seems to get quite drowsy, and almost be trying to go to sleep but not managing it. I don't think he's fighting sleep, but he does then get frustrated and start to cry when he can't drop off. I then keep switching sides, or lie him accross me while he bfs, which helps a bit, and then pick him up and rock him a bit too, and he'll FINALLY fall asleep bfing after maybe an hour.
I think it's time for me to stop trying to bf him to sleep since clearly it's not really working now anyway, but my question is how can I get him to sleep if I don't bf him? He can't self-settle, has always slept next to me, so I think sticking him in his cot and hoping he'll nod off is a bit ambitious.
What have other people done? Would be grateful for any advice, thanks.

Hi there, I also have a 16 m/o who very occasionally still b/fs to sleep. More often than not though she'll still be awake when she finishes b/fing. I just lie down next to her on our bed until she falls asleep, then transfer her to her cot.

About a month ago I started the gradual withdrawal technique as described here. It started to work but then teething/a cold/hot weather/MMR jab/holiday put us back to square one, but I am planning to try it again soon.

Good luck!

Mine has switch fed (swapping sides every 10-30 seconds maybe) since 8 months (now 15 months). She wouldn't go to sleep unless I did this, eventually as she drops off she settles on one side. She sleeps on my lap for daytime naps, or in the sling if we're out. Or if I know I'm going to need to get up while she's sleeping we'll lie down when she's going to have a nap.

She also now takes a long time to go to sleep sometimes.

I've noticed that something that has a very big impact on how quickly she goes to sleep is what activities she's done that day. So if there hasn't been a toddler group that day, and it's raining so we don't go anywhere else interesting, she just gets very fussy and doesn't sleep for ages even though she's clearly tired. So maybe she's physically tired but hasn't worn herself out mentally yet. Could this be a factor with your son?

So I wouldn't stop doing feeding him to sleep as you may find it's just a developmental phase (there's a lot of brain development in these few months, and maybe teething as well) and you miss the option later.

I think DS did this around the same time, and it was a phase - he went back to feeding to sleep.

I can't remember if anything else was happening around the same time, but I'm wondering if your DS is really tired? Does he nap in the day at all? I know DS couldn't reliably go to sleep at 7/8pm until he dropped all of his naps, before then the 7pm bedtime was less reliable.

Especially if he's waking shortly after being put to sleep, that would make me think his body clock is treating bedtime as a nap.

Thanks for the replies everyone. His nap today was slightly easier which does suggest it's a phase that might be ending, which is a relief.
Bertie, he has one nap a day from 11.30-1pm which I think is about right for his age (?) but sometimes I actually think overtiredness may play a part. We do loads each day really, out in the morning to playground for 1.5 hours, then toddling around park pm for about the same, so physically he should be shattered. Interesting about being mentally tired though.
Fingers crossed tonight will be better as well, thanks for the insights everyone.

Hi Bet I remember you from some previous traumatic sleep problem! Though it sounds like we have different issues nowadays... I've not fed to sleep ever really, but just in case you did decide to stop, I just wanted to suggest re teaching to self-settle, we moved bedtime feed to before bath, then basically just wait it out (in your case probably lie there, for me it was sit next to cot til asleep. Oops, screamy waking better run!

Hi Fifi yes I do remember you!
DP did bedtime last night as I was going out. He started at 7.30pm and he couldn't get DS to sleep until 9.20pm! He's rocked him to sleep before in about 15 mins, but now DS just screams the place down (whilst being rocked, distracted with music, singing, or even just being put down on the bed). DP said he tried everything.
I do hope it's just a phase, because at the moment if we do just try and lie with him while he goes to sleep it just doesn't work at all. He either tries to get up off the mattress and leave the room, or just screams. I really don't get why, bedtime has always been really nice for him: bath with me, then pjs and bf to sleep.
Toddlers eh? Odd little creatures...