Want to night wean but cannot hack the early mornings

[squidkid]

Any tips?

Baby is 14 months old and I work very long hard shifts sometimes and we have decided to night wean.

She is only having 1 feed a night anyway.

A few times we have tried this (when I am on night shifts) and she has slept fine and not been distressed without me - however she WILL not sleep past around 4.45am. Normal wake up time is 6.30-7! Will I just have to make the decision of feed in the night or get up at 4.30am?? We haven't tried her without milk in the night for any sustained period of time, just odd nights here and there so far, but we are hoping to do a whole week and see how it goes to wean her for good. I am having so many second thoughts!! Please give me some hope, or tactics? The whole point of night weaning is cause I am so shattered after long shifts and in the hope of improving sleep, is there any point if it's going to get her up 2 hours earlier….?

Day pattern goes like this normally

6.30 up (sometimes breastfeed)
11-1 (ish) - nap
6.30pm bedtime bf
7pm sleep
somewhere between 2 and 4am - night feed

Of course if she gets up at 4.30am she cannot last till 11 for her nap and bedtime creeps even earlier!

I think you have to tough it out for a week or so.

I am doing the same thing with my 10 mo twins. Was awake from 3.57! And they were both up from 5.15 when I gave in.

Could you give her a short power nap in the am at about 9 for 30 mins then a slightly later afternoon nap? Maybe just for a bit until it is sorted? The ultra early bedtime might not be helping.

So, you have a 14 month old baby and you don't want to get up in the night or get up early?

Good luck

I don't mind getting up in the night, but I need recovery sleep after shifts sometimes. If I night wean me and boyfriend can alternate the nights, at the moment I always have to get up at some point… I work in emergency medicine and I don't feel massively safe at work sometimes :(

I do think we need to shift the bedtime a bit later.

bedtime sounds fine to me tbh. my 3 month old can manage 7-5 and my 20 month old goes 6.30-7.30. though I'm not saying that all babies therefore can and will.

I suggest you give it a go over a week and see what happens. it takes a good few nights to cement a change.

as I'm ever the optimist I'll add in that maybe if you crack it she will sleep longer into the mornings too. a break in sleep normally means an earlier wake up for my two.

good luck

We are still on 4.30am wake ups but she is fine without milk overnight. I'm not sure if this is an improvement!! We did manage to rock her back to sleep till 6.30 this morning, but it took quite an effort and about half an hour so I'm not sure that counts! We will persevere for this week at least and then see...

7pm sounds right for bedtime, certainly not super early. DS is 3 and he's still in bed by 7 and sleeps until 6-7am with no issues.

I would personally aim to get her nap later in the day so it is over lunch (12-2) if that's possible?

I do feel your pain but in my experience we did have to make the choice between a disturbed night or an early start. In the end I chose early starts and he woke between 4.30/5.30 until he was about 2.... But pushing the daytime nap later definitely helped a little for us.

It's not going badly at all, will post a full rundown of how the week has gone tomorrow, in case anyone is interested!

Great news! Let us know

So in summary:

Night 1 (I was working a night shift): slept well from 7pm to 4.45am. Then up for the day (ouch). No tears for milk.
Night 2 (I was working a night shift): Slept well from 7pm to 5.15am. Then up for the day. No tears for milk.
Night 3: Slept well from 7pm to 5am, then boyfriend managed to get her back to sleep by rocking her in the pushchair till 6.15am. No tears for milk.
Night 4: Bad start to the evening with lots of tears and resettlings, but then slept well till 5am, and managed to go back to sleep in the bed till 6am. No tears for milk.
Night 5: went to bed early at 6.15pm as not feeling well, bad night's sleep, very unsettled. But no tears for milk. Up for the day at 6.45am!

So even though her sleep is still not brilliant (some of the above 'good sleep' is co-sleeping cause she just sleeps better with her dad than on her own) - I think the actual weaning was a total success! I was dreading her howling for me/milk, but she hasn't been bothered at all.

I have had the first 3 full night's sleep since she was born and feel fab!

Wow that's fantastic! Well done

Hello,
another update,

we have had another week of largely very good sleep and baby sleeping till 7am! No more night feeds. Maybe waking up once in the night but either of us can deal with that now. I feel like a new person and am really enjoying breastfeeding in the morning again, I just want to squish her and say thanks for all the lovely sleep!