How to NOT feed back to sleep at night?

[ellie3009]

Hi all,
I am new here and in need of advice. LO was born on 1st Jan, so is now just over 5 months. (Was born at 37 weeks.)
Until now, I have always fed him when he woke at night, assuming he had woken because he was hungry.
Last night I accidentally woke him by banging bathroom door on my way to bed (facepalm) and decided that he wouldn't be hungry since he hadn't woken for a feed IYSWIM.
So I tried to rock him back to sleep instead. One hour later, baby still screeching every time he was put down, and had tried white noise, dummy, rocking, mobile, blankey. So after an hour I gave up and fed him. Hardly ate anything, but fell asleep on boob almost instantly.
So it seems that I am now obliged to feed him to sleep at night.
I am becoming more convinced that he is not actually waking from hunger because he often eats virtually nothing before falling asleep on the boob.
How can I get him to go back to bed on his own, preferably without an hour of screaming? Anyone got any ideas that worked for them?

hiya, I wouldn't worry too much at the mo as you DS is still soooo young but here's an alternative we found and still use.... it's the 'sleep inducing point' an acupressure point that you press and get's them into a soporific mood. It's excellent if your child gets over wired and too tired to calm down to sleep and it's simpler than rocking as you can do it while they lie in the cot and don't have to pick up. Here's my blog post on it if you're interested in giving it a go - mydaughterwontsleep.com/2013/12/27/the-sleep-inducing-power-of-acupressure/ I hope it helps.

Hi Ellie. I also wouldn't worry too much about feeding back to sleep during the night. Can your ds self settle when you first put him down for the night?
I also feed dd (4 months) back to sleep, but my thinking is that as long as she can settle herself and go to sleep on her own at bedtime that the feeding during the night isn't a problem. In an ideal world our babies will be sleeping through the night pretty soon so they'll get out of the habit of being fed back to sleep. It's a pain when you wake them accidently, but feeding them gives them comfort too, and I can't see the harm in that myself.

Out of interest did you try all those different things that one time? Might have actually ended up being over-stimulating (and unexpected, from your DS' perspective). It won't help immediately, but maybe select a couple of things that can work together, eg white noise on, put blankey under his hand so he can hold it, then use the acupressure point mentioned earlier, or just stroke from forehead down to the nose, and do it every nap and bedtime so it becomes really familiar, then when you take the feed out of the equation it's still clear what time it is...

Do you want to or feel you ought to? There's nothing wrong with feeding to sleep. Babies feed for comfort too, that's a legitimate need, so it makes sense they feed back to sleep. I still do it now, it's vastly easier than the alternatives IME.