6mo night weaning / sleep training

[NocturnalBaby]

I have a 6.5 mo DS who used to be a terrible sleeper, but at about 5 months dropped down to waking just once between 7pm and 6am, and falling straight back asleep (or lying happily awake and quietly drifting off) after a bf. This was brilliant, and I started to feel like a normal person again. For the last month he's been back up to two feeds, or one feed but awake and squawking for an hour and a half. I know this isn't actually too bad, but I am just exhausted. He's a big baby (9kg), and I am very sure he doesn't need to feed at night - it often doesn't send him straight back to sleep, and he's less interested in feeding in the day if he's had a couple of night feeds.

DH and I are considering just dropping the night feeds, and instead leaving him squawking until he gets upset, and then going in every 10 minutes until he falls back to sleep. I know this is going to be more tiring in the short term, and will probably lead to some considerable crying, and don't want to do it unless there's a very good chance it'll work. Has anybody done this? Did it work? How much crying was there, and how long did it take?

You are right, that is exactly the way to do it.

We did this when DD was 4 months - went cold turkey on night feeds, DH went to comfort her in some other way when she cried, with gradually increasing intervals. Nobody slept much the first night. There was quite a bit of crying the second night, too. But she slept through on the third night and has been going to bed happily and sleeping through like a log ever since (now age 9).

DS was 5 months old when we did the same with him. It didn't work as quickly, possibly because DH was up like a shot at his first whimper and would properly wake him up by picking him up unnecessarily (I think). He slept through on the night when DH was away on business and has been going to bed with a smile and sleeping all night like a log ever since (now age 5).

You will soon get loads of people saying stuff like "hug your baby, they are little for such a short time", calling you cruel and laying guilt trips on you with bizarre references to unloved children in Romanian orphanages. Ignore them and teach your baby to sleep through the night. You won't regret it.

After the night I've just had (and the one before) I think im going to try this too! My dd is the same age (6.5m)

Thanks CoteDAzur for such a quick, supportive response. Great to hear a success story from a real person, rather than just internet advice. It's horrible hearing DS cry, but it's also a bit horrible having him awake and wanting to play at 2am (and then some) every night!

Rachel153, good luck! I think we'll try this weekend, I'll let you know how we get on.

I managed to drop from 3/4 wakings to a typical night of 1 feed and sometimes 1 quick settle through a week of cc. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, more angry than truly distressed. It wasn't perfect, but we were dropping a 4am feed dd was quite reliant on and offering water instead so it might be because we didn't go whole hog.

Going to work on it more and drop the water and cuddles soon, and then work on the final feed.

Bear in mind even if ds doesn't need the feed, his body is likely to have become accustomed to having it, and is likely to be genuinely hungry.