How to get a one year old to sleep without feeding?

[Peanutbutterandhoney]

My (just!) one year old has transitioned to cow’s milk fine (he was in formula before) but now I know I’m supposed to get him into cups not bottles. Which should be fine except he still feeds to sleep for both naps & bedtime. We tried a form of gradual retreat at 8 months & maybe it coincided with a sleep regression but it sparked terrible separation anxiety & he then started waking 10 or more times a night in terrible distress. So we went back to feeding to sleep & I usually hold him for naps as he sleeps longer that way. Sometimes I put him in his cot once he’s fast asleep but that’s it. He was a bit premature & small & has not been great at eating & sleeping in general so I don’t want to rush him, but want to switch him to cups at least during the day, & want to stop feeding to sleep too. What would you do?

Meant to say: because gradual retreat was such a nightmare & upset him so much, I really don’t want to try it again. But would love other ideas!

No need to do gradual retreat again or any other form of sleep training.

When you say he feeds to sleep, do you mean with a bottle? Is it really a huge problem for him to do so? It’s obviously comforting and works?

I did something where I started progressively diluting milk wth water and transitioned to a small drink of water before bed time.
After that you’ve really got 4 options:

1. Stay and pat/rock/cuddle your LO to sleep
2. Cry it out
3. Gradual retreat
4. Co sleep

I’m not a big fan of 2. 1 or 4 could be fine but perhaps not long term eg if you were planning another baby wouldn’t be sustainable. If gradual retreat has been traumatic lately I probably would do whatever is cosiest for now. I wouldn’t completely rule out a gradual approach if you needed to work towards LO falling asleep alone further down the line. There’s plenty of different ways of doing it and you might also find it’s less stressful in few of months/at a different age.

crazycatlady5 Yes he’s on bottles. The health visitor has been hassling me for 4 months to get him on cups as it’s better for teeth etc.

We're on the cut down of bottles with our thirteen month old. The HV referred us to a nursery nurse for support.

We're doing 5oz for 5 days, 4oz for 4, 3oz for three...etc

So far we're on 3oz. It's not been without it's tears but we just cuddle, put back down and walk out. Repeat as necessary.

Can't tell you we have results yet as we aren't done yet!

HappyHippoHippo Thanks. But is that plan so you can reduce the amount of milk? I’m fine with how much milk he has (he has another bottle at 11pm or so but if he wakes after that he has water) but it’s the feeding to sleep that worries me. I’m not a fan of cry it out either, & we have co slept a lot but we both sleep better when he’s in his cot; he’s a very restless sleeper & wakes whenever I move/breathe! So not really an option. He doesn’t seem to rock/cuddle easily to sleep but I could try. When do you brush teeth with the way you do bedtimes?

No not to reduce calories, just to shuffle calorific intake around. In our case it was for tooth brushing. Dd1 was very unhappy without a sippy cup at bed time but we didn’t want milk last thing because of tooth brushing so we moved over to water and dd1 just naturally started taking her calories earlier in the day. Then we could do nappy change, teeth and story as bedtime routine. And if she wanted her sippy cup she could have it whenever. It was never more than a sip. Water is just not as interesting as lovely milk- which is why I presumed your dc would quickly lose interest in a bottle of water and not fall asleep with it. Water isn’t snuggly like milk!

We then put dd1 down in the cot with a hand on her tummy and maybe a bit of stroking until she fell asleep. It took ages - I do remember missing the efficiency of feed to sleep. (This was a bit younger as we did do a gradual retreat thing and by 10 months she usually went to sleep by herself).

Dd1 was easily stressed by any changes to her sleeping it was better to start with naps and then tackle bedtime later- by bedtime she was too tired to cope with anything new without getting distressed. Ds, however, could settle himself down no bother at night but was a pickle with naps. So could maybe break the feed to sleep pattern with the calmest/happiest/most predictable bedtime/naptime first and build from there if you ds has best time of day?

When you tried the I’ll-fated gradual retreat, how did your ds go to sleep? What happened to the bottle then? (In my mind, falling asleep without a bottle/boob is a pre-requisite for gradual retreat....)

I think maybe the problem isn’t sleep but food then...we’ve reduced milk at night but he doesn’t then eat or drink more in the day. I’ve tried everything & it’s just really hard to get enough food into him. He still has a bottle around 11pm too & really needs it. I tried giving him water & he would drop off from the comfort but wake twenty minutes later starving. My health visitor said she’d refer me to a dietician so maybe I’ll do that. I think because he was premature & is still small maybe he just can’t eat enough to stay full for long. Thanks for the advice though. Maybe I can work on food first & then come back & try some of these ideas.