Did anyone regret breastfeeding to sleep?

[3month]

Hello, I have a 13 week girl, who I am currently co- sleeping with and BF to sleep, both for naps and during the night.

She used to only wake once or twice during the night, but since her jabs at 8 weeks has begun to wake up maybe 5/6 times. I’m thinking initially it was then jabs that unsettled her and now we have moved onto a growth spurt, and that’s why she keeps waking.
This isn’t so much of a problem, I am happy to feed to sleep during the night.

However, I am thinking of trying to train her to self settle during the day for naps. I was wondering if anyone regretted just letting their child feed to sleep indefinitely, until they just one day fell asleep by themselves?

Or is self settling something I have to teach my baby?

I am hoping to become a childminder later on in the year; and won’t be able to spend hours upstairs feeding her to sleep if I have children needing looked after downstairs. So I need to have naptime sorted.

Has anyone got success stories of babies just one day self settling themselves, where previously they had fed to sleep?

It seems like all my antenatal friends/family have got babies of a similar age to mine, who will simply drift off to sleep by themselves for naps and I’m left wondering why my Tootie won’t do that?!

Lastly any advice for how to ssshhhh/pat to sleep, instead of feed to sleep?thank you all for any advice

I don't regret feeding mine to sleep. I used to then sit with her for 20 minutes so she was properly asleep and would stay down for a longer stretch. I was a better parent for being well rested.

I regretted it for a while when she was 1 and I couldn't get her to sleep without it. But long term no I don't regret it. It just stopped one day and was fine.

@wheresmycake
That’s what I’ve been doing, and it’s a bit hit or miss as to whether she will then stay asleep, or wake 20 mins after I have moved away. 9/10 she will wake soon after, not waking in a panic, just cooing/playing with teddy etc.

@Titsywoo
What age was your baby when they stopped themselves?

Thank you for your replies.

no i dont regret it. My children are much older now, and so much time was wasted stressing about babies potentially not growing out of being breastfed or cuddled or whatever. Cuddle and breastfeed your babies as much as you both want.

I fed my second baby to sleep for all naps and bedtime until 6/7 months as it was the easiest and quickest way to do it until that point (so I could then deal with my elder one). I stopped at 6 months because it wasn’t working as quickly and so no longer suited us. We had absolutely no problem switching to not feeding to sleep BUT I think changing any sleep routine depends very much on the child.

@BadgerFace

Do you mind me asking how did you stop, and did it take a long time for your baby to learn to self settle?

I agree with PP about so much time wasted in worrying about whether she will grow out of it. I am just worried about when I childmind, how will I be able to get her to nap whilst I have others. I think I’m just worried that one day she will be a 3 year old and still feeding to sleep, but I’m sure she will have learned to nap by herself by then!

It was hard to transition once we stopped, just before he turned 2.DS still takes an age to fall asleep. He always did, even when BF. But no, don’t regret it at all! OP have a read of the below - that and the rest of the website really helped me.

kellymom.com/bf/normal/comfortnursing/

No, I don't regret it. Of course there were times when I found it frustrating, but now they are older I look back and I'm pleased I did it.

I nearly always fed my baby (now 16 months) to sleep.....I used to worry about doing it but stopped worrying in the end and just did it because I'm lazy he stopped falling asleep eventually and he just goes down awake.

I’ve breastfed all four of mine to sleep for very nap and nighttime sleep until I went back to work when they were one, then my husband just rocked them to sleep. None of them would be put down to nap so I just take the opportunity to have a sit down and read or whatever while they’re napping.

It all goes so fast. Like a PP, mine are mostly bigger now and I don’t regret a second of cuddling them while they slept on me. Seriously, what could be more lovely than having a baby sleeping on you?

No god no, never. They are nearly 3 and 5 now and professional sleep dodgers. I long for the time (two years plus for both) when I could shove the all powerful boob in and send them to sleep in a blink.

We did a light version of controlled comforting/crying a week or so after we moved her into her own room at the same time as changing the bedtime routine around. So I fed her, then passed her to my husband for cuddles and book reading and he put her down. I left the process after the feed. We let her cry for one minute then went in, then two minutes if she needed us and then three and carried on with three minutes until she self-settled. If she stopped crying whilst you’re out of the room then you restart the timer. But she was the right personality type, it only took 25 minutes the first night and maybe 10 the second. She’s now nearly 2.5 and I think she has only woken me up once in two years in the night (well, before 5am!) from 7pm so she is a good sleeper and that method of sleep training was a good option/fit for her. If i’d had a baby who took longer than half an hour or so then I’d have done a different method!!

By way of contrast, we did a lot of rocking and back rubbing with my eldest!

Never regretted it. I think it's the most brilliant, least stressful way of dealing with the early years.

I BF my DD to sleep until she was 21mo and DS was born, then she had a feed before bed and nap before cutting those out.

I'm currently BF 14mo DS to sleep for his naps (if we're at home) and bed but he settles for DH just with him rocking and lying with him.

You'll work it out for childminding when you need to.

No way, still feed to sleep st 13 months and she goes to sleep very quickly (except when teething or going through a regression) and I now see it as a very special time we have together. Will stop at some point but it works so no reason to yet.

No never regretting feeding to sleep and co-sleeping. I tried it the hard way with my first baby because I listened to some baby books and people who said you have train them and all sorts of bullshit. But once I gave up and co-slept and fed to sleep everything was so much easier. I didn't even bother with a cot for my subsequent babies. We co-slept and then straight to their own toddler bed. Easy peasy.

Some smug fuckers say about making a rod for your own back, but I never had to get out of bed at night, where's the rod? It's like saying "well you better make things definitely difficult for yourself and baby right now, just in case they might become difficult later on" Er, no thanks!

@someknobend you speak my language 😂

Never regretted it. DD is 10, and turned out to be an only (planned for more). Memories of feeding her to sleep are some of the sweetest, and I'm so glad I ignored all that "rod for your own back" stuff. I think sometimes there's an rush to get life under control after having a baby, but control is always an illusion and babies aren't babies for long. Do what makes you feel best right now.

16-month old toddler here and I still feed her to sleep. It doesn't worry me at all.

Only once it stopped working 😂 oh how I miss being about to just feed her and she'd be out like a light!

Do what’s right for you!

Conversely I’d like to point out that I did not feed my currently toddler DS to sleep, nor do I feed my 5 month old DD to sleep. I loved that I could put DS in his sleeping bag in his cot shut the door and he’d go straight to sleep for anyone. And DD is starting to link her sleep cycles and be the same way. So for me it was worth it. But then my babies don’t reallr seem to want to feed to sleep anyway so it wasn’t a huge struggle to get them to not do it

You can't teach baby to self settle, they will learn it themselves. Try looking here for information on sleep studies.

"A recent study ? demonstrated that mothers and babies undergoing a controlled-crying intervention started out with matching, synchronous, hormonal stress responses (babies cried at bed-time, their stress hormone levels increased, and their mothers' stress hormone levels also increased). After three days, the babies had ceased to cry at night, and mothers' stress hormone levels dropped, however babies' levels - despite the fact they were no longer crying - remained high. This suggests that the babies' behaviour had adapted to being alone for sleep, but that their physiology had not. The response of the babies in this study lends support to the theory that babies who undergo sleep training via extinction may be learning to 'give up' rather than to 'settle' -- outwardly the two behaviours appear the same, but inwardly the babies physiology is very different"

They will learn to sleep alone, even if they're like DC1 who went from sleeping through to waking up every 45 minutes for several months. He now sleeps beautifully without us attempting to 'train' him.

Just to clarify the facts - the "recent" study mentioned above is the Middlemiss analysis and it (1) only covered a tiny sample of 25 babies and (2) had numerous additional flaws (expectingscience.com/2016/04/21/the-middlemiss-study-tells-us-nothing-about-sleep-training-cry-it-out-or-infant-stress/). I find it surprising that a website supported by Durham University refers to this study without clear health warning disclosures.

I know it does not have anything to do with feeding to sleep - but I see the Middlemiss study gets a lot of coverage without the appropriate context.

As an alternative view, we didn’t feed to sleep for both children. There was a small amount of difficulty occasionally (and yes, we gently trained) but now they both go to sleep as soon as we put the lights out. There’s no sleep avoidance or wanting anything to drink. They don’t have disturbed nights. My personality is such that I like and need an evening that is physically mine. I would not have relaxed while lying next to them in the dark.

I disagree with the ‘making a rod for your own back’ concept but certainly there is some truth in the idea of managing expectations.

I agree that not everything can be strict and controlled, but equally the advice will to ‘just enjoy the cuddles while they’re young’ will not sit everyone. I loved my (generally) free evenings to get things done and spend time with DH. Or to spend more time with the younger next baby.

@wintertravel1980 I know it's a small study, but the results are interesting. There are other studies on there that are inconclusive about sleep training as well but the chance that that particular study is right is too big a risk for me personally to want to take.

It's an interesting site to read too, even if you don't have a horribly sleeping DC anymore, there's a page on cultural differences which is really good.