Planning to night wean - please share your experiences and advice with me

[Dillybear]

Hello all! My DD is eight months old and I think we are both ready to night wean. I think she is ready because:

• her feeds are now 3-4 minutes long, and she is off and on during feeds quite a bit
• it used to feel like she was taking a lot of milk overnight but it doesn’t anymore. I have had issues with oversupply and if she woke late or missed a night feed, even until fairly recently, I would experience engorgement and have had mastitis more than once. Now, when she misses night feeds I don’t get any discomfort. However, I would still be uncomfortable if she missed a daytime feed
• her wake ups have become random, whereas before she woke at fairly predictable times for long feeds

I am ready to night wean because I am very tired, and I’m returning to work soon. I have a long commute on the motorway, and at the moment I wouldn’t be safe to travel to and from work. I also drive a lot for work - it isn’t unusual for me to drive 100 miles in a day.

DD has two naps a day, between 2.5-3.5 hours’ daytime sleep. She self settles to sleep happily most of the time. Sometimes needs a little extra comforting in the cot, but really only if she’s teething. After a night feed I put her back in the cot awake and she self settles back to sleep without any fuss, so she isn’t feeding to get back to sleep.

DH has booked a week off work, and we’re ready for a few hideous nights (hopefully followed by the best sleeps of our lives!). I would be so grateful if you could tell me what method you used to night wean, how long it took, and did it work? Please share all your wisdom, advice, and knowledge with me!

@June628 I’m so sorry, that sounds awful. Could you be disturbing her if you’re still sharing a room? What was her crying like? Were there tears, or was she just cross?

For us last night was not brilliant, but I guess also not awful. She napped for 3.5 hours across the day. Which was a long time for her and I was worried it would impact on nighttime sleep, but then because of the clocks changing I thought I’d put her to bed late and hope that she wouldn’t wake too early. So she went down at 8 and was absolutely knackered by then. Fast asleep within 2 minutes! She woke at 4.30 (so according to her body clock, 5.30) for a feed, not waking for the day. We decided to do controlled crying rather than feed as she often doesn’t settle after a feed when she wakes around that time anyway. She barely cried, just grumped and grizzled. She kept it up until we got her up for the day properly at 6am. When I got her up she was fine being held and her eyes were completely dry, so definitely no tears. But then when she realised we were getting up she cried properly, bless her! We are now just wondering how on earth to manage naps and bedtime today. Reluctant to let her nap for much longer than normal because it does impact on nighttime sleep, but at the same time worried about the impact of overtiredness.

Bit worried that although the crying was less intense, the duration wasn’t shorter. You read people saying she cried for 2 hours the first night, 30 minutes the second night, slept through the third night.... but it doesn’t look like that’s how it’s going for us. But on the bright side - 2 nights with no feed now and we are surviving just about!

@TradedAtlanta sounds like your DD did amazingly well with all that going on! Sorry about the early start though.

I’ve actually been up since 3am, because I’ve been waking around that time (4am pre clocks changing) and worrying about when DD will wake up. Totally did not need the change in time while trying to night wean 😓

@Dillybear we are going longer nap here today (mostly because I’m enjoying it tbh) but also because she has to make it another hour til bedtime. I don’t find for my Dd that it matters too much, so long as the gap between the end of the last nap and bedtime stays long enough. It may be different for her though as she’s a few months older than yours? I don’t know... I know that their sleep drive reduces as the night goes on so that 5.30 wake will be the hardest for her to get back to sleep. Obviously no expert here (from my position of just accepting the one wake) but I wonder whether you could look at it that you are still teaching her that she can go the whole 12 hours without milk and when she next wakes a bit earlier in the night you’ll see the fruits of your labour and she’ll make it back to sleep faster and more easily.

I have been finding it much easier not to monitor obsess lately and trying to work out why. I think I had got into a pattern of wracking my brains too much for a pattern as it why she woke up earlier (had she had less to eat? Napped too badly? Napped too well?) and was taking her wake up as my failure. Since I have decided just to accept the one wake (at least for now) I have felt able to trust her to go back to sleep easily after a feed and not to wake again until something approximating the morning and I’m finding it way easier to drop off to sleep.

@TradedAtlanta oh bless her! We have no teeth here yet so can only imagine that being thrown in the mix too!
@Dillybear I was really hoping that I was disturbing her & if I wasn’t there she’d go back to sleep that’s why I was on the sofa but no such luck. Grizzled so I left her but then turned into a full on cry which is when I went back upstairs. There were tears & she was so sad but also stroppy. The thing is I don’t think she cared that much about boob I think she was just angry she couldn’t go back to sleep. If I give her Ewen to play with or my phone she’d be absolutely fine and as soon as I take them away she’d start screaming again.
Our DDs sound so similar! Last time I didn’t feed overnight she just stayed awake until the morning so I feel like I’m not winning at all it after a feed she’ll go back to sleep. Just feel like such a prisoner to overnight feeds I know she doesn’t need :(

@TradedAtlanta I so appreciate your support and the messages. Yes that’s exactly how I’m trying to think of it. She is learning that any time after 6am is up time and we can have milk, but before that it’s sleep time and there’s no milk. I got her up properly, our normal routine - I get her changed and ready before milk - to emphasise that this morning.

I’m going to persevere for a few more days as that’s why DH has taken the time off work. As you can see, her wake up times still vary wildly - 10.30 one night, 4.30 (or 5.30, depending on how you look at it) the next! That’s what keeps me so on edge. So I think it’s worth keeping at it for a while longer to see if she manages to sleep until 6am (or even 5.30, if she’s waking properly for the day).

Failing that, if she settles into one wake up around 4-5am I would be okay with that and probably just reintroduce a feed and see if that helps her resettle.

I also need to remember that if you told me a few weeks ago that she would be sleeping 8/9/10 hour stretches by now it would have blown my mind. So we are definitely making progress!

@June628 yes they do sound so similar! They would be a force to be reckoned with if they ever met and became friends. I know exactly what you mean about being angry that she can’t get back to sleep. DD seems like that very often when she’s awake for long periods. Sometimes she just doesn’t resettle after a feed, especially around 5.30am, and I can tell she desperately wants to sleep and is furious that she can’t. It’s totally different when she wakes up for the day - she’s just chatty and happy. If she woke at 5.30 and was chatty that would be okay with me! Not ideal, but I don’t mind an early morning.

Until the past couple of nights where we’ve not been feeding, when DD would wake and struggle to resettle, I found it was just a matter of waiting until she got tired enough to go back to sleep. Nothing I did really helped her. It’s so frustrating. Like, well, if you can’t sleep, can you just be quiet so that I can sleep??

OP I feel like I could have written most of your post! I can relate so much, thank you for posting and starting this thread.

DD almost 8 months and want to wean her off night feeds. At the moment she wakes up every 2 hours or so. Longest stretch is 4 hours, usually earlier in the night - say 6pm till 10 (depending on what time she has gone down). That is quite a rarity though! Then every 2 hours or less until 7ish in the morning.

She wants a bottle (formula fed now) every time she wakes up and genuinely seems hungry so I’m not sure how to get her off the night feeding. I don’t want to starve her but also she refuses to drink more during the day. She’s having 3 solid meals a day too.

Have tried CC and slowly reducing milk at night and giving water instead but all have mostly ended in a ballistic meltdown/hyperventilating crying. Kind of at a loss what to try next. Will be returning to work soon so need to try and figure something out. Even one or two wake ups a night would be a godsend.

Anyway, all that to say that your thread has given me a bit of hope! Will try to be stricter and not give in to feeding her after she cries and try shushing her instead. Fingers crossed she (and I) will eventually get the hang of it...

Really not sure what to do tonight, 5 min fee like yesterday, 7 min feed (in case I reduced too quickly as usual length is 10min) or no feed, send DH in or go in myself ... will sleep in spare room with monitor on (decided not to move her to own room as that’s attached to neighbours & don’t think it’ll be very kind )& see if she’ll be less disturbed....

That’s tricky. My DD’s feeds were 90 seconds up to three minutes before I started doing no feed. Maybe it’s worth reducing a little more slowly over a couple of weeks? If your little one had been having ten minutes that sounds like a full feed so she might actually be waking from hunger?

Definitely worth trying sleeping away from her if only for your own sanity. Can you leave your door open and turn the monitor on silent?

@Dillybear by 10 mins she’ll be near enough asleep on the boob, feeding for about 8 I’d say. Yesterday she was just on & off though & really didn’t seem interested.
Think I’ll do 7/8 minutes maybe. Not sure if it’ll make any difference but might make me feel better.

5 mins night before was the end of the world, 8 mins last night was apparently lovely haha came off happy then went back in the cot awake, took around 20 mins to fall asleep but did then up at 6:40 so not too awful I guess. @Dillybear did your DD reduce the length of her feeds gradually by herself? A 90 second feed just sounds so quick!
Hope you had another successful night

@June628 Yes she did reduce them by herself. That’s what set me off on the path of nightweaning. It just doesn’t seem worth it to be woken twice a night for a 2 minute feed, especially if sometimes she can’t get back to sleep for hours. That’s great that things went better yesterday night! I have read you can reduce the feed by a minute every couple of nights, so maybe aim for 7 minutes on Wednesday or something?

Last night was better for us. I was up every bloody hour, and haven’t really slept since 3.45. Pre-baby, I used to get into bed, fall straight asleep, and wake up exactly 8 hours later! What has happened to me?! Anyway the more interesting thing is that DD went to bed early at 6.25, slept til 3.45, woke up and whinged/grizzled (not really crying, certainly no tears) and then fell asleep again at 5am-7am! So it’s not the dreamy ‘on the third night she slept through’ situation but I feel we are making progress. She is sleeping a 9 hour stretch at the start of the night! I am hopeful that if she isn’t overtired she might be able to sleep better tonight, as last night she will have been very overtired which will have made it harder to sleep deeply. We’ll give it a few more days. I might go back to feeding at that early morning wake up if she can’t knock it on the head.

@Smudgefell thanks for your post and I’m sorry you’re having such a tough time. That sounds really rough. Does your baby self settle? If she doesn’t, maybe she doesn’t know how to get to sleep without a bottle? It sounds like she’s waking every sleep cycle and doesn’t know how to get back to sleep. If that’s the case, it might be worth trying to work on going to sleep at the start of the night rather than night wakings to begin with. Alternatively, if she does you try offering milk every four hours to begin with rather than every two hours? Or does she feed that frequently during the day? Maybe then over time you can reduce the amount you’re giving her at night so that she can slowly increase her calorie intake in the day.

None of this will be new to you I’m sure, I hope I’m not being patronising. Realise that you came here for solidarity not instructions, and you will find plenty of sympathy and solidarity here! It’s horrible having ‘going back to work’ hanging over you, it just increases the anxiety so much. How was last night?

Ugh, all of this is SO familiar to me. We are having problems and I don't think we're helping things by trying multiple techniques and not persevering with them when they don't work immediately. We have tried:

Reducing breastfeeding time at each feed. Doesn't work because DS eats at variable speeds so there's no real way of knowing how much he's had. Plus, if I take him off too soon he screams blue murder.

DH soothing him and trying to get him back to sleep when he wakes for feeds. Didn't work because DS got angry and DH got stressed so I just got up and fed him.

Introducing a bottle and cutting out night time breastfeeds. The rationale behind this was to give DS food if he needed it without the nice snuggly breastfeed, in the hope that he'd give up the night waking all together. In reality it just complicated things. He woke every 2-3 hours and had less than 2oz each time.

DH is exhausted, I'm exhausted. I think it's time to try CC.

I'm glad you're making halting progress, OP. It seems like you're nearly there and then you can start sorting your sleep out!

@Dillybear thanks for your reply! Not patronising at all and all good suggestions. I’ve wondered if it’s inability to self soothe as well but she can do it sometimes. She goes down awake when she has naps and bed time, grizzles a bit but always falls asleep on her own. I think it is every sleep cycle like you mentioned - she always wakes up at about 8-8.30 pm if she’s gone down at 6ish and has a little whine but goes back to sleep without any intervention from us. It’s the later ones from 10ish onwards where she will not go back to sleep without milk.

It could just be that she’s actually hungry as she really doesn’t have much milk during the day. I’m offering it all the time, when she wakes up/goes down/in between naps. She usually has it before a nap and I think that’s a strong sleep association now. Oh dear!

Yes the “back to work” anxiety is horrible! I think the fact that DP is back at work and I’m worried about her waking him up doesn’t help. I usually give in and feed her so she doesn’t scream the house down and keep him up. It’s all so tricky isn’t it! You feel like you have to keep everyone happy and it seems you just end up being the one run ragged!

Last night she wasn’t very good, but I think her teeth are bothering her too. Had a 4 am wake up where she just wanted to play! I think clocks going back isn’t helping! Took 45 mins of rocking and soothing to get her sleepy again.

Guys! I’m WIDE AWAKE. And judging by my use of capslock, a little intense. I have been up since 4.30.

But, guess who isn’t awake! My daughter! She is fast asleep, and has been since 6.56pm last night.

I cannot believe this is happening. The only thing that would make this better is if I was asleep too. But I’m too excited to sleep. She has never, ever, ever slept through the night before!

I hope this doesn’t seem braggy. It’ll probably never happen again! I’m just so excited and no one wants this kind of energy around them pre-6am so I’m posting here instead of phoning everyone I know to give them the good news.

I hope your babies (and you!) have all slept well, too.

Wahoo! Congratulations OP, so pleased for you!

Whoop! Well done mini-Dilly. What a grown up little girl, sleeping all night long. Raise a glass to you @Dillybear - the gods of sleep were with you after all!

Amazing! Well done!

Woohoo! What a result, so happy for you @Dillybear! Hope this is a glimpse of things to come and not a one off for you Keep us updates on your progress!

Thanks everyone. I will let you know if it was just a fluke... 😬

How was last night @Dillybear? Did she go it twice in a row?

@BigusBumus no!! 😭 last two nights have been as if we started all over again. She was awake 2 hours from 1am the night before last, and 1 hour from 3am last night. Last night she wasn’t crying just grizzling. Don’t really know what to do now, to be honest. I feel like if we go back to feeding when she wakes up the wake ups will carry on being at totally random times and I won’t sleep. I also feel like her sleep has overall improved so much in the last week or so - getting such long stretches is amazing. So reluctant to give up but using controlled crying is supposed to be a brief thing not something that goes on for a long time.

How is everyone else getting on??

Oh no @Dillybear that’s so disappointing! I’m so sorry I have no advice as haven’t used cc here (yet). Our two sleep throughs last week seem to have been the exception rather than the rule. This week she’s settled into one wake around midnight and an early start to the day (we’d made it to the hallowed ground of 7am start but the clock change has done for us and it was 5.30 all over again this morning). I really feel for her though as she has at least 4 molars coming through at the same time (possibly 5 - one quadrant is just sharp ridge after ridge all the way back). Bless her she is keeping her spirits up ok but we’ve had a few two man pin downs for the judicious administration of calpol (she’s not a fan).

I’m not sure what to do here. I’m back to work in a couple of weeks so feel this is my last chance to night wean as I can manage one wake up and work but not hours of crying. I’d really like to try for Tiny-Traded 2 but my periods still haven’t come back so seems likely they won’t until I stop bfing completely...

@TradedAtlanta oh poor little one. DD is just the same. It’s horrible having to give painkillers with them screaming and protesting, it feels really wrong and cruel. I keep thinking, you’re going to get how many teeth?!

Yeah this is my thinking about the CC. I was hoping we’d get to a point where wake ups are the exception rather than the norm. Long wake ups with her crying, even just a grizzle like last night, aren’t going to help me with the back to work situation. And it’s definitely not what I want as a ‘normal’ night for her. It is quite normal for my DD to make really great progress with her sleep when we change something, and then to sort of regress for a couple of days almost as if she’s protesting the change. So I have a glimmer of hope that we’ll see an improvement again. But if not in the next couple of days then back to the drawing board I think.

I can’t believe you’re thinking about doing this all again! I don’t know if I could ever have a second. Maybe I’d change my mind with some sleep haha! I’ve read that bf at night can be the thing holding up periods coming back, so maybe that’s the issue. Are you still bf at other times?