Success stories please on helping 22 month old to sleep on own

[Stargirl2707]

My 22 month old sleeps in the same bed as me. He’s always been a frequent waker through the night, never any different. For this reason he shares a bed with me as I also work full time.
I’d love him to learn how to fall asleep on his own. Currently he falls asleep for my partner at bedtime, we transfer him to his cot in his room, and then after his first wake up he’s in bed with me for rest of night. I breastfeed him back to sleep each time he wakes (usually every 2 hours from his first initial wake)

His first lot of sleep can be anywhere from 2-4 hours before he first wakes, then every 2.

How can I help him?
How do I help him to fall asleep on his own? How do I wean him off night feeds?

We still haven't managed to get our 3.5 year old to fall asleep alone but it's much easier than it used to be. Used to rock him until I was too pregnant to manage it a year ago. At that point I just laid with him in our bed in the dark and pretended to be asleep. Took ages at first but now he goes off fairly fast so don't mind.

He would come in with us from about 1am until we recently moved him to a proper single bed. It's a lot more comfortable and he will go until 6am now probably 5 nights a week.

I breastfed him back to sleep during night wakings until 16 months. We broke that cycle when we went on holiday and I got my husband to deal with the night wakings, so he got out of the habit of foraging for milk! Not much of a holiday for hubs but I was very well rested. 🙂

Sending you all the strength! This was me just over a year ago. All of it. It’s tough! You’re doing an incredible job.

We started by cutting out the bedtime feed. I’m not going to dress it up, it was hell. I used Moshi sleep stories that I had playing on the tablet. I would lie with him in his cot. Then I’d feed whenever he woke up and through the rest of the night. I tried to keep him in his cot as long as I could but sometimes that wasn’t long at all. I then gradually started pushing back the first feed, so I’d give myself a time that I would feed from, say 1am, and would just play the sleep stories again or Hushabye Lullabye on CBeebies to try and soothe him back off up until that point. Eventually he fed less and less until I wasn’t feeding him at all. Once I stopped feeding, he woke less and consequently came into our bed less. We moved him into a new bedroom with a double bed at around 2 and a half and he slept through once in there for a while. Now it’s phases of sleeping through and phases of waking a few times, I guess as he navigates growing up! But my god it feels incredible to sleep. We still lie with him at bedtime and if he wakes in the night, one of us will go in and cuddle him back to sleep but this isn’t an issue for us. We could probably gradually stop that if we felt it was a problem. The feeding thing was by far the hardest part. I hope you’re able to get to a place where you feel comfortable with night times. We’ve now also got a 6 month old and it’s so different with her. It was so hard with our DS, I really do feel for you. Lots of love to you and good luck!