Night weaning / sleep / breastfeeding

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Not sure if I am looking for some advice or just moral support, maybe some success stories 😅
I have been trying to reduce the amount of times I feed my son at night in a hope to get some longer chunks of sleep. He is 9mo and EBF until weaning started at 6mo

At night I have been feeding him back to sleep as this has always been the quickest way with the longest results. The issue now is if I try and comfort him when he wakes without feeding him he SCREAMS, kicks thrashes, not just cries but really winds himself up until he sounds like he is going to throw up. Last night he was up for hours until I gave in and fed him again. My aim was to try and go 4h min between feeds.

During the day I can rock him to sleep or pram (although he still catnaps)

feeling a bit like a failure and pretty exhausted

You shouldn’t be nightweaning such a young baby. He’s 9 months old, doing a lot of growing and is hungry. He’s absolutely not taking in enough solids that will compensate for the fullness, calorie content and nutrition of breast milk.

Babies will feed through the night until they are 1. This is developmentally normal. Some longer. This is also normal.

Being hungry is not going to equal more sleep. Not what you want to hear- sleep deprivation is shite, but your baby is acting completely normally and you won’t be able to coax him into more sleep by withholding breast milk.

If you're trying to extend time between feeds you need to send your partner in when you're not planning to feed otherwise your son will expect milk. I night weaned (at 12 months each time) by handing nights over to my DP completely for a few weeks til the baby got the idea.

It’s not so much that I want to stop breastfeeding yet it’s more to reduce the amount of times.

Sometimes he will only feed for a couple of minutes and I’m sure it’s just for comfort or to get back to sleep rather then for the calories, less then 1h after having fed.

He is still feeding during the day alongside his meals.

@NotToYou
thanks, yes I think I would like to have stopped by around 12 months too as I will be back at work and currently doing all the nights! I don’t think I could function

He still may need to feed in the night though, alongside day feeds and whatever solids he is taking in.

Even if you take hunger out of the equation- nine month old babies will wake up in the night and need help and comfort to get back to sleep.

This is normal behaviour. Babies of this age rarely sleep through the night and multiple wake ups are normal.

I know it’s exhausting but it does wonders for your mindset if you stop seeing normal behaviour as a problem that needs to be solved or trained out of.

I feel your pain, my 7 month is still waking frequently at night too, and I’m reaching breaking point! I think it is possible to start cutting down night feeds, as they begin to up their solid intake during the day. I’d say ignore the poster above (bit of a know-it-all tone there!) , and try to get some proper advice from someone medical, doctor or public health nurse, on whether your baby needs the nutrition overnight .

DS2 is EBF and until last week was waking up every 2 hours overnight. He's almost 10 months corrected and I think the two biggest changes that have contributed to it are that he has massively upped his solids recently and he's started rolling onto his front to sleep. So there might be a change coming for you! He's managing a good stretch at the start now, and then mixed after that.

The best thing that DP has done is take him for a long shift early in the evening. He'll happily sleep for 4 hours on a person, so I would go to bed at 9 and DP would bring him up at 1. That meant I at least got one solid chunk of sleep.

I didn't contemplate night weaning seriously as DS2 is absolutely tiny (0.4 centile) and so I felt even if it was just comfort feeding the calories were essential for him, and because his screams would wake up DS1. You have my sympathies though, it is gruelling.

With DS1 we night weaned at 15 months I think when we were confident that he was getting enough during the day. It took a few days, I assume because he was clearly ready.

For reference the Irish health service suggests night weaning is possible once baby is established on solids between 6-9 months as they are getting enough nutrition during the day
https://www2.hse.ie/babies-children/sleep/how-to-help-your-child-sleep-through-the-night/

Im sure the NHS have similar recommendation. Of course people may want to keep up night feeding for comfort after that, all personal presence!

no infant feeding specialist would advise night weaning before 12 months.

And then- even the guide above says only night wean if solids have been fully established by 6-9 months. i never met a child fully established on solids by 9 month,
let alone 6. 6 is weaning age. That would mean three meals a day, large portions, the baby consuming as much calories as they would night feeds.

(also as an aside, this guide suggests ‘drowsy but awake’ (lol) and suggests that you should stop rocking your baby to sleep at 6 months and they just need to learn to sleep without you. This is the stuff of 90s American hands-off parenting guides. It’s concerning that this is national advice.)

@sickbucket67 I’d lean towards taking advice from a national health service over a randomer on mumsnet though!!

@Poppy9876
haha yeah I’m pretty sure I have read that from several sources too! It really is exhausting and I do think it’s party habit / comfort for him to get back to sleep. I wasn’t planning on completely stopping just gradually cutting down if possible. Which is anything seems a more gentle way to do it!

@Merrow
ooo that’s good to know thank you! He has just started moving around a lot more and pulling himself up so I was hoping that would start to tire him out more 😂
Just like a nice 3/4 hour chunk would be bliss right now 😅

Its fine to night wean. As long as they get enough calories through the day.