Stopping breast feeding may not solve the waking in the night. It may just be a stage she’s going through, teething could be waking her up, she’s right in the middle of teething age.
If breast feeding settles her quickly so she goes back to sleep then it may be better than the alternative of trying to sooth her without breast feeding.
From experience, I bf DS until he was 22months. He co slept which made life easier for us since we didn’t have to get out of bed to try and settle him if he woke. He would rapidly go back to sleep as would we.
DS always slept soundly when sleeping with us. He learned to quietly wake me and was an easy baby as a result. We didn’t co sleep by choice initially. I put my back out and found it difficult to put him back in his cot. He was around 7 months, everything was going to plan and he had always been happy in his crib then cot. DH suggested leaving him in with us since it became apparent co sleeping was actually easier for both of us when I was struggling to put him down without waking DH up.
We were both working so decided that good sleep was more important than trying to follow the crowd and moving him into his own room.
Even when he did make the move ( age 3), he would often quietly sneak in with us. He was like a ninja and we’d often wake up with him between us. He worked out early on that if he didn’t wake us he could stay, it was quite comical if we woke up while he was climbing in because he would just freeze until we pretended to go back to sleep.
When he eventually started sleeping on his own through the night we actually missed him. We always slept better when he was with us.
Co sleeping isn’t for everyone but it is a parenting style worth considering if sleep is important. We are meant to sleep together and studies have shown that it was definitely necessary in the past for survival. When we talked about DS sleeping in his own room he would ask why he had to sleep on his own when we slept together. He had a point.
Sometimes it’s worth rethinking our approach to sleep and looking for solutions that suit the individual family rather than what we are led to believe is “right”. How you parent is your business. We often had comments from friends and family who were very negative about co sleeping. But my DHs grandmother, who had six children, would just say that she had yet to meet an 18yr old who was still sleeping with their parents. I think with six children she’d experienced most problems.
I often thought that the negative comments were the result of regret for the parenting choices they made. My DSis did sleep training with her eldest who was always difficult to settle as a result. She would get up, ask for water and use any excuse to avoid going to sleep. Her youngest co slept and was never a problem when she eventually moved into her own room. She would go to bed and go to sleep. On paper it should have been the reverse, the eldest was a really laid back, easy child apart from sleep. The youngest was and always will be high maintenance apart from sleep. As DH’s grandmother predicted DS became a wonderful sleeper and as a child was never a problem sleeper.
Obviously I speak from anecdotal experience but most of the people I know who co slept had similar experiences. I suppose you only continue co sleeping if it works. What we did have in common was we learned to keep quiet about co sleeping because of the comments it encouraged.
Essentially find what works for you and ignore the judgement of others.