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Weaning

Find weaning advice from other Mumsnetters on our Weaning forum. Use our child development calendar for more information.

Weaning help, skipping bottle, how?

2 replies

EastLondonmama · 04/01/2018 02:48

My baby (N) is 6 Months, only breastfed and I’ve just started weaning.

I’m going to be going back to work soon and have a few weddings coming up which N isn’t invited to so it would actually suit me to wean him completely by 9 Months, ideally!

I have two questions:

  1. if I do wean him completely, what milk substitute do I give him? I would rather avoid formular as I’m skipping the bottle, he is already using a doidy cup at mealtimes, and everything I’m reading says not giving cows milk until they’re over 1. I can express but he just won’t drink my milk out of anything that isn’t the breast, including any food I put it in, which suggests I may have an issue with my supply once frozen (but that’s a whole different conversation)

  2. How do I go about weaning him off the nightfeed, which I believe tends to be the last to go, and what can I give him instead (which is basically my question above) if I do get him off the breast before bedtime and he doesn’t take a bottle? And also try to stop him wanting to feed throughout the night - so far, food has done nothing to change this (sleep training also hasn’t worked)

At 10 Months I will NEED to leave him for 2 individual nights, I have no choice there, and I’m finding it difficult to see how I will currently be able to do this, or even work my way to getting to the point where I can leave him. I don’t want to use formula and although I can express, I’m skipping the bottle stage so I’m at a loss as to what I could do!

Just as a side note, he is a big boy and still feeds 3 hourly at night and before every nap in the daytime... Leaving him with anyone else might actually send them to an early grave!!!!! 😬

OP posts:
ElphabaTheGreen · 04/01/2018 03:58

Well now...

If you want him off the breast by 9mo, your only option is to give formula, if you don't want to express. Cows milk is too high in sodium at that age to give as a BM substitute. You can give formula in a doidy cup - there is no law which states it has to be given in a bottle! I think you've got zero chance of him taking a bottle now and he's old enough to know it's no substitute for a boob, so I think that option of a 'mum-substitute' is gone.

I went back to work FT when my first was 8mo and a complete bottle-refuser and wouldn't even take expressed milk (frozen or freshly-squeezed) from a cup of any kind. He also ate next to nothing so I was beyond sick with worry about going back to work. However, without me around, he actually ate like a horse at nursery. I just got them to mix expressed milk into his porridge and give him an extra yoghurt or two to make up for the lost milk feeds.

However (again) he was still feeding every 90mins to 2hrs at night at this time, and continued to do so until well past a year, so I knew, if nothing else, his milk requirements were being met at night. Any attempts to reduce his night feeds were met with screaming, screaming, screaming...I even left DH to deal with him for a couple of nights and slept with ear plugs in. DH couldn't hack a third night (I was well-hardened to the sleep deprivation by this stage, which he wasn't) so it was back to being the all-night milk bar until he was developmentally ready to sleep more independently. I tried all other methods of sleep-training as well to no avail.

Do bear in mind, though, that night breastfeeding is about a great deal more than the milk which is why babies do not like parting with it- it's reassurance that primary caregiver is still there and they're not going to get eaten by wolves, it's comfort after a bad dream, it's relief from teething pain or any other growing pain, it's relief from boredom in a dark room...the milk is a bonus and why introduction of solids may have zero influence on the sleep of a breastfed baby. The ability to not breastfeed at night is, as I alluded to earlier, a developmental skill, and has less and less to do with nutritional needs as they get older, but at 6-9mo, nutrition does still play a big part. After my experience with DS1, I didn't even attempt to night-wean until after 12mo with DS2 as I knew his nutritional needs were definitely being met in other ways and he was more likely to be developmentally ready to not need boob-support to get back to sleep at night. Basically, when you do it, lie with him and have him scream in your face and pull your hair for three or four nights until he knows night boob is no longer an option. People talk about Jay Gordon's 'gentle' night weaning - that's basically what it amounts to. I think it has to be done cold-turkey as well - JG advocates no feeds until midnight, then feed thereafter, and gradually extend that time, but a baby can't tell time and I think that's just confusing and prolongs the process. Do it cold turkey and get it done, but again he doesn't advocate doing it until after 12 months.

In short, whoever you leave N with when you have to go away will need to be prepared for a rough couple of nights, unless you're able to a) change your plans and not go away or b) physically remove yourself entirely from N for 4-5 days and leave your DP with a bottle and see if N will take this in desperation.

Sorry. No easy way around it!

EveryoneTalkAboutPopMusic · 04/01/2018 15:11

  1. Totally agree, formula is your only option if you want to stop Bfing. Once your baby has turned one you can give Cows Milk as the main drink. Their kidneys just aren’t mature enough until then. EBM can be given from a cup, it doesn’t have to be a bottle.
  1. Unfortunately for you, but not for your baby, sleep training isn’t recommended until they are one. Also, how you feed your baby has very little to do with night waking for the reasons posted above. Roughly half of all one year olds still wake at night. If you are going to be away, you need to let the person who is going to be responsible for him to start getting used to looking after him now for at least some of the nights. Have a read of 12 alternatives for the All-night nurser. This is aimed parents of toddlers but might help.

It’s also pretty normal for them not to be dropping feeds yet. If you do want to stop, I’d pick whether yiu are going to offer EBM or formula and then pick a feed and offer that one each day before dropping the next feed. You could always get your DH to give the first feed, so that you get —a lie in— chance to have a shower in peace. Smile

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