Author Topic: How to stop the dream feed for a breast fed baby  (Read 1033 times)

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Offline Marjan

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How to stop the dream feed for a breast fed baby
« on: May 30, 2012, 18:30:14 pm »
Hi. I have a 12 month and I am still doing a dream feed at 11:00 by breast feeding my baby. There has been nights that I have extended the drean feed to 12:00 and she has not awoken up to nurse and is sound asleep. We are still breast feeding 5 times a day (including the dream feed) and she is taking solids 3 times a day. Two reasons I am hestiate to stop, 1. I work so this give me the chance to get her to nurse twice in the night to help keep up my milk supply and more importnaly bond with her; 2) She is sleeping through the night (7:30pm  to 5:00am, nurses at 5:00 and goes back to sleep until 6:30) and I am afraid she will wake up and want to nurse herself back to sleep.

So what is the correct way to stop the dream feed so she does not wake up from hunger?  ???
« Last Edit: May 30, 2012, 19:14:44 pm by Fiver »

Offline Fiver

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Re: How to stop the dream feed for a breast fed baby
« Reply #1 on: May 30, 2012, 19:20:44 pm »
Welcome!  I think what most people do about losing the DF is to move it forward gradually until it is meeting the BT feed, that said, if she is sleeping that well you may be able to just drop it cold turkey.

At 12m, your supply is well established, so is unlikely to be affected by stopping the DF now.
After 12m, there's not such a focus on milk for nutrition as there has been in infancy, so if you are concerned about her being hungry, you could offer more food.  You're BF more times during the day than a lot of people at that stage (we were probably on 4 feeds per day, no DF at 12m, dropping down to 3 feeds not long after).
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Offline Erin M

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Re: How to stop the dream feed for a breast fed baby
« Reply #2 on: May 31, 2012, 01:03:05 am »