Stopping nursing to sleep - how do I know night feeds no longer required?

[spammerb]

DD is 11 months. She was EBF until 6 months and we started BLW at 6 months for solids, and now combine BF with solids. For weight, she has consistently been just above the 75th centile since birth and has always been hungry for breast milk!

Her longest period of uninterrupted sleep to date is 8 hours (once!), but most nights she wakes on average 3 times, and I feed her back to sleep. I have also posted on the 'Props' Board and 'Support Thread for Spirited Babies' as I have been nursing to sleep and need to have DD sleep independently.

Gentle Removal has been suggested as a method of stopping nursing to sleep, and so has PU/PD. There is also an example in BW for Toddlers which has been suggested which is when nursing before her nap, break the latch when she starts dozing off. When she cries, put her back on, but break the latch when she starts dozing off. Continue for 15 min. If she is still crying, change the scene. 20 minutes later start over again. Eventually she'll fall asleep on your lap. Then use pu/pd in cot for naps and night wakes.

When she wakes in the night, most of the time she takes a good feed. How do I know if she is hungry/thirsty or if she just wants to nurse to get back to sleep? I want her to be able to re-settle herself at night, but I don't want to deny her a feed if she needs one.

My DD is spirited, and I'm steered towards the last method as I think this will be the least distressing/least frustrating method for both of us. Does anyone have experience to share of any of the above methods? Especially with a spirited LO.

Any thoughts, advice, or support on any or all of the above is very much welcomed!

Thank you

[anna*]

Chances are she probably is hungry when she wakes in the night, but that's not the same thing as needing to nurse. You can have learned hunger. If you set the alarm for 3am and went for a sandwich, pretty soon you'd start waking from hunger because your body had learned to be hungry at that time.

I never had any luck with gradual withdrawal - to me it felt like I was teasing my LO - we went cold turkey and within a few nights he was sleeping through 12 hours. Did it at 9 months.

Hopefully someone else will be along with some advice on the method!

[Love, laughter, & PJs]

Have to say I had the same experience as Anna around 9.5mo.  I think he was eating out of habit.  Usually by this age they don't need that nighttime feed, even if they're taking it.  They will redistribute those calories over the daytime feeds soon enough if you drop the NF.  We also just went cold turkey since GW wasn't working for us, either.  It took 3 nights but then he STTN for the first time and we haven't done a NF since. 

[EloysH]

GW isn't working very well for me either, I have similar issues.  He cries and cries and does not want to be unlatched before he's ready.  I'd say my little man has a strong stubborn streak if not spirited.  I have a thread going on NW's board if you'd like to read along for a similar situation.

ONe thing that hepld me determine whether he has been really hungry or not is to time the night feeds over a few days.  I am finding that some feeds are short and snacks - some are long and full feeds.  The other indicator I haev taht he doesn't need them is that he's not hungry in the morning until being up for 1.5 hours.

We are going to bite the bullet very soon and resettle (by DH) on one of those night feeds.

Good luck~

[spammerb]

Thank you all for your replies... they are very helpful. So now I'm thinking that 'cold turkey' may be the way to go.

When you talk about cold turkey, do you mean just going straight for PU/PD?

My initial reservations with PU/PD were because I read that it is best to use it as a last resort, and only when you have a good EASY, but we don’t have a great EASY probably due to nursing to sleep!

And because DD is spirited, we usually find that she can't switch off and won't sleep at bedtime even though she's tired, and then moves into manic hyperactivity. We assume this is overtiredness. Most nights we get no signs of tiredness, so we go on times, but we have played around with times so much and rarely get it right! If we do get tired signs, it seems to make no difference, she just won’t go to sleep. Most of the time it will take me an hour in her room in the dark to get her to sleep. So that was the other concern with PU/PD, as I read that you should not use it when overtired?

Did you have good EASYs and no overtiredness, or shouldn't I worry about this and just go for it anyway?

If she is waking sometimes due to 'learned' hunger, would we just continue with PU/PD for the NWs so that she 'relearns' and does not need these night feeds?

I will take a look at the NW Board, thanks.

Thanks again for your very useful advice.

[Love, laughter, & PJs]

When you talk about cold turkey, do you mean just going straight for PU/PD?

Yup, that's what we did.  Nothing else would work so we just went for it with PUPD.  The first night was horrendous but it was all uphill from there.

Did you have good EASYs and no overtiredness, or shouldn't I worry about this and just go for it anyway?

Hmm.  I can't remember exactly but I do think we were doing pretty well with EASY by the time we got rid of that last night feed.  When we first worked on the nurse-to-sleep habit, though, we had nothing of the sort.  I think that the better the routine, the more set up you are for success with PUPD but you do have to start somewhere.  I'll ask one of the PUPD mods to weigh in on this one since I'm not totally sure.

If she is waking sometimes due to 'learned' hunger, would we just continue with PU/PD for the NWs so that she 'relearns' and does not need these night feeds?

Yep.  That's the idea that at this age they don't need the feed so they just have to learn to go back to sleep without it. 

[Katet]

 I had issues with night feeding with both my boys... ironically illness had them feeding again at night post 7mo when I'd had them doing good stretches before that.

What I did was the following.
Work on getting to sleep without feeding to sleep, it was a bit different for each boy as they were different personalities... so I say follow your instinct on what will work best for your child on the way to not feed to sleep. for me it was to read to Ds2 until he fell asleep on my lap & with DS1 it was to cuddle him & then pat his back/mattress, after I'd read & relaxed him. sort of a modified Pu/PD, where I'd cuddle until really relaxed & then lay down & I'd not do PU/PD when he was upset because he was a child who would throw up if you did that.

Then first wake up - NO Feed... get child to sleep best way could, take as long as it took... even if he woke 20mins later feed for all other night wakings... for us that actually got (over about a week) the first waking to move to about 5am & that one... well wasn't fun LOL

My theory on the not feeding at first waking was they they learnt how to go to sleep without a feed at bedtime & at least once & then after that I could (esp if it was 20mins later) trust that it quite probably was related to hunger & eventually the learnt hunger would lessen.

For the record I do have a memory of walking around the room with a sobbing child on my shoulder (& my boys were over 12kg (26lb) at 12mo) for a couple of hours when I was trying to get one of them to sleep.

[timmysmommy]

Just checking in on you spammer.  Hope you've found something that works for you!

[~ Vik ~]

Just wanted to offer another perspective because I never actively dropped any night feeds except the dream feed.  If he woke up in the middle of the night due to hunger (not teething pain or OT, for example) then I fed him.  And I often ended up feeding him to sleep in the middle of the night.  We had a night feed until about 1 year, but then he started STTN all on his own.

Here's a link with some gentle methods for encouraging fewer night feeds:  http://www.kellymom.com/bf/weaning/weaning-night.html

[spammerb]

Thanks again for all your replies. I really appreciate you all taking the time to inform me of all the options available...  I am now a bit confused as to what to do! On one hand I think let's just get it over with as quickly as possible so there's no confusion for DD as to when to expect a night feed and go cold turkey. On the other hand, putting to bed and stopping the first night feed initially, sounds less stressful!

A deciding factor will be that I don't have time on my side unfortunately, as I return to work in just over 2 months, and unwillingly I have to fully wean DD by then as I can't see it being possible to continue with BF when I return...she will be 1 year, 1 month and 10 days by then.

So I have to stop putting this off and make a decision quickly, as I guess I'm going to need her to be able to get to sleep independently before I can start weaning!
I need to read about weaning asap...and that's another thing that I'm dreading!

Amy - thanks for checking in on me!
Eloise - I have read your NW post and will drop a comment on there as soon as I can.

Thanks again all. I will update with our progress.....

Sam

[Katet]

Sam if you wish to you could still reasonably do 2 feeds (morning & night) when you return to work.

I think if you focus all your energy into making sure that your baby doesn't fall asleep while feeding then the rest will fall into place, because you will have other ways for your baby to fall asleep & you can pick the times feeds happen if you want to keep BF.

[Bex18]

Hi Sam,

I can relate to you in some ways with the night feeds.  I have a post on the Night Wakings board, 8.5 month with random night wakes.

I too have a spirited LO, we are ok with bed time, it is during the day that I really need to wind him down before his nap, and make sure that he is not OS.  With bed time, what do you do for a routine?  We do dinner at 5pm, bath at 6pm, then boob at 6.30.  After dinner we keep it nice and quiet, read books etc, nothing to make him excited.  What time are you getting her down?

We had trouble with EASY as well as at one point he was only sleeping for 35 mins at a time.. it is getting better, we still have bad days, butoverall  he will sleep for an hour in the morn, and an hour in the afternoon.  I played around with his A times for weeks, got me so stressed at one point.  If you look at an example of an EASY for a 9 month old, you can see approx how long her A time should be and work around that (or course every baby is different, but compare her A time before bedtime and see how that compares to an example).  It does sound like she is OT at night, so I would look at bringing her bedtime forward - even if she is not showing any signs of tiredness..

Do you nurse to sleep for the day time naps or just the night wakings?

My LO will wake anywhere between 0 and 2 times a night (more when teething sick etc), and I wait until his mantra cry turns into a real cry, then will go in.  I have tried cuddling, shhing back to sleep etc, but it doesn't work (tried a version of PUPD the other night, but after an hour caved in and fed him ).  Because he can now sit, crawl etc, once you put him back in the cot, he will sit up, or pull himself up on the cot.  The only way to calm him down is to put him to the breast, it seems to reelax him.  He is a quick drinker, so in the night is done after 5 mins.

I too want him to be able to put himself back to sleep..  I am going to try gentle removal, see how that goes.  Last night I fed him for 3 mins (he woke at 3.45am after putting him down at 6pm), when I pulled him off he was a bit confused, but was ok when I put him in the cot, talked to himself for a bit, then went to sleep until 6.00.  Tonight I will try 2 mins.. I am not sure how that goes.

I am starting to worry that may be my milk is decreasing, I am not getting the same let downs as I used to.  I was going to try an experiment with 1 formula feed, may be at the 2.30 pm feed, to see if theis makes a difference (more calories for him).  i don't want to give up breastfeeding, butif I am not producing enough milk for him, I may have to give bottles as well?

Just wanted to see if you have tried PUPD?  My LO cries even when i pick him up, so not sure if PUPD will work?

Sorry to rant, hopefully you can get something from this?

Let us know how you do get on.

x

[anna*]

Just as a note ladies, after about 5 months you wouldn't expect a baby to calm down in your arms during PUPD - the calming down happens (eventually) in the cot and by 11 months you will really only very rarely pick up at all. At this age it is mostly just 'PD' when they pull up to stand while they're crying, and reassuring them with your voice and presence.

[Bex18]

Hi Anna,

Thank you for this note.. I thought it was just my LO!!

So would I just go in and keep putting him back down on his tummy until he falls asleep?  He wont be able to hear my voice over his crying

[anna*]

Yeh, you'll just keep lying him down when he is standing up to cry. Doesn't matter if he can't hear you, he will know you are there - pat his back or his butt or just put a hand on him while he is lying down and trying to settle. If he is totally hysterical, pick him up just for a moment.