11 month old, eats minimum 2 times a night, STILL! HELP!

[SAHMof2]

My sweet, darling son has never gone all night without waking at least once a night to eat. I have tried CIO several times, have tried just giving him a pacifier instead of feeding him, and nothing has worked. I'm not sure what else to try? If I don't feed him he's likely to be up at least 1-2 hours crying and fussing until he falls asleep again, only to wake up a few hours later to start the whole thing over. I am ok with once a night, but last night he was up 4 times a night to eat. He nurses 4-5 times during the day, and eats 3 good meals.

Here is his typical routine:
7am wake & nurse
7:30 breakfast
10am nap
11am wake & nurse
12 lunch
2pm nap for about 1.5-2 hours (nurse before if he will, or after if he won't)
3:30-4pm wake and nurse if he didn't before the nap
5pm dinner
6pm bath
7pm nurse & bed (he is awake when I put him in the crib)

Wakes between 12-1 and between 4-5 to eat, sometimes more often.

Any advice for me? I would like to start weaning soon, but we are no where close to that with him nursing 6-9 times every 24 hours!

Thanks in advance.

[Erin M]

Hi there, welcome!

Looking at your schedule, I would say that you are most likely in the midst of the 2-1 nap switch which can cause some havoc with a baby's sleep.  Here, have a read of this: 10/ 11mo sleep gone wonky? Read this first! and see what you think.  The long periods of awake in the middle of the night are most like because he's getting too much sleep during the day, especially on top of a 12 hour night.  You probably need to shorten one nap so it's just a quick cat nap. 

Are your wakings happening at exactly the same time, or just in a general time frame each night? 

As you've previously used some CIO, you might want to try weaning the feedings through gradual withdrawal -- he's young for walk in/walk out but there's some good information on gradual withdrawal in this link right here: Walk In/Walk Out vs. The Gradual Withdrawal Method (HOW TO CHOOSE) -- you can also pair this with some sort of put down method -- How to PU/PD (inc age adaptations)  -- also, some people choose to wean night feeds by settling their LOs by any other means necessary (rocking, etc) and find that after a few nights (3-4 of consistently not feeding) their LOs stop waking for the feeds.

I'll also add that on the Baby Whisperer site, we follow the writings and teachings of Tracy Hogg who did not advocate or condone any form of CIO or controlled crying -- loads of research on it here (Research on why 'cry it out' and 'controlled crying' is NOT recommended!) if you'd care for a read.

[SAHMof2]

Thank you for your input, I truly appreciate it and am going to check out those links right now.

[Erin M]

Great, let us know if you have any questions!