Tips for Sleep Training

[Twosweetgirls]

Ok so my daughter is 15 months now and still waking up about 2 times a night for milk.  I have decided, this is enough.  In a few days I have arranged to have my older daughter, husband and border out of the house at night so I am not concerned about keeping her relatively quiet.  I am planning to break her of as many habits as possible, but I'm not exactly sure how to go about it.  These are my thoughts- habits to break- breast milk at night, wanting mommy to hold her to fall asleep at night (she doesn't need either of these at nap time or going to sleep at bed time), and really I would love her to sleep through.  Right now she sleeps 4 or 5 hours a stretch.  She has been much worse for wake ups but i've been gradually breaking the habits and now I'm ready for cutting the big habits, cold turkey. Since I'm doing this by myself and I have myself a girl who is a mobile angry strong toddler when she isn't happy, Ive been putting this off.  Please, any advice you have would be awesome.  Do I replace the breast feeding with cow milk for a night? Should I do cold turkey till only 3am the first night? or just push through till the morning? Thanks!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Personally at 15 months I would go cold turkey on nf's...switching to.cow milk will just delay the issue. Does she bf in the day or take cow's milk? What is her routine like in terms of wake times, nap(s) and bedtime?

[Twosweetgirls]

Thank you!  That feed back helps.  I just need to discuss it with someone.  She has cow milk in the day and breast milk on wake up and 20 min before sleep at night.  schedule

7 wake up
1230-230 nap
730 bedtime

The last two nights she has been doing a bit better in regards to nw but she definitely needs milk to go back to sleep, which is the problem. 

This weekend my goal is to just quit the milk.  Another weekend will most likely have to conquer the need me to go back to sleep.  She has been super adamant in wanting bf to fall asleep in the past, so Im guessing this will be a horrible weekend! here we go!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

She doesn't need the milk...she wants it! Totally different thing at this age - wakings by now are not due to hunger but other factors, she is just used the prop of bf to fall asleep again. No it won't be easy! But with no worries on disturbing anyone else it should be doable. Though tbh my DH and older kids rarely were disturbed when I bit the bullet and stopped holding DD3 to sleep - and there was a lot of shouting and crying involved!

[Twosweetgirls]

yes.  the wake ups are habit and she is used to me putting her to sleep at night differently than day time.  I just was thinking with the cow milk that her stomach will be used to food at that time and may need something to change the habit.  But your right.  I just have to ride it out. And i know my daughter sleeps through the screaming we've had before, but I have two adults in the house besides me and they wake up.  Thanks so much for the feedback!!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Earplugs lol...I used them when pregnant and let DH deal with DD1. Worked a treat! Fx that things go okay...one good thing is by this age you can also talk to them about it out of the moment as they generally have good receptive language even if they aren't verbal.

[creations]

Just stopping by to cheer you on really
I have not had a habit like this to break (thank goodness) but I did have an awful few days transition from hammock to cot-bed which I still remember.
My advice, as I cheer you on from the side lines, is to have someone who can take over for some of the A time the following day.  Chances are you are going to get close to zero sleep night 1 and not much better night 2.  It will be hard to function well in the day without some rest period and you do need some rest period as you will have another night to face and will need all your strength and patience for it (don't know about you but me personally and most people I know get pretty short on patience when the sleep deprivation hits).  If your DH is able to do some day shift great, if not is there a family member or friend who you can set up to come in the day?

Not sure what Heidi thinks but it also occurred to me you might cut the milk and holding at the same time rather than go through (and put her through) all the screaming for only one habit to then have to go through it all again for the other?  I probably couldn't do it myself, I don't go the cold turkey route unless forced to (like the bed transition, there was no option) but  maybe it is something to think about before you begin?

Good luck, FX for you!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

I am totally a cold turkey queen! I have never had to break two props at once though - but creations makes a good point, why go through it twice? Although if it works better for you to steel yourself up for one thing now and another thing later then go for it. 

[creations]

I am totally a cold turkey queen!

You should have this as your tag line

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Great idea! Haha really could be "Impatience Queen" as that is the whole reason I do things cold turkey

[Twosweetgirls]

Thanks everyone! I ended up doing just the milk habit.  She doesn't seem to know how to fall asleep at night time without just having milk, so I was hoping just one at a time would make it easier for me to focus in the middle of the night when I wanted to cave.  I need more help now!  She did alright during the few nights, and I was feeling positive about it all, her sleeping from 730 to 4 by the end without a wake up, and the wake ups got shorter and shorter.  Then, two nights ago, she got horribly worse! Not for milk, but just waking up way more.  Sunday night, (the forth night)--- (i'm going to make a new post to ask for help so it is more easily seen!)

thanks everyone! One hurdle, always more.  Oh, and I just found out I'm pregnant, so I'm desperate to fix this.  I can't be taking care of two sleep issues!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Congrats! And good work on persevering with one habit!