How to break the habit of breastfeeding to sleep!

[ycartw]

Could anyone give me some advice to how to get my daughter to sleep without breastfeeding her!  Last night it took us 3 hours to get her to sleep which is very unusual for her.
We have tried pu/pd but we've both lost our patience and given in and breastfed her.
She's now 11 months so I realy want to get her to have a bottle all the time now instead of me.
I have just managed to get her to have a nap without breastfeeding her by doing a little of pu/pd then just lay her in the cot and put my hand on her back.  She's started to suck on her sleeping bag though as she has never taken to a dummy.
Any advice would be welcome.

[isaac'smom]

Hi there,

Sorry to hear you're having such a rough time. I know what it's like. I too used to bf my ds to sleep and then struggled to help him become an independent sleeper. I used a combination of pu/pd and pat/shhh and the gentle removal plan. Here's a great link from this site that has tons of info n the gentle removal plan.

http://www.babywhisperer.com/forum/gentle-removal-plan-vt24669.html

It seems like you had some success with the pu/pd for her nap today. I know it can be difficult at first, but if you are conisistent, it WILL pay off. It is tempting to cave in and bf her to sleep, but it will be too confusing to your little one. She will think, 'what's going on here? Mom gave me the boob for the last nap, why not now?!' It isn't fair for them.  It will take some time, but is definitely worth it. It is a gradual and gentle method, which is what really appealed to me - no huge changes too quickly for our little ones.

Another thing that really helped me was listening for his 'I need you now!' cry. I would leave the room after laying him down and let him settle while listening. Tracy calls this S.L.O.W. - stop, listen, observe, what's up?....I think (it's been awhile since I had to read her book). This is NOT the same as cry it out. It's just allowing them to settle themselves without rushing in.

I wouldn't introduce a pacifier at this stage in the game if she's finding other ways of soothing herself.  The pacifier would just be one more thing to wean her off of.  :roll:

I hope this helps somewhat. Sorry it's all over the place. Gotta go rinse the hair colouring out of my hair!  :oops:

Let us know how things are going.