Nursing question - keeping supply if night weaning

StephBrim24

So LO is 6 months and he ended up creating a bad habit of needing to nurse to get back to sleep every 1 to 2 hours. So I've been working on gentle sleep training because he wasn't able to self-soothe and was miserable since he wake up crying for me constantly. Anyway, I'd love a full night's sleep AND I feel like sleep training is tough since sometimes he'll cry and I'll feed him (to keep supply up) and other times I'll deny him. So he has to be confused since I'm not consistent. Can I get him to sleep 8 hours or so and not pump or will I lose my supply? My lactation consultant said I have to drain the breasts 8 times every 24 hours or my supply will go down. So I'd have to pump 2-3 times overnight. Is this right?? I'm not interested on whether or not you agree with sleep training. It's a gentle form and I'm doing it because he was miserable for every nap and all night long. I'm just curious if I really will lose my supply if he stops nursing overnight.

katka512

When my LO started STTN, I did not pump overnight and my supply is fine. I am engorged in the morning and do pump then to empty one side and make the other a bit less full before she nurses. (She only nurses one side at a time.)
Your supply should adjust according to how often LO is nursing. If you pump in the middle of the night, your body will think you need that much milk and will continue to make it. If you don't pump, you should adjust in a few days.

talee1989

with this LO, I stopped pumping (EPer) at night about 2months in. My last pump is at 8pm and my first morning pump is at 5am. When I stopped pumping at 2am, I pumped my 2am Oz & morning pump oz all in the morning one. It's 4 months and I haven't had a dip in supply. And 8x in 24 hrs? I pump 4 times in 24hrs and haven't had issues. I did the same with DS1 and pumped well over a year.

MA&CB

Your supply should eventually decrease in the overnight hours, but not during the day hours when you're still nursing and pumping.  I nightweaned my first at one year and had no supply issues.

dannie2011

It really depends on the person. Some women cannot night wean or they see a major drop, others have no problems. One thing you do want to be sure of is that your LO takes in the extra milk during the daytime if you are dropping night feedings or you could see a drop in weight. 

kaking78

It hasn't affected my supply. J's been sleeping through the night for several months now (yes, I'm lucky; please don't hate me). His last nursing session is at 8pm and his first is around 7am and I've never pumped in the middle of the night. I wake up pretty full in the morning (how full depends on how hydrated I am) and I can often feed from one side and pump the other. His morning nursing sessions are pretty long and leisurely. I'm not sure if that's related to the no night feedings or not.

StephBrim24

@Monster1984‌ Can you tell me about your experience sleep training? I can now get a 5 hour stretch from 7-12 or so, but after I nurse him at that point, he's up every 1.5/2 hours crying for me and I can't calm him down for more than a minute before he winds back up. I do my best to comfort him without picking him up. He's still in a pack-n-play since his room is on a different floor. I need him to get this figured out so his sister can sleep better and so I can get my marriage back.

walkek85

I read that when you wean nights then LO may eat more during the day.  If you are feeding more during the day I would guess your supply would get to and stay at what it needs to be in order to sufficiently supply LO.  You could always try cutting the MOTN feeds, see how your supply does and then pump if it dips.

Good luck with the sleep training, it was one of the best things we did for LO and our family.

defri17

We haven't been night feeding since about 10 weeks, and no drop. 

I pump right away in the morning to empty (pretty engorged by then), 2x at work, and 2 to 3x after work making sure it's the last thing I do before bed. Right now I pump about every 3.5 to 4 hours or so during the day depending on schedule.

N decided that breastfeeding was too much work around 3 months, so we've been EP since then. Had a little dip at first but have been going strong ever since.

Edit to say N was a big baby, and we were super lucky that he cut night feeds so early and has been a great sleeper.

jennybean80

8 times in 24 hours is usually the recommendation to establish a supply. Once your supply is well established you should be able to adjust to your and lo's demands.

braintree

I go 10-12 hours over night and feed/pump to completely empty in the morning.  My supply was not affected by not pumping overnight.

Kewii

Monster1984 said:

StephBrim24 said:

@Monster1984‌ Can you tell me about your experience sleep training? I can now get a 5 hour stretch from 7-12 or so, but after I nurse him at that point, he's up every 1.5/2 hours crying for me and I can't calm him down for more than a minute before he winds back up. I do my best to comfort him without picking him up. He's still in a pack-n-play since his room is on a different floor. I need him to get this figured out so his sister can sleep better and so I can get my marriage back.

My LO is still in our room as well as his room is on a different floor too. 

For MOTN wakings I had gotten into the bad habit of feeding him to get him back to sleep. So to break this habit for the first few nights I would not feed him until he woke up after midnight. Wake ups before that I would just pat him tummy and shush to console him for 1-2mins. I would let him cry for 3 mins and increased the amount of time to 7 mins intervals. The trick was to be consistent and never pick him up.Then after a few nights we phased out the one feeding. That didn't really seem to be an issue for him. Now he sleeps 7pm-5:30am or 7pm-7am. If he gets up after 5am I will feed and put him right back down. Eventually I will phase that out as well.

My pedi's advice was for DH and myself to be on the same page about our approach and to be prepared for a few crappy nights. Apparently it takes 3-5 days to change a baby's sleeping pattern (according to our pedi). This was the case for us, he cried anywhere from 5-40 mins at first. It helped that we saw improvement each night, but it was still very sad to hear my baby cry for me and not to go to him immediately. I thought he would be permanently scarred, have negative associations with his crib, or just hate me- none of these things have happened. He is just as happy as ever.

Hope that helps!

So what would you do after 3 minutes? Feed him? Pick him up?  Or is this when he's in the other room?

StephBrim24

@Monster1984‌ - thanks for sharing your experience. I started last night with trying to feed him after midnight and then 5. He went back down easily after the midnight feeding but then was back up at 1:45 and he cried for an hour and a half (me going back in every few minutes) before I threw in my towel. My daughter woke up crying from him crying so much. I couldn't take it. So tonight he's in the basement so we're not in the same room and so he won't wake up the rest of the family. I'm completely discouraged after last night and struggling to have hope of success. Hoping I can see progress tonight to encourage me.

katykatykaty

Hope tonight is better.  We are in the same position you're in now, and I'm dreading fixing it so I've been putting it off.  Good for you for trying to make it better!

Kewii

@caseinpoint I've been reading The No Cry Sleep Solution.  There seems to be a lot of good ideas of things to try in there.  I'm waiting for this tooth to cut (it's so close!) and then I'm going to start trying some of the ideas in there.

StephBrim24

@caseinpoint -- I totally empathize with your situation. That's how things got bad for us. He slept in a pack-n-play next to my bed and when he started waking more, I'd just bring him to bed with me. Then it kept getting worse. I feel bad because I think I crippled my baby from learning to sleep well on his own. And he's much worse when I'm in the room. He knows when we're in the room with him. Hence putting the poor kid in the basement until he's good enough to sleep in his room on the same floor as his sister. He'd wake her up too much right now. He's much better when he's out of our room.

I know you and i are using different methods to help our babies, but i just wanted to encourage you no matter what. I feel your pain.

Last night was better though. Two nights ago was our first big attempt. It was awful, it's true. I ended up giving in. Last night the longest he ever cried was 14 minutes (went in to comfort him twice in that time). He didn't nurse until 3:30am (went to bed at 7pm). So I'm hoping things keep getting better.

SurpriseAt39

Jenstwins said:

8 times in 24 hours is usually the recommendation to establish a supply. Once your supply is well established you should be able to adjust to your and lo's demands.

To add to this, feeding LO 8 times in 24 hours will help to suppress ovulation, but it's only considered effective if its directly breastfeeding (not pumping) and no food by mouth.

As for supply dropping if not feeding or pumping at night, most of the ladies I've heard over the years have not had issues because LO made up for it during the day.
I've never had an issue of not having enough for LO, and I don't pump at all. (Except to go to the wedding this weekend)
Most nights LO sleeps 8:30-ish to 5-ish. He has an 'off' night every now and then.

Sorry, I'm starting to ramble. Tired. I-)

StephBrim24

@caseinpoint‌ - no problem on the hijacking! Happy you did. In the 3 nights we've been working on this, we have improved exponentially! Last night he fussed himself back to sleep every single time he woke up and I didn't feed him until 4am. I just figured he went long enough and I didn't wait to see if he could settle back to sleep without nursing. He only cried minimally for 5 minutes after I nursed him and then was back out. Then he woke up at 6 and I nursed him in case he was ready for the day, but he seemed tired so he went back down (cried for 5 minutes) until I woke him at 8:30.
Soooo feel free to hijack. I think we're on our way to good nights!

I think the best thing for you to do (as far as knowing if your LO is really hungry) is what monster1984 suggested. Set times that LO has to make it to. I had no clue if DS was mad or hungry so sleep training sort of came first. I just decided he couldn't eat until midnight so that each time he woke before that, it was an opportunity for him to learn to fall back asleep on his own. Now that I'm just 3 days into it, I can already determine that he isn't hungry because I only have to wait 5 minutes to see if he'll settle himself back to sleep and he does.
I hope this makes sense. So set times for now - he has to make it to midnight and go from there.

StephBrim24

@caseinpoint‌ - that's how the first night went for us. Then we made him cry it out in small increments the next night and he caught on quickly. Much improved. Just because it was a failure for the night does not mean you're doing it wrong. I promise.

StephBrim24

Maaan I jinxed myself. Only a little after midnight and he's crying. He'd been going to 3 or so. :-/ Back to training.