Weaning Question/Advise
So Keira is completely weaned of BF during the day! Yay! She will still eat right before bed, when she wakes up in the morning, and still several times a night. I don't mind the before bed or morning, but I am SO over the night feedings. She is now one (hooray for making it a year!) and I think I am going to *try* and stop these night feedings.
If you did this, did you just stop feeding your DC and let them CIO? I have tried the Sleepeasy and that did not work. I thought for sure now that I am only down to 2 "real" feedings she would eventually just stop wanting the middle of the nights ones, especially since my milk is almost all gone. The big issue I am running into is that she wants to still eat twice a night and then in the morning there is no milk left. She gets really mad and wants to wake up at like 5:30 or 6am since she is hungry.
Also, she does not drink milk. We have tried and tried and she just hates it. She will drink water now from a sippy (thank God) but nothing else.
When you weaned, how did you cut the other feedings, especially the ones in the middle of the night? I don't mind the morning and bedtime one for now, but these mid-night ones have got to go.
/"><
Re: Weaning Question/Advise
First of all, Congratulations for making it a year! That's a huge accomplishment!
I don't know much about parent-led weaning b/c Nate weaned on his own. However, I have heard a lot of people recommend Dr. Jay Gordon's method of night weaning. You can get some info here: https://drjaygordon.com/attachment/sleeppattern.html You'll want to scroll down to the part where he has some text in red that says "Here's what I recommend for older babies."
This is a somewhat Attachment Parenting approach to night weaning, but it seems like it might be similar to other methods. I don't know much about it, but like I said, I see this method mentioned over & over again on other boards that I visit. I think that Ferber also has some recommendations in his book too though (but I bet they are similar).
GL!
Blog
Congrats on making it a year!
She more than likely does not need the night feedings and is just doing it out of habit. From what I've heard/read, babies physically don't need to eat at night once they are 9 mo old -- it's just a habit thing. If sleepeasy didn't work for you, I think you might just have to try CIO. I would have your husband go into her though if you do interval CIO.
Also, Natalie drank only a little cow's milk in the beginning. It took a few months for her work up to drinking a decent amount. She's still not a big milk drinker though. Just try to get her to eat yogurt and cheese (or other dairy foods) so she gets enoug dairy in.
Try going in with a sippy cup of water and just cuddle her back to sleep... or better yet- have DH do it- since at fist she may associate you with BFing
eventually she will get that she is not getting BM and if she's not thirsty she will be off the water as well at night... plus once she gets that you are not going to BF her at night- you can start going in and just cuddle, tell her night-night, put her down and let her learn to soothe herself to sleep.
It took Riley a couple of good cries (we always listen, and if she gets hysterical for more than 2 minutes straight, then we go in, soothe her with a paci and walk right back out) and now it's a few grumbles but she goes out for the night and usually sleeps right up to 6:30am...
hope SOMETHING works for you and you start STTN soon!