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Dropping a night feeding?

Mrs.TeddyMrs.Teddy member
in Babies: 9 - 12 Months
Those whose LOs did this or are STTN or only waking once did you encourage this or wait on LO to do it? I am torn on what to do. I am exhausted. We went back to cosleeping because L was waking so much but last night he was up and crawling over us and banging our headboard for an hour at 4am. I can't do that. He nurses 4 times during the day and has 3 solid meals and sometimes a snack. He eats a ton. He then wakes 1-4 times a night. If it was just once and he ate and went back to sleep maybe I could cope but its getting hard and he often only nurses for a  few minutes and falls back asleep. I think I am going to work on transitioning him back to his crib (he is there now). I am debating on this feeding thing. I read/hear mixed things. A lot of people say he is a big boy and shoudl go all night but I am so afraid he will need to eat and be hungry. Any tips/words of wisdom.
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Re: Dropping a night feeding?

  • b.heatherb.heather member

    My DD is the same age and goes from 7:30 p.m. to 7 a.m. with no wakings and no feedings. She is just fine :-)

    I did a night feeding until she was 7 months and then we started weaning the night feeding. We sleep trained (CIO) so to wean the night feeding I would wake her and do a dreamfeed 1 hour before her usual feeding time. Each night I would let her nurse a little less until, over several nights, we went from nursing 15 minutes to only 2-3 minutes. At that point I stopped waking her and if she woke and cried I would come nurse her. She stopped waking on her own and now we are where we are at today. 

    I hope that helps a bit! Good luck and hang in there!

    Oh, and DD sleeps in her crib (we never co-slept.) And she is a great sleeper now. I highly recommend the SleepEasy Solution if you'd like to read about the method we used. 

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  • Jules GJules G member

    We also co-slept & there just came a point where DD wasn't sleeping as well so we put her in her crib & she's been fine pretty much ever since. As far as your DS being hungry, he'll be just fine. It's not like when their super little & NEED to eat every few hours. We didn't do this, but my pedi said to let her go when she wakes up in the middle of the night & that she would eventually get it that there was no food coming her way. Even when DD started sleeping in her crib, she would still wake up 1-2 times a night because she just wanted to nurse. Since weaning her (I'm not recommending that or anything), she's been sleeping straight through the night about 12 hours usually. I think when she woke up, she just wanted to snuggle up with mama to go back to sleep. Maybe try giving him a bottle instead of the breast when he wakes at night. I don't know if there's any correlation with me weaning & DD SSTN or not, but an exhausted mommy will try anything to get a little extra sleep =) 

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  • DEPDEP

    He is totally capable of STTN.  You should shift your thinking from hunger to sleep being the the most factor;  they need a good solid uninterrupted sleep of 12 hours at this age in order to grow and be healthy;  this he is not getting. He should be learning that night time is when he should be sleeping and not eating;  afterall, mommy and daddy don't eat during the middle of the night!  Trust me, he will make up for it during the day.

    THat being said, it sounds like he likes snacking on you in the middle of the night.  Offer a pacifier or a bottle/cup of water instead of your breast;  He'll be sure to stop the habit fast. 

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  • egsquaredegsquared member
    DD was nursing 2-3 times a night (and waking up even more than that).  We tried a suggestion from the Ferber book.  He says that babies know what times are feeding times and will wake up pretty consistently at those times to eat.  So, we followed his plan and determined what the shortest amount of time was between feedings (for DD it was 3 hours), and on the first night I didn't feed her if she woke up less than 3.5 hours from her last feeding.  Yes, she would need to be picked up, soothed, etc., but we didn't feed her until she hit the 3.5 hour mark.  The next night, we moved it to feeding every 4 hours, then 4.5 hours.  After that, DD remarkably got a lot better and only needed one feeding during the night (in the early morning).  She was still waking up at other times, so we did the CIO part of Ferber after getting the night feedings under control.  I still do one feeding in the early morning and LO goes right back to sleep. 
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  • g_belleg_belle

    Our Little Man is about the same age.  I'm not really comfortable with CIO and he's teething so we're trying some of the Sleep Lady Suggestions (from Goodnight Sleeptight)

    He goes down for the night around 7.  He usually wakes at 11 to eat and then off and on all.night.long.  I'm a walking zombie.  He usually eats every 3-4 hours during the day so for now- I'll feed him at 11, 3ish and 7ish depending on his wake up times.  Any other times he wakes up- my DH goes in to comfort him.  he'll rock/sing/offer water etc.  If he can't calm him down within 10-15 minutes- then I'll go in and nurse him back down.    We did this plan a few weeks ago and it worked really well after just a few nights.  His first tooth came in last week though and destroyed all of our progress so we're starting back at square one tonight. 

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  • Mrs.TeddyMrs.Teddy member
    imageg_belle:

    Our Little Man is about the same age.  I'm not really comfortable with CIO and he's teething so we're trying some of the Sleep Lady Suggestions (from Goodnight Sleeptight)

    He goes down for the night around 7.  He usually wakes at 11 to eat and then off and on all.night.long.  I'm a walking zombie.  He usually eats every 3-4 hours during the day so for now- I'll feed him at 11, 3ish and 7ish depending on his wake up times.  Any other times he wakes up- my DH goes in to comfort him.  he'll rock/sing/offer water etc.  If he can't calm him down within 10-15 minutes- then I'll go in and nurse him back down.    We did this plan a few weeks ago and it worked really well after just a few nights.  His first tooth came in last week though and destroyed all of our progress so we're starting back at square one tonight. 

    Thanks. I am not sure exactly when he wakes because he has been with us btu i have to try to pay attention and develop a plan.  I just feel like I'm going to lose it I'm so tired most of the time. If DH goes in the room L loses it which makes it even worse.

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