Weaning off night feeds

[BabyHopes1974]

Anyone weaned their baby off night feeds and how did it go? How did you do it?

 

[MindUtopia]

With my daughter it just happened naturally on it's own at 9 months, I think because she was starting to finally eat enough to really satiate hunger and was getting all she needed during the day. This was just the time when I could tell she was really eating for the sake of eating, rather than just play, and she was starting to really eat a significant quantity of solids during the day. We didn't actually do anything to encourage it. We would offer her usual night feeds, but she started to only take a tiny amount or refuse it altogether. So finally I just stopped offering them, gave her back her dummy instead and we had some cuddles and she settled back to sleep easily. It didn't mean she wasn't still waking lots! But it did mean she wasn't interested in a feed.

 

[BabyHopes1974]

I ended up proactively weaning at night and last night was the first time that one of my girls slept 9 hours straight.

 

[BabyMamma93]

im going to stalk this, if thats okay, my LB is 11 month old and im trying to take the bottle away both day and night, but i know night is going to be hardest.
Sometimes it takes 2 bottles for him to go to sleep, he wont take a dummy so really he comfort sucks on his bottle. i dont think i can actually just not give him a bottle and he will go to sleep, he will stay awake, become over tired, and be worse for it, no one likes a over tired baby

 

[BabyHopes1974]

So far I am down to only one ounce every four hours. But one of my girls has been sleeping through the night. This leads me to believe it was more habit than need.

My other girl, also five months, is having a hard time. It might also be that I have stopped swaddling and don't let them sleep in swing or bouncy seats anymore. I put them to bed and hope they stay asleep so I can sleep. I haven't had more than four hours of uninterrupted sleep for more than nine months, when I was still pregnant. I'm up 3-4 times a night. I'm looking forward to sleeping longer each night, I hope my other girl will adjust to less food at night. I suspect it's not so much the amount but that she's so used to waking up and being held until she's asleep each time.

 

[StranjeGirl]

With both my kids I just figured out how much they needed in a 24 hour period and fit all of it in during the day. It can change though. Dd 2 started sleeping 8-10 hours at 6 weeks and then went back to eating during the night at 10 weeks. After a few weeks I spent a week increasing her formula during the day and she is back to sleeping through again. If I get off schedule and don't feed enough during the day then she wakes at night. This was also the case with dd 1.