1 year old still having 6+ feeds per day...

[Fig]

Hi Girls

My DS has always been a huge booby boy, but latley I have been getting pretty fed up with feeding all the time.

Our general routine goes something like:
7:00 wake up
7:15 breakfeast
7:30 B/f
11:30 B/f to sleep
1:00 B/f either back to sleep or just to wake up
4:00 B/f
5:30 Dinner, Bath
7:00 B/f to sleep
10:30 B/f
3:00am B/f
6:00 am B/f

Sometimes I can I get him through the afternoon without a feed.

He eats lots of solids so that isnt a problem. But I would really like it if I could take a break from always putting him to sleep. I thought of giving him a bottle to get him off having the boob to sleep for daytime, but to be honest I am not a good expresser ( have to work really hard to get anything). So it would have to be cow's milk or formula?

I am just really tired at the moment and feeding him so often is getting hard. I can't even go out at night at all, because when he wakes up, he will only be settled by a feed.

I don't want to give up breastfeeding all together, but really not sure which feed to try and drop and how.

[~Kaz~]

It sounds like hard work for you! Have you tried calling the ABA hotline to see what they say?

It's really up to you which feeds you try to drop. You can try nightweaning which would mean cutting out the 3am feed or maybe one of the day feeds that bothers you the most. A lot of kids drop a few feeds at around the 12 month mark by themselves. I'm not sure of the stats/percentage of kids who do this but it was certainly my experience with DS. We night weaned at 12 months by following the Jay Gordon method but he also dropped quite a few day feeds by himself within about 3 weeks. From memory he'd still been feeding 6-7 times at the age of 1 too.

I feel for you hun. It is hard work, especially when you feel like you're joined at the hip and you need a break. From what you have posted, most of the feeds, aside from the early morning one, are to help him off to sleep. If it were me, I'd try to start spacing the feeds out from bedtime a little bit and see what happens. I'd also make sure he was asking for a feed. I found I just got into a habit of offering at the routine times with DS and of course he never said no but wasn't really having big feeds. If you change things slightly, he'll let you know pretty quickly if he's ready to go along with fewer feeds or if he still needs them.

GL hun.

[Fig]

Thanks for your reply Kaz

He definatly asks for them, pulls my top down and sucks on my chest

Tonight tried to space it out, feed him then rocked him, cuddled him, sat next to the cot for the next 2 hours. I got fed up and feed him and he went straight to sleep.

I really don't know how to break the feeding to sleep, it is so entrenched he doesn't know how else to fall asleep.

[~Kaz~]

He definatly asks for them, pulls my top down and sucks on my chest

hahaha no worries.

Have you had a look at Elizabeth Pantley's book 'No cry sleep solution'? There are some suggestions in there about gradually cutting out night feeding and feeding to sleep. DS used to be like that too. It just seemed to gradually change and we did night wean him as I said. It was hard work and after a while we replaced bf overnight with cows milk which I wasn't happy with but it worked at the time. We have now cut that out too. He still doesn't sleep through and we still get up to him but he can re-settle without feeds.

It's really tough to know what to do. In hindsight I would definitely do a few things differently. Every baby is so different it's hard to know how they will respond. I can definitely recommend the Pantley book. It gave me some great ideas to try and it's a slow, at your babies pace kind of approach.

He will get there eventually.

[~Kim~]

Fig, I wish I could offer some magical advice, but i wanted to offer sympathy and support

My little guy was exactly the same, except he hardly ate at all. Was still 6-11 feeds per day until 15months maybe? I used Rick Gordon's site to help encourage him to night wean and finally at 15months he was ready. He's also dropped the other feeds all by himself and we are now down to three feeds per day (4am, 11.30, 6pm). He still feeds to sleep but asks for water if he wakes in the night now. Like you I was so over it all, so I really understand, but for us it co-incided with huge stuff developmentally for our DS and when all that was done he slowed right down.

[onthefly]

My DS was having 8-10 at that age.
By 15-16 months he was down to 4 or so after we night weaned at 14 months. He dropped the day feeds more or less by himself.

If you drop feeds, there's no need to give him a bottle at all. You can offer some milk (maybe in a cup) - whatever kind you prefer - but no need for formula, especially if he is eating well otherwise. Don't replace all the feeds with milk as this may fill him up to much and affect his eating. Although he's feeding very often now, he will be regulating his total breastmilk intake appropriately (if that makes sense) and if you give bottles of milk to replace these feeds you may end up giving much more.
I'd go for whichever feed you feel he is least interested in first - try distraction and offering drink/food. Do it gradually to avoid any lumpy problems. The ABA will also be able to offer some support and guidance for droping feeds.

More generally, maybe try and get yourself a break. Just getting some 'me time' without your son might make all the difference to you, even if you continue feeding.

Good luck!