I night weaned DD, but TBH she was a little bit older than your DD. For some reason, at about your DD's age for a few months she suddenly increased her need for bfing overnight. In our case it might have had something to do with the fact that as DD was becoming more independent during the day (and spending a couple of afternoons which soon became a day with her godmother) she needed to reconnect with me at night.
It sounds like you are ready to night wean, because of TTC, but she might not be just yet. You're feeling guilty because you think you're pushing her, etc, etc. Night weaning to try to give her a brother or sister is a wonderful blessing for her, one that she will have for most of her life! Don't beat yourself up over it.
I would hesitate to drop the night feed before bed. If she does need a feed nutritionally, or to wind down (which was definitely the case in our household), it might make it harder to put her to bed in the first place. Plus, it disrupts her routine even further.
I told my DD that boobies were asleep while it was night and we had a drink of water by the bed instead. If she was thirsty, that was enough. If she wants comfort, lots of cuddles. I'm not so sure about getting up to warm up milk, etc, sounds like that might be more disruptive to your sleep than just bfing back to sleep! It took a good few days of DD being very definitely unimpressed with the lack of bbs before she asked for and expected water. She still asked occasionally afterwards, but was settled pretty readily. She was 16-17 mths at the time. Another thing I did was to convert her cot to a junior bed so she could come into us when she woke (my DD wasn't good at resettling on her own in the middle of the night either).
hun. I hope you figure out a balance that works for you and your family!
We have seen some improvement!! Last night she slept for 5 hrs straight up!! That is awesome for her! She rarely goes for more than 3hrs at a time. Then she only woke once after that. I can't remember the last time she only woke twice at night!! lol.
And guess what!! I just got AF!! Didn't take much, LOL. Must have been when we tried to night wean a few weeks ago. Looks like that was enough to get it back! DD is still having 5-7 feeds in 24hrs, lol. I was a bit worried bc my mum said she never got AF back until her kids were completely weaned (at 1 yr) even though they were only on one feed a day for a while before that. So that takes some of the stress off that we HAVE to do it now iykwim.
Hooray! Yay for af! I was just reading this thread because I STILL haven't got mine and we're desperate to ttc.
I just wanted to suggest feeding her to sleep in your bed and keeping her there, then when she stirs I cuddle her and only feed if she gets worked up. We started doing this about a month ago and she now does 8-10 hour stretches and some nights 12!!! Still no AF though. hope it gets better for you.
Thanks anna. I do usually feed her to sleep in our bed. Well, I haven't been feeding until she's totally asleep anymore. But then I move her to her cot bc I don't want to go to bed when she does and I'm scared she'll fall out! lol. I have tried just cuddling before and that sometimes works. I think I will try that in the second half of the night instead of feeding her so much! Then if she gets too worked up at least it's during the time I can feed her anyway, lol.
that's great news heaven! 5 hours is awesome! (gosh, i hope that doesn't sound sarcastic? i'm absolutely serious - you give me such hope that it will one day be possible to get more than 2 hours sleep!!)
Going well! She's only waking up once or twice a night now, big change!! She seemed to get the idea quicker than expected! We had a setback last week when she was teething badly and I just started feeding back to sleep because I thought she needed it for comfort and pain relief. Thought that would really wreck things and we'd have to start again but it didn't!! When she felt better she just went back to her normal routine!! Last night she slept for 6.5hrs straight up
Heaven, this is a toughie, isn't it.
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