I find early childhood centres chronically out of date. I've been to three different ones and they all gave me incorrect breastfeeding advice and none have been informed about full term demand breastfeeding. I've fed one child until 3.5yo when my milk dried up during pregnancy and am currently feeding a 3 year old. I demand full term breastfeed and this means my kids are free to follow their body's lead and choose between solid food or breastmilk and will wean themselves when they are ready. Not until they are in their third year do they have three sit down meals a day - until then it's grazing and little snacks throughout the day and boobie any time or water if they want that instead. They are offered meals with the rest of the family but don't rely on scheduled meals to get their nutrition. They prefer to walk around while eating and to have frequent small amounts and eat more that way than if I try to get them to sit down and eat it in one go. All my babies have eventually slept through the night and eaten well at scheduled meal times but I don't expect that of them before they are around 3. When my bottle fed son was 13mo I still gave him at least one bottle through the nigh, sometimes two, which I had to get up and make (it's important for healthy digestion to have formula warm) and I don't think it's healthy for a little body to go through the night without some rehydration whether that be water, breastmilk or artificial breastmilk - breastmilk is the easiest to provide and the healthiest. My 3yo has boobie once a night now and if she doesn't want that then she asks for some water which I have in a sports bottle by the bed. You cold wean him to get more sleep but IMO that would be inexchange for the health benefits that he receives from your breastmilk. I do lots of things to help my child sleep better at night so that I can sleep well too like using aromatherapy, giving her a hot protein rich meal before bed, offering her lots of breastmilk in the hour before her bed time so she fills up then and lately I've found that waking her up from her day nap after 2 hours rather than letting her sleep on helps too.
Heidi sweetie, I've seen your other posts and I know you are having a hard time atm. I really hope it settles soon for you. But I don't think weaning is the answer.
DS1 self weaned at 14months (prob bcos I was pg). While bfing he slept through the night. The only period of night wakings we experienced with him were after he had weaned. So, bfed babies can sleep through, and weaned babies can wake. There goes the theory of the MCHN.
Also, DS was not a good eater. He first started eating more than a teaspoon of food at about 9 months, and was nearly two before he started eating decent amounts and a large variety of foods (actually he now eats everything that we do). And he is very healthy and always has been. The medical advice we got at the time, was that if he needs to eat he will, he won't starve himself. But that I was giving him too much milk (every bf he dropped I replaced with cow's milk so he was having 8 or more cups of milk a day. They suggested to cut it down to 3 cups a day, one with each main meal, and only water at other times. In your case you will adapt this a little as he is still on bm. Other things that worked were to not offer him a food he liked, if he didn't eat the first thing he was given, and to make sure he always ate meals at the table with us. It took a while but we got there when he was ready. Now people comment on what a great eater he is and can't believe he was ever any different.
Hang in there, I am sure everything will work out. Please do not wean, and maybe find someone other than a MCHN to get help from. I had one tell me to wean Jack at 12months for no reason. She just assumed that I would want to. Well, she was wrong. I now know MCHNs often are!
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