Help! Do I nightwean? Night-nursing tandem?

[Maggirayne]

My DD still nurses about 50% of her diet. I feed her at meals with us and when she asks for something to snack on. We don't do a lot of snacks. I am 13 weeks pregnant and don't like food right now.

I don't mind night-nursing, except for when she.will.not unlatch--from 4-7 am. It's not every day, but when she does, I just want to scream and pound the bed. DH does hold/rock her, offer a bottle, and after I've slept a little while, I can nurse without gritting my teeth in anger(she just won't let go and let me sleep!). But I am really nervous about night-nursing with two.

I would like to have two weeks we're home and try it, but we're traveling the next two weekends(other people's houses), and who wants to hear a screaming baby? And then I don't know what December looks like yet.

Oh, she's 18 mos old. So far, no dip in supply, but I'm paranoid it will dry up, I do not want to nurse if I'm dry, it's painful enough on my nipples already(but mostly latching on, except for the long sessions).

So any suggestions? BTDT?

[dex_millie]

Will she not go down after your DH has rocked her and gave her a bottle during those times?

DS was nursing in the wee hours of the morning, DH and I would have to get up and hold him or gave him a sippy cup of Ricemilk while holding him until he falls back asleep and then put him down. If he didn't go down we would let him sleep untop of us until he was really in deep sleep and put him down. I would continue it if he woke up again. Right now we are much better. I did these things also because I was weaning him. So I had to keep it consistant. It was tiring, but now he STTN sometimes and may wake once or twice but goes down faster than before.

[Maggirayne]

Nope. So far, she's just cried until I nurse her. She doesn't like it when he takes her and tries to crawl back to me, generally.

She sleeps pretty lightly between 4-7. Then she'll nurse at 7:30 for a bit and sometimes 8:30 and go back to sleep until 9 or 10, and I get up. But between 4-7, if I move or unlatch she wakes up. SHe does only do this thing from 4-7 am 2-3 days a month. Today she nursed for a while at 4, then 6:30, altho' she moved between and ended up horizontal, so I moved so she wouldn't kick me, she didn't rouse enough to want to nurse. Then she nursed for a while 8-8:30, I dozed a little but said enough after she'd drained both sides, and rolled so she was against my back. She fussed a little, then crawled up on my pillow and went to sleep. DH was gone overnight. So I was quite relieved.

Oh yeah, she quit taking a paci in Feburary, and I've tried, she jerks it out and throws it away.

I nurse her down for naps and bedtime all the time. She has rarely fallen asleep without nursing. We don't have a set naptime or bedtime, generally 9-10:30 pm. For naps I have to lay her down in the first 10-20 minutes, or she wakes when I move. I sit on the couch and go back to the bedroom. Unless she's really tired, if I lay down before she's asleep, she decides it's time to play. She take pretty short naps, 45 min-1:30, rarely that long.

[Maggirayne]

If anyone else is looking for help on this, I thought I'd post this link:
http://www.llli.org//NB/NBMayJune04p106.html

[dex_millie]

Hi,

DS was the same for DH. He would cry murder if Dh tried to take him at night, I am not sure if it came with age or that we tried to get DH more involved with putting him down to nap. DS also use to just fall asleep while nursing. I was the only one who could have dealth with him, it was so tiring.

My milk seemed to had dried up a bit and that was hell, but then it seemed to come back so I always had milk for him.

Hope things get easier for you soon

[Maggirayne]

She didn't like DH taking her, but I thought, "What would help calm her?" so I unlatched and talked to her, patted her back and hummed, and she fussed a few times and settled into a deeper sleep. It's so easy I'm a little shocked.

[ainh]

Around that age I started to say that the boobies stayed asleep until the sun came up. We talked about it a lot and DS took "no" better if I said "yes, we'll do it when the sun comes up" with a happy sounding voice. I found I was a lot happier once we night-weaned. As a pregnant and nursing mamma I can say that the pain has worsened and DS is more biting with his latch now that my supply is low.

DS did better with me holding him and explaining when we could nurse than with daddy holding him and doing the same. It took about 4-5 nights (be consistent, even if it's hard) for DS to stop asking -- of course, there are occassional backslides, but the hard part was over in a few nights.