Why night weaning?

[justKate]

DD is only 9 months and we have no intention of weaning. My question is, why does everyone night wean first? I thought you ladies might have more knowledge of this sort of thing...

Here's the thing--I work full time. I would like to stop pumping at work and have DD eat/drink water during the day and nurse evenings & nights. Is this possible?

It seems like babies sleep longer at night after they partially wean. Why is that?

Sorry if my questions seem amateur, I'm just trying to figure it out!

TIA

[Thalia the Muse]

I would either keep pumping until she's one (just a few more months!), or else plan to add some formula to her daytime feeds. They are still really dependent on breastmilk for nutrition at nine months.

Aside from that, what you're describing is caleld "reverse-cycle" nursing, and lots of babies do it spontaneously when their mother is gone during the day, because they really like to nurse! It shouldn't be hard to get her to nurse more often when you're home, if that's what you want.

As far as why to night-wean, I think it's because a lot of us are really, really exhausted from nursing all night. And many babies sleep more when night-weaned because they were only waking up to eat, and they start eating more during the day when it's not available at night.

[moondiapers]

Most moms that I know that night wean, do it because they aren't the kind of sleeper that can sleep through nursing and they are tired. With my last child night time was the last to go, because I slept through most nursing sessions and didn't want to deal with upsetting ds at night until I had to.

[Baby_Cakes]

I waited until DD was a year before attempting to night wean and it was really because I was exhausted. I just couldn't deal with waking up 2,3,4 times a night to nurse any longer. She and I both needed more sleep.

At 9 months, I was soooo done w/pumping as well. (I WOH part time - so I feel some of your pain there). But I decided to just stick it out. Soon enough, you might be able to drop a session or two and still get enough for at least one bottle during the day for your LO.

I think as babies get older, they do learn to self soothe. I believe that is why they sleep longer stretches after night weaning. At first, they wake up, look to nurse or call out to nurse, and when they don't get it right away but get rocked or patted back to sleep, they realize it's much less trouble to just fall back asleep themselves than fully wake up be "put" back to sleep. But I really think this comes with age and time. I could not see my 9 month old Nora doing this. It just wouldn't have worked.

[major_mama11]

My DD reverse-cycled from 9 mos to almost age 2 (I didn't pump when I was away at school- she wouldn't take much from a bottle anyway).

At around age 2, I night-weaned, because 1) I was exhausted - I've never been able to sleep through night nursings, even with an older baby, and 2) she was getting all kinds of cavities, and I felt that her habit of being latched on nonstop all night, as was her habit, was not doing her weak tooth enamel any favors.

She continued to nurse for nearly a year after night-weaning, and would have gladly gone past age 3 had I let her.

I understand being sick of pumping- I love being able to nurse my son and provide him breastmilk, but am SO OVER the pumping-at-work thing.

[kiwiva]

I night weaned because I was so tired and kept getting sick. I have never really slept through nursing and had difficulty falling back to sleep. But I waited until I thought DD would be amenable at 28 months. She had started to fall asleep without the breast some nights, so I figured she had realized she could go to sleep without it.

[justKate]

I just re-read my post and realized I wasn't really clear. I'm going to keep pumping at work until she's a year old, at least. It's just going to become awkward beyond that, because of my work environment. I do (mostly) sleep through nursing, and I really don't want to give up that time with her. So it sounds like it will be okay (after one) to "day wean" so long as she can make up for it at night? I really don't want to give her formula if I don't have to.

I'm looking for a light at the end of the pumping tunnel, but then I wonder, is even 12 mos. too early?

[Thalia the Muse]

If it helps, that's what we did. I stopped pumping at work right at my daughter's first birthday, and we went to whole cow's milk and water during the day. She still nursed when I was home for another year, until she weaned around her second birthday. It worked great for us! She really, really liked to eat, so she was getting quite a bit of nutrition from actual food by the time she was one. She still really, really likes to eat!

We night-weaned at around 13 months because we didn't cosleep (we tried it, but she kept us awake and vice versa), so I had to get up to nurse her every hour and a half and it was killing me. She promptly stopped night-waking and started eating more during the day, and everyone was happier. If you cosleep and can sleep through the nursing, that's a fabulous arrangement -- I wish it had worked that way for us.