Nightweaning help?

[Curlyfry7]

I have been trying to nightwean my 19 month old for the last month now, and am making little progress. I am using Jay Gordon's plan but planned to stretch each step out longer. I can do the "pop off before completely alseep"-or at least I think she's not completely asleep-maybe I'm waiting too long. But I've moved to the next step and either I fall asleep while she's still attached, or she gets instantly hysterical and screams, which is bad as my almost 4 y/o is also in the room. The other night she screamed, hit me, pushed me, and kicked me for an hour before finally falling asleep. And then I was so tired that I just nursed her the other times she woke up. I have no help as my DH is always at work, so I need to do this myself, I think.

Any tips? Do I just have to brace myself to get through the screaming? She is very intense and sensitive and gets hysterical very easily, even during the daytime. I hate to see her so upset but I am DONE with nursing 4-6 or more times a night, plus we want to TTC in a couple months and I have not started cycling yet and want to see if this will kick it into gear. Thanks!

[SeekingJoy]

[LadyCatherine185]

We nightweaned at 19 months using Jay Gordon's method as well, and took about a month or so. It significantly decreased his wakings. My DS was very verbal though and really knew and understood what I was saying. I would start shortening the sessions to about 10 seconds, rather than waiting until she is "almost asleep." That is what I did and it worked really well. I would let him nurse for 5-10 seconds and then unlatch him and say "milkas are finished now, shhh, go to sleep." He would fuss a little but never cried and went right back to sleep.

How verbal is she? Could you talk about it during the day, make like a special book for her about the daytime/nighttime and how at night we all sleep and the milk goes to sleep too? And right before bedtime tell her that she can nurse again in the morning.

Does your DH work nightshifts? I would see if he could sleep with the 4 yo until nightweaning is done. Or move the 4 yo to another room by herself.. You will just have to push through the screaming if you are really determined to do this. For us, in the end it took moving DS to his own bed and having DH go to him when he woke up after we got to the end of the nightweaning.. He still doesn't STTN all the time, but only wakes up once a night or so and quickly goes back to sleep with a quick resettle/pat on the back from DH.

[artzy_fartzy68]

we started the JG method, but then we switched to Daddy doing all the nighttime nursing while I temporarily moved to the living room. Our William was 17mths and was nursing every hour through the night and I was pregnant with Aldous. ARG!! I was SOOOO tired! I was fine with nursing him once or twice thru the night but all night was too difficult and I was so tired and resentful.
So we did JG for a bit, but didn't have any luck. William would be VERY upset about not nursing if I were in the room.
I moved to the sofa for a couple of weeks (omg, it was like a vacation!!) and DH took the night shift. The first couple of days when William woke he would be quite upset, but DH would wear him and pat him and sing and comfort him. If he was inconsolable, i would come and nurse him again for a few minutes, then DH took him back. After 3 days, William was perfectly content with DH consoling him and comforting him and would go right back to sleep. pretty soon he stopped waking up! At all!!! i was hoping to get down to one night nursing, but he went all the way to the next step! I was pleased that it wasn't as difficult as I had imagined.
Each little "step" took about 3 days, and it was easy enough on DH as well.

Night weaning is so hard!! hang in there!

[Curlyfry7]

Thanks for the hugs, SJ!!

I'll try cutting down on the time of the nursing. DD understands a good amount, but is not speaking nearly as much as her brother did. I've been starting to talk about "milkies going night-night" and she looks at me and walks away, like she's saying "I'm not listening to this!"

My DH works 2 jobs, basically-he works his "regular" job 8-5/6, comes home for a couple hours, then leaves once the kids are in bed and is gone until 2-4 am, so he is not available to help pretty much at all right now. DS is afraid to sleep in his room by himself-he will if DH sleeps with him, but with DH gone he won't-absolutely refuses.

I wouldn't mind if we got down to one feeding a night, but 6 times between 10pm and 5:30am is too much-I just can't do it anymore. It's making me resent the daytime stuff too-it took her 45 minutes to fall asleep tonight and I had to deep breathe the whole time to keep from chewing my own boob off and run screaming from the house. (and isn't that a visual!)

[LCBMAX]

For me one of the hardest things about nightweaning was having to be awake even more to get it done! Many times after unlatching, I would be sitting up in bed rocking my son on my lap and actually fall asleep and tip over. That said, sooooooo worth it.

And while your dh (what a work warrior!) is not available to help with your 4 yo, I must say that my dh could never have completed the nightweaning - it had to be me, since I'm the one with the milk. Can the 4 yo wear earplugs?

Clearly your dd is understanding everything you say, so go ahead with LadyC's ideas about talking to her, even though she's not talking back so much.

If you are 100 or better yet 1000% committed to the nightweaning, your dd will get that and be reassured by your consistency. If you are at all ambivalent, skip it for now and wait for the miserable moment to overtake you.

I do suggest only nursing for a set count like LadyC or in our case one song, and not waiting for the almost sleepy thing. It's an ambiguous sign, and it only woke up my son even more. Then I'd tap my breast so his lips would feel the vibration, unlatch come hell or high water, and pull my thick bulky turtleneck sweater down for good til the next wake up. Rocking sitting up, humming Hey Jude into his skull, and sometimes rocking him on my chest as I lay on my back were what worked for us. (That last one is a hip workout if it goes on long enough.)

Happy ovulating, brave woman!

[SeekingJoy]

So here is the random mis-mash of stuff we did to get DD to nightwean. She was older, much more verbal young like your DS (although I think Tessa's receptive language skills are off the charts. She does *know* what you are saying).

• I started offering more high-calorie, high-fat, high-protien snacks right before bed. Avacado, steak, full-fat yogurt with granola. I also offered more of these snacks throughout the day. Bascially, the logic was to make sure that if I was trying to cut several over-night nursings I wanted to make sure I set her up to succeed by not being truely hungry at night.

• I started doing other things while nursing her like rubbing her feet and back. I also tried her hair, hands, face. At night, I would rub her feet, her favorite, while nursing her, give her a count down (i.e. "we are going to stop nursing and go night-night in 10 ... 9 ... "). Then, we would stop nursing, but I would keep rubbing/holding her feet.

• I started putting her down in her own room to start the night. I would always come get her and transfer her to our bed (actually by the time she was nightweaning she was in a big-girl bed and came to us) the first time she woke to nurse.

I will add others as I remember them.