"Early" night weaning

[atpeace]

DS is turning one year old next week, and I'm curious about night weaning at this age. I'm aware that many people continue night nursing a lot longer than one year (I nightweaned DD at 20 months, and she continued nursing during the day until she was 2.5yo), and am not looking for a debate please, just tips and suggestions, and what worked for you if you night weaned at this age. 

I love nursing and I enjoy co-sleeping, but I wouldn't mind some "no milkies" time at night. DS wakes about 2-3 times at night to nurse. I'm going back to work in July, working shifts (nights and days), so my partner will be doing the night-time parenting while I'm at work. I'm hoping night weaning will also make thing easier for when I'm not home. 

Please share your wisdom! 

[expat-mama]

Here with you! I think everyone will mention Dr Jay Gordon's nightweaning method. It looks good, but hopefully mamas can share other experiences and methods too!

Actually I was thinking today- we sort of partially nightweaned my DS already. We used some tips from the NCSS to get things so that DH would be the one in charge of soothing DS from his bedtime of 7pm till our bedtime of 11pm. It was rough at first, and sometimes I still have to go in and nurse DS if he won't be calmed by DH- BUT now DS will sleep from 7-11 without really waking *sometimes*!

So I'm hopeful that full nightweaning will do the trick and take care of his multiple (I'm talking 5-8!!!) wakings from 11 to 5 and have him sleeping mostly thru the night. Heck, I'd be ecstatic if I "only" had to wake up 2 or 3 times, but we're aiming for total sleep.

Yeah, yeah- I KNOW it's normal for babies to not STTN, but a girl can dream can't she?

[Zimbah]

I did the Jay Gordon method when DD1 was 9 months (yes I know...) and it worked fantastically.  If I remember correctly, we did it really really slowly e.g. a week at each stage of reducing the length of feed, gradually going down to no feeding and then to not bringing her into bed (she had a cot in our room).  Using that she cut down to waking once around 11 and then around 4am, and gradually the 4am feed moved later and later without me doing anything.  There were some tears but not as many as I'd expected.  I had also coupled it with the Baby Whisper walk in/walk out method to get her initial bedtime under control (I'm not keen on BW for young babies but at 9 months, and with a very short crying tolerance time (10 seconds) it was what we needed).

Good luck!

[ciga]

I also went with the jay gordon method when DS was 1 year and it really did work.  I'll still nurse him around 5am to get a couple more hours of sleep out of him but that's it. He still wakes at around 2 or 3am and moves into our bed from his crib but there is no nursing involved.  He cries, I bring him in between us, and he goes back to sleep (usually within moments and without another peep). Once in a while, when he is sick or especially fussy in the middle of the night I will relent and nurse but that is not more than once a week, if even.  He was nursing every hour or so before and I've never been able to sleep through it so I was feeling totally overwhelmed and beyond sleep deprived and now, for the most part, I rarely feel like I NEED to nap with him during the day to keep going.  I can actually do other things when he sleeps now.  Good luck!

[Terrilein]

I did a faster track version of Dr. J and it worked great for us. We were still co-sleeping so it wasn't a brutal weaning from the breast AND the family bed. If you want your baby in your crib, night wean first and then look into moving the baby to his/her crib in 2-3 months. Don't do too much at one time. Also, I night-weaned my dd twice (she was back to night nursing after being really sick once) and the second time she was older (maybe almost 3?) and I was able to communicate with her that I would nurse her down for the night, but that she had to wait until the sun came up to nurse again. Not quite advice for a baby, but more for a toddler, I know.

[atpeace]

Thanks, ladies. I've been ruminating over all your suggestions.

And I'm having second thoughts about night weaning, after considering it carefully.

I totally didn't clue into the fact that some days, I'll be away from DS for over 12 hours (my 12 hr shifts start at 7 am and end at 7 pm), so I'll be gone before he wakes up, and back around the time he goes to bed, so in essence, I won't see him at all! Terrible.

And I know he'll want to nurse a few times at night to make up for the separation during the day. I don't want to deprive him or wean him completely, but if I night wean him, then he won't have any nursing for two full days, and two full nights each week. That sounds like such a long time! So I think I'll keep nursing at night too, because I think I'll want to reconnect with him after such a long time apart. 

Thanks for the suggestions though! I think I'll post a question about my new realization in the breastfeeding area. 

[MJB]

Originally Posted by ciga 

I also went with the jay gordon method when DS was 1 year and it really did work.  I'll still nurse him around 5am to get a couple more hours of sleep out of him but that's it. He still wakes at around 2 or 3am and moves into our bed from his crib but there is no nursing involved.  He cries, I bring him in between us, and he goes back to sleep (usually within moments and without another peep). Once in a while, when he is sick or especially fussy in the middle of the night I will relent and nurse but that is not more than once a week, if even.  He was nursing every hour or so before and I've never been able to sleep through it so I was feeling totally overwhelmed and beyond sleep deprived and now, for the most part, I rarely feel like I NEED to nap with him during the day to keep going.  I can actually do other things when he sleeps now.  Good luck!

This is pretty much exactly what we just did with our 11 month old, except she is in a floor bed instead of a crib. Last night, for the first time, she got up and started walking to our room by herself instead of crying in bed, so I'm guessing we won't have to get up at all soon. I would like to get her to bed earlier but it has been pushed so late with other things (my oldest son has swim meets until 9:30pm on Mondays, for instance) that she's been up until 10:30-11pm every night lately.