We’re linking up with the Breastfeeding Blog Hop again! We’re joining Life with Levi, The Slacker Mom, and Diary of a Devil Dog Wife this week to talk about night weaning.
I wish that I had some great wisdom on this topic. I’m currently breastfeeding my fourth nursling, so the assumption could be that I’ve gone through this several times, and know what there is to know about it. It hasn’t really worked out that way, though. My first was weaned entirely, all at the same time. My second daughter self-weaned, with some light boundaries put in place by me. Night time was one of the last to go, but it went slowly on its own, with no help from me. My fourth is eight months, and still nurses frequently at night. I would like to start decreasing our night time sessions, but I’m not taking any active steps yet.
But then there’s my third. The one child who I’ve night weaned.
Fair warning, this isn’t an encouraging “how to” post. It’s more of a “We’ve been through the fire, but we’re still here,” post. Want to keep reading?
Last summer my third born was almost two. He had always loved to nurse. And nurse. And nurse. And at night, his favorite thing to do was… nurse. We co-slept, so it wasn’t a huge issue, but as he entered toddlerhood he went from being a rough sleeper to a terrible sleeper. He would wake up crying about mysterious complaints, and end up hysterical. So even though he had free reign of the good stuff at night, he still wasn’t always pacified by nursing. In addition to that, he loved having an all night buffet, and would stay attached most of the night.
Then I started having horrific pain while nursing… “I’m-going-to-bite-my-lip-to-keep-from-screaming” painful. Thrush had decided to pay me my first visit! Nursing at night made me want to scream. Not nursing at night made my son scream. So I normally gritted my teeth and bore it, but I was getting exhausted, frustrated, and feeling resentful.
And then I found out I was pregnant! Suddenly it made sense. There was more to my pain than just thrush. And the pregnancy had increased the likelihood of me getting thrush in the first place.
But meanwhile, I was rapidly burning out. Before the thrush and pregnancy, I could nurse my son mostly in my sleep. Now I spent the time curled up wanting to cry. Unfortunately, no matter what I tried, if my son woke up or started looking for the breast in his sleep, he would go into a screaming meltdown. I tried walking. Rocking. Singing. Offering water. Snacks. All were met by screams.
Finally, I decided I just could not keep going the way things were. I had been exhausted before the pregnancy. Now I needed rest more than ever. Because of the way my son responded to attempts to distract him, I didn’t feel like there was any way to gradually cut back on our night time sessions. So we went cold turkey: no nursing from our “nurse to sleep” nursing session until daylight the next morning.
It was unspeakably hard. When we started the process, he woke up several times every night, without fail. He would scream (and I do mean scream) for anywhere from 10 min to close to an hour. He never cried alone. I was always right there, holding him and loving on him, just no nursing. My husband took several “shifts” as well.
Slowly but surely, over the course of a few months, the time between wakings grew shorter, and the screaming lasted for less time as well.
The all night buffet was officially closed.
I wish I could say that solved all our sleep issues, but it didn’t. As I mentioned in my post on infant sleep here, my son continues to be a bad sleeper, and he frequently wakes at night. I still feel night weaning when we did was the right decision for our family, for a variety of reasons, but I regret how traumatic it was for all of us. I’m already trying to work towards making it easier on my fourth child, by doing things like introducing and encouraging a “lovey”. I’m looking forward to reading all the posts for the breastffeeding blog hop this week, and I would love if you would share your thoughts below!
Do you have any suggestion for easing the night weaning process? Have you had to night wean, and how did it go? Did your child sleep through the night afterwards?
