TTMA Weaning

[stringy]

P will be 1 next week. I don't need to be done next week - but I need to be done overnight like, soon.  If that means weaning completely I'm fine with it. If she can night wean and still nurse when she's around me in the day that's fine - but I don't really have a need for it.

In a lovely coincidence, she just got really good at crawling up to me, looking me in the eye and signing for milk.  So don't ask don't refuse probably isn't gonna work at this age. She goes for like 9 hours on work days without me or a bottle just fine - so its possible.

I'll wait til she's not sick anymore, I'm not cruel.

But really - what do I do? I have to just say no and let her be pissed, right?

[Dramaphile]

I'm not weaned yet, but sort of working on it. I have minimized her nursing sessions during the day by offering food or a sippy cup if she asks to nurse, and sometimes that works. It seemed that at least half of the time, she was asking to nurse because she was hungry or thirsty and it was easier than trying to convince me to go get her food. She has since learned the power of "go stand in front of the fridge and yell" and that's cut down her requests to nurse to 2-3 times a day. I also sometimes say, "that's for night-nights" and she cries a little, but then gives up after a few minutes. I'm definitely following this thread because I've been thinking about totally weaning for a bit now and I should actually make more of an effort at it. I'm currently re-night-weaning because she got sick and I let her nurse at night again and ruined all my progress.

[charlotte]

I night weaned by nursing for increasingly short periods over a few weeks. I'd nurse a few mins, put him back in the crib, and not go back in until the next wake-up (he was typically okay with that). I also tried to give him up to 10 mins at each wake-up to see if he could put himself back to sleep. Eventually he started waking less and then finally stopped altogether. For us, weaning/STTN kinda went hand-in-hand... I never really went in and didn't nurse, even if just for a minute.
Once we night weaned, he weaned himself for daytime too. He was 16mo.

[critter015]

For night weaning I would give them a few minutes to make sure they were serious at wake ups. I would try to soothe without nursing first and if I did nurse I made the sessions gradually shorter over time. If it wasn't long enough between wake ups I either didn't go in at all or sent DH. What helped to transition our bedtime routine was giving them a sippy cup of water and one of those glo worms to sleep with. Eventually at wake ups I'd hand them the cup, turn on the glo worm, and leave until they learned to use those tools to soothe themselves. I was an asshole who didn't mind a few minutes of crying though. For E we did the sleep lady shuffle, and DH did a ton of the work while I hid under the covers because she was in our room and wouldn't quit crying if she knew I was there.

For us daytime weaning was a gradual progression. My kids were really into solids so by a year we only were nursing at nap and bedtime (except E who didn't STTN until after a year) With C I was pregnant with O and my supply was gone, so I just changed her routine to eliminate our last few sessions. O self-weaned just after his first birthday, he was too busy to sit still for that. With E I kept those last few sessions for a few more months until I changed the routine to elimiate them when it wasn't as enjoyable for us anymore.

[brandiewine11]

We were able to night wean and still daytime nurse a little for a few months.

Basically my MIL volunteered to take night wakings for a week. She soothed and offered water. This was around 14 months. He was still waking 2-4 times a night and I was so done. He was mad the first 2 nights. After that, she let him fuss for a couple of minutes before going in (he wasn't crying, just fussing a little). R was down to only waking 1-2 times by the time she left and would put himself back to sleep both times. We also introduced the crib aquarium for music around this time and started leaving a water cup in bed. Within another month he was STTN.

For daytime, around that same time, it was basically don't offer, don't refuse. But I tried to distract him a bit. If he asked, I'd suggest some water or a toy or whatever. Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. He mostly wanted to nurse when he was bored or got hurt or upset so I just went with it. The next time MIL visited, he just stopped asking because she distracted him enough. I didn't offer. That was it.

[stringy]

why is nothing easy? who signed up for this parenting thing anyway?

P has turned out to be QUITE opinionated in recent weeks, and loud. This isn't gonna be pretty.

thanks people, keep ideas coming...

[grumpycakes]

I tried going in to soothe E at night or sending DH in. He would have none of it. If he wanted to nurse, he wanted to nurse and that was it. Because of this, I found myself just getting up on auto pilot to nurse every time I heard him cry.

When I decided I couldn't handle MOTN feedings anymore, I started to notice that he wasn't nursing a whole lot at his 1 o'clock feeding. It was like a 5 minute snack. I decided to drop that one first. Instead of going right in, I let him cry/fuss for a few minutes to make sure he was serious. Shockingly to me, a lot of times he would go back to sleep on his own after only a few minutes. So I continued waiting to go in until that wake up was dropped. I did the same thing with the later wake up and he dropped that one almost immediately and also dropped his first MOTN wake up pretty much simultaneously without my prompting. The whole process took a couple of months.

I feel like it was easy because he was finally ready. I had tried lots of gentle solutions from age 8 months on and he just didn't start to respond until 14-15 months old.