Monday, February 22, 2010

night weaning, night fourteen...















ok, today is actually day 19, but night 14 was a REALLY big night. please don't be scared by the numbers here.  we are doing gentle weaning that is not that different from bed-sharing.  you can read about our exact set up in my first night weaning post.

on evening 14, i did some doll roll playing to show my 15-month-old the old "[his name] go night night...mama go nigh-night....no nurse nurse."  i then repeated this during the night whenever he woke up.  on a side note, he had been doing pretty well in this new set up of sleeping separate from me.  nonetheless, he was still putting up a good fight/couldn't fall back asleep sometime between 3-6 a.m. which would always end with me nursing him back to sleep....it was the only way.

weeelllll, on night 14 when he woke up at 3am, i just held him and repeated "[his name] go night-night...mama go night-night...no nurse nurse." he wasn't that psyched about it and ended up crying for about 20 minutes in and out of my arms.  sometimes he didn't want to be held and was just walking around the room crying.  i was gently talking to him and trying to console him.  it was hard for both of us, but i realized that night weaning just isn't going to succeed unless eventually i actually STOP nursing at night.  i felt like 14 days was gentle and gradual enough, and i knew he wasn't hungry.  i knew this because there were nights when i would nurse at 3am, then he'd be up an hour later and ready to nurse.

so after the 20 minutes of crying on night 14, my husband took him, gave him a paci, quickly busted out some tibetan monk zen chanting shit on his iphone, and rocked him back to sleep.

ever since then, my son sleeps basically through the night not only without waking but without nursing....yea!!!!!  sometimes, he wakes just for 20 seconds, and i give him a paci and a quick cuddle and say "[his name] go night-night" and he goes right back to sleep.

UPDATE : my son is now 21 months old and, for the last couple months, has been waking up about an hour or 2 earlier than "usual".  i end up getting up and nursing him, but only OUT of bed.  we sit in the rocker to nurse, and often he'll fall back asleep.  i tried nursing him in my bed in the morning when he wakes (for my sleep's sake), but very quickly he got into a pattern of waking up anytime in the middle of the night, thinking it was morning, and wanting to come into my bed to nurse.

photo courtesy of deerfieldcc.com

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