Night feeds as a habbit

I’m BF and went cold turkey on the night feeding early last week (I had norovirus and was simply too unwell and on my own). We had two hours of tears the first night until he went back to sleep and since then he has not had a night feed.

This is a baby who was routinely feeding every couple of hours, sometimes more 🤯.

I night weaned in Sep.
Was purely habit for my LG.

More than likely out of habit especially if it’s around the same time every night. My LG will wake up at 10:30 and 2:30/3 every night without fail, feed for literally 2 minutes and go back to sleep. I’m in the same boat trying to cut it out but the crying killing me when I’m tired😩

We are trying to wean by decreasing amount every 2 nights (we’ve had a few false starts due to different reasons)
If baby is crying that much I don’t think cold turkey should be the advise maybe slowly weaning
By decreasing we are slowly getting a longer stretch of sleep without a feed during the night so I think it’s working x

This popped up on my feed so thought I’d comment- it’s actually considered normal for little ones aged 6-18 months to wake up 1-3 times overnight for a feed so you’re really not doing anything wrong :)

The HV I had had told me to just follow babies lead on feeds so clearly they are all offering different information!

We are currently reducing our sons night feed because he’s waking at 2-3am for 7oz and then won’t take any more milk til around 11am so we’re trying to get him to have more during daylight hours haha. We’ve just been reducing it by 30ml each and we’ve got him down to 3oz so far (if he was distressed or not going back to sleep etc I would cave and just him it 😆) x

For those that have given water as a replacement for milk during the night, do you give it in their usual milk bottle rather than a cup?

We had a sleep coach who talked us through night weaning. Mines breast fed so I was to reduce the time of her feeds by 30 seconds each night, then feed her as much as possible in the last wake window before bed. This gives her time to adjust to taking the same amount of calories during the day instead.
Yes they might not need to feed during the night, but if that’s what they’re used to they will still feel hungry at those times.
Cold turkey is a bit of a hard core way to do it!

thank you!

how did you manage with the crying? I always say to myself I’m going to leave my little girl a little longer when she wakes up in the night but when it happens I just rush in every time cause I want to get to bed quicker xx

how has this worked for you?

to be honest I never intended for it to be that way but I was so unbelievably sick and hadn’t eaten in days. He woke in the night around 1am and I immediately went to him like I always do, would fall asleep feeding and then wake up on transfer. I then played the pick up/feed/put down game several more times while trying not to vomit and eventually relented and went to bed when he wouldn’t settle in bed. I didn’t fall asleep but listened to him wail and eventually he fell asleep. It absolutely broke my heart but on that night I felt like I didn’t have a choice 🥹.

ah I understand. I’m sorry you had to do that it must have been so difficult for you. However I guess there is a positive from it if he doesn’t need night feeds now :) hope you are feeling better now

Thank you all so so much! 🤗