“You only love me in the daytime” - a tale of night weaning a toddler
In the middle of night weaning, our second attempt, I was comforting my toddler having explained that it wasn’t time for ‘scoobie’ (her pet name for breast milk). I said something along the lines of “It’s OK to cry, I’m here with you, I love you”. In reply my toddler said, “You only love me in the daytime”. Brutal.
Luckily being the second attempt I was prepared. We were doing this during a period where nothing else big was going on, I was feeling well and resilient, I had time to feed her more if wanted or needed during the daytime, she wasn’t ill (a rare week for a child in childcare!).
When I’m working with clients preparing for maternity leave or returning to work the topics of sleep, breastfeeding and weaning are common so I wanted to share here my experience and some links I share with clients.
How night weaning worked for us
I’m struggling to remember exactly when we tried night weaning, I think the first time was around 18 months and the second perhaps around 2. Importantly, it was well after a year. At that time some babies do still really need milk and comfort at night. It was also once we could start talking about it with a simple book. And I wasn’t trying to navigate returning to work at the same time!
For us, we continued to bed-share throughout. This has only very recently been something we’ve started ending as we have baby two on the way. Having said that - our daughter does have a double bed and often my husband or I do sleep in with her.
Feeding at night is also not 100% off the table. When my little one is in pain, ill or scared, sometimes a quick feed is what she needs to calm or ease the pain and get back to sleep.
Now that she’s nearly four we’ve found a compromise on a brief feed when she wants one - she asks for 5 and she gets to latch on for a slow (sometimes quick) countdown from 5. I still feed her to sleep most nights and these days she’s usually gone in under 5 minutes.
Get advice and information on night weaning
I’m conscious I’ve not really outlined an approach above - that’s because a) I’m not qualified to, and b) you’ll find your own way that works for you and your family. As a coach, my role is to create the space for you to explore how you want to approach things.
Here are a couple of articles I read to work out what might work for us, you might find them a helpful starting point:
Personally I used elements from all over to work out what worked for us. Instinct definitely played a part, as did a high-necked t-shirt to sleep in. I also reached out to someone I know who is a breastfeeding counsellor to talk through how I was feeling.
Finding support for weaning
You can access all the same support a new breastfeeding mum would - you might find the National Breastfeeding Helpline a good source of support as all call handlers will have personal experience and many will have older children now too so you'll be speaking to well trained people who've been in your shoes.
If you’d like some time to explore your thoughts and feelings around this topic you can book a free call with me here: calendly.com/thefloatspace
