Eliza turned the grand old age of 2 last week and I have decided it is high time I weaned her off breastfeeding.
We have been cutting down for a while, and she now only has it first thing in the morning and when she goes to bed. I do love this bond we share, but I need to break the cycle of her falling asleep whilst nursing as she rarely settles herself if she wakes at night.
I remember stopping around the same time with my others, but cannot remember how I did it and there is no good advice online – well none I can find anyway.
Eliza won’t drink cows milk, although she will quite happily drink the remaining contents of her cereal bowl, turns her nose up at formula (I don’t blame her) but will drink bucket loads of water.
With Isaac I remember he liked the comfort of switching to a bottle, but Eliza won’t take that either – she is a feisty, independent cup girl.
So ladies, do we go down the cold turkey route and deal with a few nights of pain or do you have any other suggestions?
No advice, but as Syd is 18 months in a fortnight, and still feeding day and night, I will be hoping someone leaves you some awesome tips! I need to stop soon as have a couple of weekends away from him booked for the summer!
It is tough isn’t it. It feels like I have been cutting down for ages and just as we get somewhere she is ill and it’s all she wants!
I’m a cold turkey kind of girl. I tough it out on everything, which is always bloody hard, but consistency is my thing and it’s worked for us. I stressed because the Bug wouldn’t have cows milk, so he actually just gave up drinking milk totally. I worried for a while, but I just gave him lots of other calcium rich foods, and he’s fine. As it goes he now drinks school milk every day.
How about warm milk and honey in a cup?
I think that is what we did with Isaac and the HV said it is 3 days of pain and then the routine is changed for good. I did work, but then I was working evenings – now I do the bedtime routine on my own as hubby works late night!
I’d drop the nighttime feed first and get used to that. I found doing that quite liberating as didn’t need to be around at bedtime. Could daddy do bedtime for a few days/week or so?
He works late sadly, so she is normally in bed by the time he gets home!
Oh good luck! I will be watching these comments as well for some tips. I am a long way off with having only a 6 month old, but I can already tell he is going to be a boobie monster for quite some time 😉
Lets hope I get some more tips!
Good luck Kara, same as Helen here, when I stopped – cold turkey – neither of mine would drink cows milk, though I confess that I hate the stuff so didn’t encourage too much. They will have with cereal, well Scarlett will, but I know that they are getting enough of everything they need in their diet.
Maybe you need an interim first team feeder haha (on my own)
I do love you Annie!!
I went cold turkey because I found it impossible to drop it down gradually. The little greedy gobbler was having none of that reducing lark! I was amazed how quickly he adjusted once we stopped though. A matter of a day or two, really. Incredible. (And not a little poignant.) Good luck with however you decide to tackle it. You’ll find the way that works best for both of you.
Thank you – it appears I just need to bite the bullet and decide enough is enough! #eek