Sadly, I don't have any words of advice, but I am sending good wishes your way.
Wait, I do have a question or two. How much solid food is she eating? Would eating more of it before bedtime help her feel sated through the night? Or is the night feeding more an issue of comfort than hunger?
It's a great question. But we're pretty sure that it's a comfort issue -- she drinks mostly cow's milk and eats three meals a day and snacks a ton. She really only nurses before bed, upon waking, and, when I give in, through the night. She falls asleep easily and sleeps soundly from 8pm on until usually 3am (sometimes 1am but if that happens she falls right back asleep). Then the sleep strike begins.
Hi Kate,
We started night-weaning Wild Man at about this age, but we were also trying to stop co-sleeping, which may have made it easier. Because of that our approach was a little different, but it may work for you, so I'll share. I would nurse Wild Man to sleep and put him in his own crib. If he woke up before midnight, C would go in and get him back to sleep. If it was after midnight, I'd bring him in bed with us and nurse him. We gradually pushed this back by an hour--about every week or so. This worked really well for us as it taught Wild Man to go back to sleep without me and to sleep on his own. He eventually stopped waking up to nurse. You might try something similar, although your presence in the bed may make it harder as you know. Maybe you could try having TD sleep b/w you and La Dudarina? If you're not right next to her, she may go back to sleep on her own.
Fairly new to following your blog, so I forget exactly how old Dudarina is at this point. But, we have similar parenting styles, so here is what we have done.
You could offer another type of milk in a bottle or sippy while saying "Mommy's milks are asleep." We did this successfully around 14 months while still nursing him to sleep and during the day. (I was having some serious health issues and needed my partner to take over night time parenting and straight out night weaning wasn't going well) Proceed with caution because now are in the position of a 23 month old who recently weaned from the breast but still associates cows milk and a parent cuddling him with falling back asleep.
In trying to deal with this recent challenge of waking 6 times a night for cows milk and not taking no for an answer, I've re-read the No-cry Sleep Solution for Toddlers (Pantley). I've had some success with breaking the "I WILL wait you out" cycle while become increasingly more upset with telling him a story where he is the main character who goes on this fanciful play adventure, gets tired, and comes back, sees it is dark and goes to sleep.
M and DRD, those are all very helpful (and DRD, LD is 19mo). I think the plan for tonight is I'm going to sleep in the other room and we're going to have some cow's milk handy. If we have a repeat of the last few nights, even with me not there, then to spot TD we'll probably try something along the lines of what you suggested.
Let's hope something gives because the last few nights have really sucked, in a way that is totally different from the early days when La Dudarina was an infant and simply had no circadian rhythms yet.
When they are tiny, your own hormones manage to make it ok, if not ever fun, to wake up every 2 hours, stay up for 5 hours in the middle of the night, etc. Somewhere around a year though I think something actually shifts within a mama and dealing with this becomes more physically draining. Totally sucks. Good luck!
I have no advice. but am just weighing in to comment how interesting it is to see what other parents do. We stopped co-sleeping with Absurdist Baby when he outgrew the sidecar/co-sleeper -- and I remember thinking that transition hard for him. Now he sleeps in his own room and has for a while, though he's not a good sleeper in that he must nurse (or have breastmilk in a bottle) before he'll sleep, which means that if we wakes up, I'm on duty. Night weaning is something I hadn't even thought of because finally for the last couple weeks he's back to sleeping through the night. (knock on wood)
I wish you much luck! May La Dudarina allow you to sleep a nice long sleep!
You've got lots of good suggestions here. I concur with the idea of giving her a bottle rather than nursing if she wakes in the middle of the night (since she is on milk the rest of the day). And if you can swing it, have hubby give it! It will help her make the transition if you can reduce that nightly presence a little bit.
But mostly just wanted to say hugs to you. It's so hard to function in that sleepless space, and you're doing great!
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