How do I break feeding to sleep association?

[justifiablerebel]

@patrick963 I did continue to breastfeed throughout the day. I went back to work when they were both 4.5 months and they both weaned on their own around 15 months. They are now 4 and 2 and have slept through the night ever since!

 

[snjeri]

@allfree15 I'm still feeding my 16 months old to sleep. Usually for his nap too nowadays, because that's how he sleeps best (around 2 hours) . He's sleeping through the night most days, or goes back to sleep in 5 minutes if he wakes up a few times (usually before my bedtime). He knows he needs to sleep, half closing his eyes when I put him on the breast in the evening and fall asleep in less than 10 minutes. Why would I make my life harder?

 

[gell]

@allfree15 We are 18 months in, and still feed to sleep about 50% of the time. Allow yourself to keep using this super power because during the regressions and teething it really is a super power.

As they grow, and start to wean.. they will have better sleep skills and a more diversified sleep association.

Mine can now fall asleep in the car, stroller, and being snuggled. In addition to nursing.

 

[strider1002]

@allfree15 Since this is a science based group there’s no actual evidence to support sleep regressions.

Dr J Midell talks about this excessively but it’s not supported by sleep data.

Mostly it’s used to sell books and online coaching.

 

[filqwer]

@allfree15 R/sleeptraining is helpful. Good community and folks with good links for more gradual methods.

For mine the 4 mo regression never ended. If she fell asleep on the boob she expected the boob at every single wake up. Which became 5 then 10 times a night. I endured it for 2 months and we caved and did sleep train.

I changed my mind about crying. She was allowed to be upset. Change is hard. Meanwhile I nearly crashed the car falling asleep at the wheel, my PPD was raging, my marriage was on edge, and my mental health was slipping. A few tears (which did instantly stop the "regression" the first night - bc it wasn't a regression anymore it was a habit) was worth it for safety and sanity.

We had future regressions sure, plus colds and travel, it's not like it's a cure all forever. But it helped us!

 

[tjh]

@filqwer This was our experience as well, although it was a 6 month regression. She is 16 months now.

Before we sleep trained, we were feeding to sleep. She would go down quickly (20 mins of feeding) and sleep through the night. Suddenly at 6 months, she was taking 1-1.5 hours to feed to sleep and then waking at 45 mins and then 45 mins after that and then would go to 1.5 hours without waking and then get an okay block before wakeup, but 4 hours of sleep wasn't cutting it for me. All of those wakes were at least 30 minute feeding back to sleep, and the it would take me another 20-30 to wind down, so I basically couldn't sleep until her last wakeup of the night. We were dying - especially me. I would sit in her room with her on my boob and scroll on my phone or read a book so I wouldn't fall alseep and just get more and more and more touched out. I was a zombie during the day from the night wakes (she would not settle with my husband, at all, and I was awake anyways from the crying so I just took them. I got a break when he came home from work and would nap) When she was 8 months my husband was like, yo, this has to change, you are not doing okay. I truly was not. I don't think I ever had postpartum, but I was exhausted and touched out and just not in a good place every night. I didn't even want to have my husband hold my hand when we watched TV and wouldn't even want to talk to him.

We started a really good bedtime schedule. We took a bath, put on jammies and a sleep sack and then she breastfeed with the lights on for 20 mins and then I would leave the house to go on a walk or go to Target and he would read her a few books and put her down. He would text me when it was safe to come back. It took a couple of weeks of me leaving, but she now goes down without crying with him at night (she does get mad when it is time to stop reading... but same, girl), and also goes down easy for naps with him/grandparents/whoever on days I'm in the office with a bottle and similar routine - sleepsack, bottle, story, bed. We need to swap to a straw cup, but we aren't there yet.

I do still feed her to sleep for naps when I'm home, but she takes less than 20 mins and it is a nice, bonding time for us. We are going to start weaning her off this soon, and I expect it to be pretty easy as she does go down without me 2/3 days a week.

 

[filqwer]

@tjh Beautiful, well done! Thanks for sharing in detail. I feel the same and Had a similar experience.

 

[julius_cyrano]

@filqwer I think it's r/sleeptrain actually! Love this community.

 

[wagingwar]

@allfree15 I was worried about this too, but my baby naturally stopped feeding to sleep at 8 months old. I still feed him before bed, but he usually finishes the bottle and then needs a little rocking/patting to fall asleep. He doesn’t fall asleep with the bottle in his mouth at all. He literally just stopped on his own. If feeding to sleep is working, there is no need to stop. Your baby will eventually not need to feed to sleep.

 

[allfree15]

@wagingwar That’s great! I hope it’ll be similar for us. I feel so much better about the situation now that I’ve stopped thinking of feeding to sleep as a ‘negative sleep association’

 

[kna325]

@allfree15 I read the book No Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley, and she describes how to do this gently! I personally still do feed my 10 month old to sleep, but I would be comfortable following her instructions, even though I’m personally really anti CIO or any sleep training that involves leaving my baby to cry alone.

@heysleepybaby on Instagram might have a highlight about this too. I think she recommends layering other sleep associations before trying to remove nursing, so like adding rocking, music, etc for a while so eventually they have more cues that help them get to sleeeo.

 

[allfree15]

@kna325 Thank you! I have added in bum pats and shushing this past week. Hopefully it’ll help

 

[carolynj]

@allfree15 We read the Ferber book and did the check in method, which worked great. It was still hard but not as hard as CIO and took about 3 nights. I like the book because it was written by sleep doctors and is very evidence based. They also discuss different sleep problems in very easy to understand language. There is also a very active sub for moral support (I might not have the exact title but search for sleeptraining)

 

[allfree15]

@carolynj Thank you! Is it solve your child’s sleep problems by Richard Ferber or am I looking at the wrong book?

 

[carolynj]

@allfree15 That sounds right! There are probably multiple editions my parents used it to sleep train me lol

 

[nimbus]

@allfree15 Are you nursing to sleep? Does she take a pacifier? If you are nursing, do you ever pump and bottle feed, or do bottles of formula?

You say she's not sleeping through the night anymore, is she waking out of hunger? How often is she waking? And is she getting enough calories during the day, has she recently started daycare or anything that could cause her to be reverse cycling?

I would stop trying to put her down drowsy but awake and focus on getting her to sleep and helping her stay asleep, and then you can move on to the drowsy but awake thing. One thing at a time.

FWIW, my son is 9 months. We still feed him a bottle and rock him to sleep every night, and then once he's asleep, we transfer him to the crib. Sometimes he'll be extra wiggly and we'll put him in the crib wide awake. Sometimes he just falls asleep, other times he starts crying when he's actually ready for bed and we go in and rock him and put him down. There's nothing wrong with soothing a baby to sleep. It's all about the convenience for parents. Just because you don't do the drowsy but awake thing doesn't mean you'll be rocking them to sleep forever, and personally, I love our night time snuggles.

 

[allfree15]

@nimbus Thank you for your response!

Yes I am nursing to sleep. She gets very upset if I try to stop. She won’t take a pacifier or a bottle .

I don’t think she’s waking out of hunger every time. Sometimes she wakes after half an hour of just being fed and put back down but the only way to get her down again is to nurse.

I’m not sure how to get her to stay asleep? We keep her white noise on all night and keep the room at a consistent temp.

I’m worried that the feeding to sleep association is what’s causing these problems? I would be happy to keep doing it if this is temporary, but I’m worried she’ll never come out of the sleep regression if I don’t change it? I would be happy to rock to sleep too but she doesn’t seem to like it.

 

[nimbus]

@allfree15 Ah, I understand. Yes, it's definitely harder when they won't take a pacifier in my opinion.

Babies have shorter sleep cycles than adults, and often have trouble connecting those sleep cycles. The reality is almost no baby (or adult) truly sleeps through the night, we just connect our sleep cycles and go right back to sleep.

When she wakes, does she immediately start crying? We do not do CIO, but we will do fuss it out. If baby wakes and starts fussing, we let him be. Most of the time he goes back to sleep. When he starts actually crying, we get up and tend to him, usually he's hungry. I used to jump up and get him every time he made the smallest fuss, and I wasn't even giving him a chance to get back to sleep on his own! Not sure if that's relevant to you, just something to think about.

If she was just fed, and you know she isn't hungry, then I wouldn't feed her. Do you have a partner, someone without breasts that smell of milk, who can go in and try soothing? Or who could take over the bedtime routine after you're done nursing?

I personally don't think that feeding to sleep is an issue at all, BUT when babies can smell the milk, they want the milk, even if they aren't really hungry! Your baby also finds nursing soothing. She's using you as a pacifier. Which is normal, but only okay when it's okay with you. Personally I would keep trying on the pacifiers... I know it's easier said than done, but a pacifier was a complete game changer for us. Luckily we started pretty early so we only had to try a few different brands before we found one he liked (tomme tippe).

If she doesn't like being rocked to sleep, there's probably something else she likes that would help her sleep. We've gone through phases of how we get our son to sleep. Sometimes we would have to stand and essentially sway him back and forth, bounce him, just lay with him, and now rocking. As annoying as it is sometimes that's our job, to find out what it is that works!

You'll also see that a pretty common opinion in this sub is that sleep regressions are not real. It's not just a natural thing that happens to all babies, and they're not based in science. Sleep regressions are more likely to be developmental changes that parents simply haven't adapted to yet. At 3.5 months when you said all this began, she was just leaving the newborn phase. Going from a sleepy potato to a baby. Lots of changes! And with those changes often come changes in parenting. Changes in feeding schedule, wake windows, nap times, preferences, etc. So I personally wouldn't focus too much on the sleep regression and focus more on following her cues and supporting her development.

 

[allfree15]

@nimbus Thank you. She seems to go straight to crying. Sometimes fusses and I wait, but usually ends up crying.

We have tried having my partner rock her when we know she’s not hungry. It has worked maybe twice but usually she just keeps crying until she is fed.

I’ll keep trying the paci. I have a box full of different brands. Maybe I need to try when she’s really sleepy.

 

[hollyroller7]

@allfree15 Honestly I am going through the exact same thing as you. I could have written your exact post. But to me, feeding to sleep isn’t the issue, especially since our babies were successfully sleeping through the night by being fed to sleep up until the sleep regression. I think this is just the pattern of their sleep cycles at this point. Not to say that you can’t change feeding to sleep if you don’t want to- just that I don’t think it’s the root cause of the wake ups