# When did your dc NOT nurse every 2-3 hours at night



## rixafreeze (Apr 30, 2006)

My daughter is almost 1 and still wakes up every 2-3 hours at night. Nothing will calm her down or put her back to sleep except nursing. (If we try to rock/cuddle/bounce her, she just gets mad and wakes all the way up). She started getting solids at 10 months old, but still mostly is breastfed. She sleeps with us in our king-size bed or in her crib (next to our bed). I haven't noticed any difference in her frequency of waking when she's in the crib or in bed with us. She's EC'd and is usually dry in the morning, but occasionally I'll need to potty her or change her diaper around 4 am or so.

Some days I feel like I can't function because I'm so tired from waking up so many times. I'm not willing to do CIO (which is what so many people I know tell me to do--no thanks!). I'm reluctant to move her to another room, although I might try that if I feel desperate enough.

So...when did your children start sleeping for longer periods of time? Did it correlate at all with how much solids they were eating? Any other advice/encouragement/words of wisdom for this tired mama?


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## ColoradoKat (Feb 23, 2006)

:

My 1 year old still nurses all night too, :yawning: I am so sleepy, I would do anything to get 5+ hours of sleep at a time.

I feel ya sister! Can't wait to hear what people say!


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## netgyks (Aug 5, 2007)

Oh my one year huh? Wow, I'd better prepare myself for this. It's been 4 months and the overnight feedings really get me!

And my







: family doctor







: said ohhh well by 4 months we expect babies to be sleeping through the night. Yeah and you also tried to chart my baby's growth with the wrong chart so see how much I listen to you.....


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## applecider (Jul 16, 2005)

My son is 28 months and he probably quit doing that about 3-4 months ago. But I wasn't actively making it stop either. Recently I got to the point where it was driving me nuts. So I cut out the night nursing all together and he seems to be ok with it as long as he gets to lay on top of me instead.


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## rzberrymom (Feb 10, 2005)

My DD started sleeping 5-6 hour stretches almost immediately after her first molars and the incisors came in. I had no idea how painful teething really is until those teeth coming in solved most of our sleeping problems.

It's weird, but for us it was almost exactly like she describes in this article.


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## jrose_lee (Oct 2, 2005)

Ds is 21 months and still wakes every 30-90 min all through the night. Yes, I'm very tired. I tried nightweaning, but he still did it. Now, we're back to nursing because he was inconsolable while cutting some teeth. It's been particularly rough here lately.

I can't wait for all the teeth to be in. I'm hoping....hoping.....

right now I can't imagine having another one. Our kids may be 5 years apart! I just can't imagine doing it all again without at least a year of actual sleep in between!


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## Sharlla (Jul 14, 2005)

WHen I weaned him at 24 months.


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## LowFlyingAnimals (Nov 30, 2003)

With dd, around 10 months old. She reverse-cycled for a while, too, because I worked, but she wanted sleep more than food by 10 months.

With ds, around 2 1/2. It was exhausting.

It's very different for every baby, I guess.


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## MilkTrance (Jul 21, 2007)

My CIO friend's babe still woke up at 18 months and she nursed him, so even CIO babies don't STTN sometimes. Just so you know.


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## lakesuperiormom (Apr 11, 2007)

my kids all nursed at night until they weaned at roughly 1 1/2. i slept topless and that helped so they could just latch on.sometimes i would wear an unbuttoned flannel pj top if i was cold. not much help is it


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## lakesuperiormom (Apr 11, 2007)

my kids all nursed at night until they weaned at roughly 1 1/2. i slept topless and that helped so they could just latch on.sometimes i would wear an unbuttoned flannel pj top if i was cold. not much help is it sorry


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## sunnygir1 (Oct 8, 2007)

My dd is 8 months and has already been through a phase where she would sleep 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or even 10 hours straight. That isn't happening now, and I am lucky to get 3-4 hours in a row, but I suspect it will happen again sometime. I think they just go through cycles of development and teething that wake them at night. Too bad dads don't lactate too!!!


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## merliss (Jan 9, 2007)

I've been feeling the same with my 6.5 monther. The only thing that is helping me is getting to nap for 2-3 hours with her during the day. I'm not getting much done but I'm a much nicer person for it.


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## Daffodil (Aug 30, 2003)

At 1 1/2, my DD still rarely slept longer than 2 hours at a stretch. She gradually started sleeping a bit longer over the next few months, and then when she nightweaned just before she was 2, she started sleeping even longer stretches. On her 5th night with no nursing, she slept through the night for the first time ever. By the time she was 2 1/2, she often (but not always) slept through the night, and if she did wake, it was usually just once.

DS still commonly woke every 2-3 hours when he was 1, but by the time he was 1 1/2, it was probably more common for him to sleep at least 3 hours at a stretch. He's almost 2 now, and typically wakes up a couple of times during the night. He's not nightweaned yet, but I'm working toward that now.


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## milansmommy (Sep 13, 2007)

My 14 month old ds still does this. I sleep topless so not much effort has to go into nursing him and I feel pretty well rested. He was waking up every 30 to 60 minutes all last week because of a molar coming in and that was tough so right now 2-3 hours feels really nice.


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## SquibsNCrackers (Oct 21, 2005)

DD1 - 2-1/2 years
DD2 - 2 years
DS - 2 years


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## rachellanigh (Aug 26, 2006)

I like this article as well. It is true that when you just give into it and not resent it, it does get better. I even dreamed of giving him a bottle of formula at bedtime to see if that would help him sleep better.







:

I would never do that though!























Quote:


Originally Posted by *rzberrymom* 
My DD started sleeping 5-6 hour stretches almost immediately after her first molars and the incisors came in. I had no idea how painful teething really is until those teeth coming in solved most of our sleeping problems.

It's weird, but for us it was almost exactly like she describes in this article.


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## Nora'sMama (Apr 8, 2005)

In my experience and that of my friends, from 9 months to 18 months is a difficult sleep time. I nearly went crazy from sleep deprivation when my daughter was that age. Every 2-3 hours is actually much better than what we were dealing with. But I know that that is difficult enough.

Honestly, you want to know what started us down the road to better sleep? Nightweaning. And, putting her in a separate sleep space. I never slept very well while we were co-sleeping and it seems my dd did not, either.

At 13 months we got a crib and started putting her in it for the first sleep of the night. It didn't help that much but it did get her used to the crib, since she had been in our bed since day 1 (oh and sometimes in a bassinet as a newborn).

But, her sleep pattern was still: sleep from 45 minutes to 2 hours, wake up, demand to nurse, rinse repeat all night. In the mornings it was like every 15 minutes.

I couldn't bear to nightwean her until 19 months because I felt she wasn't ready and that she wouldn't understand. I should have tried earlier. A friend of mine who is *very* AP had great success with her dd at 13 months, using Jay Gordon's method (www.drjaygordon.com). Whereas I suffered another 6 months. Finally I had to do something. I didn't really use Dr. Jay's method, I just explained to my dd that from now on nummies were going to go night-night and we wouldn't nurse until morning, and that daddy would go to her in the night if she woke.

It was way easier than I thought it might be. If it had been really hard on her I would have stopped. She cried a bit when she woke the first few nights when daddy came instead of mama but not the hysterical crying I had envisioned. On the 5th night or so there *was* some hysterical crying but I think that is because we were out of town. That was the only bad night! (I did go to comfort her that night, even if she was w/ daddy I couldn't take it to hear her upset.) After that it was smooth sailing. She adjusted to the new routine easily.

DH did all the night-time parenting for a while and then when she woke up at or near 6 AM I would nurse her and she'd sleep the last stretch of the night with us. This is still the basic pattern nearly a year later.

It greatly increased the length of time she would sleep on average before waking, right off the bat. That did not mean she slept through, but it radically reduced nighttime waking and I started to feel like a human being again.

Now she sleeps through 2 out of 3 nights. And while DH still instinctively gets up to go to her if she calls out, I sometimes do too...she will let me put her back to sleep without nursing. I do nurse at night if she is sick.

Anyway, follow your instincts. When things get pretty unbearable, you should not feel badly about making changes. That does not have to mean CIO or anything close to it, happily!

I share my story just to show you that it does work out in time. By the way, I do not *know* that I would have had success nightweaning at 1 year instead of 1.5 years, but many people I know have done it easily and gently and their kids slept much better after that. So, IMO it is worth a try and as I said, I should have at least tried it earlier.

Good luck.

Oh, and my dd still nurses avidly at 2 1/2, so nightweaning totally did not speed weaning along. That is a concern for some people but in our case it was quite unwarranted.







If you are concerned about that and you decide to nightwean you can offer more during the day and she will probably make up what she isn't getting at night.


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## burke-a-bee (Jan 8, 2005)

When I weaned at 18 months, 12 months and 2 + years.


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## hipmummy (May 25, 2007)

Ds is 13 months and we are up every 2-3 hours. He is lucky I ma his mother because everyone (except for the awesome mamas here







) said they think I ma crazy and that he needs to sleep. He rarely eats solids anymore, when he wad i got him to do four hours.


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## hipmummy (May 25, 2007)

cont.from post twenty. :LOl ds woke again he only made it an hour that time. Yeah it' killing me. I think it why I wait so long to go to bed. At least by one he only nurses 2-3 more times. If we start at eight I would be up 6 times of not more.


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## thixle (Sep 26, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *rzberrymom* 
It's weird, but for us it was almost exactly like she describes in this article.

Really good article, especially the very end- "Carry on." Cause, well, that's all you can do







DD (26 mos) was up all night. She's either getting MORE teeth, doesn't like the new blanket on the bed, or is getting sick. Haven't figured out which, but she was up 8 times last night, in a 10 hour period... "mommy, I want booby..."

Mommy sooooooo sleepy.







:yawning:

Thought I would get a bit of advice on this thread, and I did-- A big reminder that kiddos don't always sleep through the night, and that's only considered 5 hours anyway









eta: she has usually slept at least a 5 hour chunk since the day she was born... unless she was sick or had figured out some new skill. It had nothing to do with solid food , though sometimes she does get really thirsty or hungry in the middle of the night and only cow milk or a snack will get her back to bed and sleeping... so... who says you can't give a baby a snack at 3:00am? It doesn't have to be liquid.


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## Evansmama (May 13, 2007)

Great...this does not give me hope! I had a friend talking about sleeping in the other day. I started crying, seriously, I got emotional when she was talking about sleep. Now she thinks I'm nuts!


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## Evansmama (May 13, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *rzberrymom* 
My DD started sleeping 5-6 hour stretches almost immediately after her first molars and the incisors came in. I had no idea how painful teething really is until those teeth coming in solved most of our sleeping problems.

It's weird, but for us it was almost exactly like she describes in this article.

Awesome! Thanks for the link!


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## artemis80 (Sep 8, 2006)

Around 14-15 months he started sleeping 6-7 hour stretches. Of course, he's only 16 months now....but I am keeping my fingers crossed! We did nightwean, though.


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## savienu (May 26, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *netgyks* 
Oh my one year huh? Wow, I'd better prepare myself for this. It's been 4 months and the overnight feedings really get me!

And my







: family doctor







: said ohhh well by 4 months we expect babies to be sleeping through the night. Yeah and you also tried to chart my baby's growth with the wrong chart so see how much I listen to you.....

Oh, yeah, I got this too. A nice little lecture from the doctor about how my 4 month old was manipulating me because he still nursed through the night. Lovely, isn't it?







: He must just be a demon now, since he's still nursing through the night at 8 months.


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## wildflower_mama (Feb 22, 2007)

Can't tell you. My 2nd is 18 mos and nurses through the night every 2 hours or so. My first is adopted and we didn't get the chance to breastfeed, which I think makes a difference in sleep schedules.


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## Tofu the Geek (Dec 2, 2003)

2-3 hours? That sounds like heaven! My 14 month old is waking every hour to hour and a half! But, she's got some heavy duty teeth coming in right now and is barely nursing at all during the day (mostly just evening and night). Many months ago she used to sleep 5 hours! Looking forward to when she can go longer again...I know it happens eventually since I recall with my first DD, at 3 years old she would nurse once before bed and that was it.


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## sfashho2 (Oct 16, 2005)

DS#1 night weaned around 15 months...DS#2 is still nursing every 3 hours or so at 16 months.

I just sleep through it though, and it doesn't bother me much!


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## prettymom (Feb 23, 2007)

At 12 months she is night nursing more than ever.


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## Kay11 (Aug 30, 2006)

DD is 25 months and wakes every 45 min - hour to nurse through the night. She's always been like this, though occasionally I'll be really lucky and get a 2 hour stretch. I have to say that, weird as it might make me sound, or smug, or saintly (I'm not being any of those things), I'm *not* feeling tired all the time. Tbh I think some of it has to do with expectations. I learned from ds that the more het up I got about night wakings, the more tired I felt. He also taught me that it's pretty unreasonable to expect a baby to sleep through, or for long stretches when they're nursing and need to nurse at night. So when DD arrived I *expected* to have lots of broken sleep for a long time.

I know a lot of people will say how awful sleep deprivation is, but I really wouldn't class this as sleep deprivation. Unless you're having to get up to nurse, nursing will help you to fall back to sleep quicker anyway. I'm seldom awake longer than it takes to make sure dd is latched on properly because she can get really sloppy and lazy.

The other thing I have to say is that this is a very short period in your life and your baby's life. It may not feel it right now, but it helps to look at the bigger picture sometimes.


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## thixle (Sep 26, 2007)

Evansmama said:


> Great...this does not give me hope! I had a friend talking about sleeping in the other day. I started crying, seriously, I got emotional when she was talking about sleep. Now she thinks I'm nuts![/QUO]
> 
> I'm right there with you. I get soooo angry at my best friend when she talks about napping and sleeping late. I cried the other day, too... and yeah, she'll understand when she has kids


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## laohaire (Nov 2, 2005)

26 months, and she usually wakes every 2 hours, but sometimes she goes through periods of waking more often.

During the waking-every-2-hours phases, I long for more sleep, but I can function.

But more than 2 nights in a row of the waking-every-hour or waking-every-30-minutes phases, I completely lose it. During the day I have no patience, and dealing with normal 2-year-old stuff just makes me want to yell and/or cry.

DD started eating significantly better when she was about 23-24 months and got her molars in. And yet I never noticed a difference in her nursing at night.

I don't even understand how SHE can function like this. She's got to be awake just like me, right? How can she get REM sleep like that?

We've got to be doing something different than our ancient ancestors, right? I agree cosleeping and nursing is the natural and best way to go, but surely our ancestors didn't suffer like this, did they? If they did, there has to be a purpose, right? When I get sleep in 2 hour chunks, I feel like nighttime parenting is just part of the package. But when I get less sleep, I feel cheated - but then when I think of the alternative (CIO or whatever) I feel like I have no choice.

CIO has always felt wrong, and not an option to me. So if I complained to a mainstream friend about my sleep, she would think "God, what a martyr, thank goodness I was smart and just did CIO. Why doesn't she stop complaining and just CIO already?" But my thoughts are more "We must ALL have this wrong... surely there must be some better way - and for now, I'll take the suffering rather than selfishly placing that suffering onto my child."


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## Mama Esq. (Feb 8, 2005)

For my almost 1 year old DS, we recently "loosely" followed Dr. Gordon's "Changing the Sleep Pattern in the Family Bed" routine, which is specifically designed for breastfeeding/cosleeping babies. Although he does not recommend this or any "sleep training" method for babies under 1 years old, we started at 11 months because we were desperate. DS was waking every 45 minutes and demanding to nurse. Also, his naps were down to 1/2 hour total per day. Awful. Within a couple of days of following the program, his sleeping improved immensely. It is not perfect (still wakes up at least twice), but I was not looking for perfection -- just something a bit better. Yes, he cried a bit, but he was between my husband and I on our king size bed and we rubbed his back and cuddled him. He was not happy, but certainly not scared or lonely. We did not night wean my older son until he was 2 1/2 -- I think I waited too long. Good luck to all.


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## Cujobunny (Aug 16, 2006)

I think all kids are different. my ds woke 3 times a night until we nightweaned at 20 mo. my dd has only woken once per night since she was born.


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## Muminmamman (Jul 28, 2007)

Ds stopped around four months. He decided every hour was more his speed.
























Seriously, though, when he does sleep for three or four hours (about once every two weeks), I feel as though I could life a house when I wake up in the morning!


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## coobabysmom (Nov 16, 2005)

Ds stopped waking every 1hr -3hr at 18 mos. when I nightweaned him. (He's still nurses during the day.)

He still wakes up 1x night but he's easily settled with a cuddle (we're co-sleeping).


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## MCatLvrMom2A&X (Nov 18, 2004)

Both mine did that till they were 2yo







: I was so exhaused by then I had to night wean them.


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## bunny's mama (Nov 19, 2001)

neither of my kids slept more than a 3 hour stretch at night (and 3 hours was heaven, with dd is was mostly every hour) until we nightweaned them using the jay gordon method that a PP linked to.

sleep is a health and sanity issue for me, i just wasn't functioning well at all on what i was gettng (afraid i'd get in a car accident just about every day) and i couldn't just sleep thru the nursing. so for us, nightweaning was the only way to go. we did it at 1 year with both kids, and both went on to day-nurse another year (until age 2).

directly after nightweaning with both of my kids, they slept a 7 hour stretch (11 pm to 6 am) and at 7 years and 4.5 years now, me and dh are always so happy about what great sleepers they turned out to be (we no longer co-sleep).


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## rabbitmum (Jan 25, 2007)

My 21 month old started skipping one of his night feeds around 18 months, which means he sleeps a 5 - 6 hour stretch. It's rather nice!









I haven't tried to nightwean, and I haven't done anything to make him nurse less often. And it didn't have anything to do with how much solids he has eaten, since he has eaten quite a good amount for about a year.


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## *Erin* (Mar 18, 2002)

my dd was about 2.5 when she really consistantly slept without nursing for 5+ hrs in a row. i was so. tired. i was about ready to night wean, but she finally just did it on her own. i won't be doing that with my next dc-i was absolutely ragged from the lack of uninterrupted sleep!


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## BoringTales (Aug 1, 2006)

Mine nursed several times a night until they weaned....


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## Muminmamman (Jul 28, 2007)

I also wanted to mention that I have friends who DON'T cosleep or do extended bf and their kids still woke up many times a night. They would crawl out of bed and come looking for their mommas to come tuck them back in (say to about the age of 3).


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## newbymom05 (Aug 13, 2005)

Our ds woke up every 2 hrs (or less) until about 14 months, at which point DH and I seriously thought we were having nervous breakdowns and so started trying to night wean using the Jay Gordon method. It took 4 months and then at 18 months he started sleeping 4-5 hrs at a stretch. He just started sleeping 7 hrs at 26-27 months. Honestly, I don't know what we could have done differently to speed the process. I read all the books and we were truly desperate, but he just wasn't ready until then. Sometimes I think waking every 2 hrs is the dirty secret they don't tell you about breastfeeding.


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## nylecoj (Apr 24, 2007)

Dd still wakes up anywhere from 4-8 times per night. Although the other night she woke up every hour until we went to bed and then slept for nearly 6 hours straight!! This was maybe the third time ever she's done that. Awesome.

Last night she was up every 1.5-2 hours and up wanting to play/cry between 1:30 and 2:30. I think she's teething again so tonight should be lovely too.









I just try to look at her sweet sleeping face and capture it so that when she's 14 and wanting to leave me to explore her independence I'll have all the good snuggles to get me through.


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## eclipse (Mar 13, 2003)

My two year old is still waking every couple of hours to nurse.


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## Peony (Nov 27, 2003)

DD1 was 3 years old, she went from waking up at least every 2 hours a night to sleeping through the night. DD2 is only one so I'm figuring she still has years left. After alsmot 5 years of this, it doesn't bother me anymore, this is what parenting is, and I've learned to survive on very little sleep.


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## maiat (Dec 15, 2006)

DD is 6 mo. I know lots of people with infants and it seems that those who bottle feed and crib sleep have been sleeping through the night for months now. All the co-sleeping, breastfeeding babes (like mine) are still waking up frequently.
Sometimes this is a depressing observation and at other times I feel really good about the closeness we have at night. And I really believe in nighttime parenting. I check her for temperature and safety everytime she wakes me up. I'm also glad that she feels the big mama body next to her and knows she's not alone.


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