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Life after night weaning?
Mar. 11th, 2021 07:37 amWhat is life after night weaning like? Parents, paint me a picture. Particularly interested if you still all share a family bed, although maybe night weaning will be the thing that enables us to transition E to their own bed.
I really like being able to soothe them instantly. On nights when I'm woken twice or three times and each time I can roll over, nurse and pretty much go straight back to sleep, it works really well. I like the cuddles and closeness and the security of knowing I can get them back to sleep whatever.
Here's what's not working:
- they have sixteen teeth and their latch is often bad, especially at night. No matter how many times I take them off and adjust them I just can't get them to open their mouth wide and tilt their head back enough. I end up with toothmarks, nursing aversion and sore nipples. Plus the irritation keeps me awake.
- sometimes trying to adjust their latch stresses them out and they get into a proper tizzy. Twice we've had night terrors this way.
- the roaming tickly twiddly fingers under my clothes and over my skin. It's irritating and overstimulating and leaves me touched out and unable to stand normal breastfeeding even when the latch is better. Also intensifies nursing aversion. I have to constantly defend myself, which makes them more insistent, and then we're both awake.
- when they have a sniffly nose, which has happened a few times lately, they can't latch on. They want to suck on my nipple (with a very lazy latch), then breathe cold air over my nipple, then latch on even worse and have one more suck. It drives me mad. There's no way I can negotiate a decent latch if they can't breathe through their nose.
- chronic exhaustion and sleep deprivation. I get woken up to feed between 2-10 times per night. Towards the end of the night sometimes the feeds are back to back and I don't get a chance to sleep inbetween. If I need to pee I have to wait until they've finished nursing and gone to sleep. And then sometimes they wake up wailing 1min later cos I'm not there and I have to nurse them back to sleep again. If there's something worrying me or stressing me (which hello, pandemic) sometimes once I'm woken in the night I can't get back to sleep, even if E does, and end up lying awake for hours. When I do get back to sleep after 2-3hours, I'm woken soon after to feed them again.
- When they're wiggly, it disturbs my sleep. Even if they're sleeping.
- breastfeeding aversion. Happens every month when my period is due and other times too, when the above problems are going on. It's an indescribably horrible feeling.
- I'm trying to do consent based parenting, but lying there gritting my teeth and disassociating while my body is retraumatised by unwanted nipple touch is not consent based.
- I want an unbroken night's sleep. I want Leo to do a night shift without me. I want my parents to be able to take E overnight once covid permits so Leo and I can have a night off together.
They're 20 months old. I was vaguely thinking of doing natural term breastfeeding but also interested in honouring my own boundaries.
My fear if we night wean is that it won't actually result in more sleep overall, because we'll no longer have the insta-soothe (well mostly) option and we'll have to get them back to sleep the long way round.
So what's it like? ATM E wakes up next to me and says "booby milk" and sleepy nuzzles into my front and latches in. Sometimes I have to get my boob out, sometimes it was already out from last time. Sometimes I have to shufty them across or down the bed into a better position. Then sometimes they go almost straight back to sleep, sometimes I go almost straight back to sleep, and sometimes I lie peacefully until they're done and then go straight back to sleep and don't really remember it. Other times the above things happen. The whole thing usually happens lying down with my eye mask on and no talking or mental stimulation to wake my brain up and disrupt my getting back to sleep ability.
What's it like without booby milk?
I really like being able to soothe them instantly. On nights when I'm woken twice or three times and each time I can roll over, nurse and pretty much go straight back to sleep, it works really well. I like the cuddles and closeness and the security of knowing I can get them back to sleep whatever.
Here's what's not working:
- they have sixteen teeth and their latch is often bad, especially at night. No matter how many times I take them off and adjust them I just can't get them to open their mouth wide and tilt their head back enough. I end up with toothmarks, nursing aversion and sore nipples. Plus the irritation keeps me awake.
- sometimes trying to adjust their latch stresses them out and they get into a proper tizzy. Twice we've had night terrors this way.
- the roaming tickly twiddly fingers under my clothes and over my skin. It's irritating and overstimulating and leaves me touched out and unable to stand normal breastfeeding even when the latch is better. Also intensifies nursing aversion. I have to constantly defend myself, which makes them more insistent, and then we're both awake.
- when they have a sniffly nose, which has happened a few times lately, they can't latch on. They want to suck on my nipple (with a very lazy latch), then breathe cold air over my nipple, then latch on even worse and have one more suck. It drives me mad. There's no way I can negotiate a decent latch if they can't breathe through their nose.
- chronic exhaustion and sleep deprivation. I get woken up to feed between 2-10 times per night. Towards the end of the night sometimes the feeds are back to back and I don't get a chance to sleep inbetween. If I need to pee I have to wait until they've finished nursing and gone to sleep. And then sometimes they wake up wailing 1min later cos I'm not there and I have to nurse them back to sleep again. If there's something worrying me or stressing me (which hello, pandemic) sometimes once I'm woken in the night I can't get back to sleep, even if E does, and end up lying awake for hours. When I do get back to sleep after 2-3hours, I'm woken soon after to feed them again.
- When they're wiggly, it disturbs my sleep. Even if they're sleeping.
- breastfeeding aversion. Happens every month when my period is due and other times too, when the above problems are going on. It's an indescribably horrible feeling.
- I'm trying to do consent based parenting, but lying there gritting my teeth and disassociating while my body is retraumatised by unwanted nipple touch is not consent based.
- I want an unbroken night's sleep. I want Leo to do a night shift without me. I want my parents to be able to take E overnight once covid permits so Leo and I can have a night off together.
They're 20 months old. I was vaguely thinking of doing natural term breastfeeding but also interested in honouring my own boundaries.
My fear if we night wean is that it won't actually result in more sleep overall, because we'll no longer have the insta-soothe (well mostly) option and we'll have to get them back to sleep the long way round.
So what's it like? ATM E wakes up next to me and says "booby milk" and sleepy nuzzles into my front and latches in. Sometimes I have to get my boob out, sometimes it was already out from last time. Sometimes I have to shufty them across or down the bed into a better position. Then sometimes they go almost straight back to sleep, sometimes I go almost straight back to sleep, and sometimes I lie peacefully until they're done and then go straight back to sleep and don't really remember it. Other times the above things happen. The whole thing usually happens lying down with my eye mask on and no talking or mental stimulation to wake my brain up and disrupt my getting back to sleep ability.
What's it like without booby milk?