Whining about Sleep and Night Weaning
Poker has a post up bemoaning the fact that his daughter still doesn’t sleep through the night. God, how I sympathize.
J not only doesn’t sleep through the night, he isn’t night weaned. That’s right, he’s almost two and he still gets up and demands to nurse at night. Oh, you are thinking, smugly to yourself (and don’t you deny it) just wean him and everything will be better. HAH. He screamed for TWO HOURS last night. That’s right. No, he wasn’t alone, crying in his crib, sadly waiting for his cruel mother to come to him. Oh no. His father was with him patting and soothing and loving and it didn’t matter because that kid wanted to nurse and he was going to scream until he got to nurse and nothing was going to stop him.
I mean, you do kind of have to admire his persistence. It would be an admirable trait if it weren’t so directly connected to everyone else’s lack of sufficient sleep.
It took ten minutes when I finally just gave him the boob. And ten more minutes for his sister who had been woken up by his endless shrieking - go figure - and figured if she had to be awake she wanted tissy too.
“I want tissy too.”
In our house the sentence “I want _____ too” comes out of her mouth a lot. Fill whatever J has in the blank.
“I want to get up and get attention showered on me as I keep everyone awake and ensure that no one will have energy the next day too.”
This wasn’t, I confess, typical. In a typical night he gets up three times, nurses, and goes back to sleep.
“I want sleep too.”
Stumble it!
Donate to the Zoë and Lennox Simpson Memorial Fund
and the 529 college savings accounts get a kickback.
June 19th, 2008 21:32
Thanks Susie. Thanks for the sympathy. And believe me, you have mine as well. Speaking of weaning in a different manner, to top it off, we’ve (Kate) has decided that now is a perfect time to get Jayden off the pacifer. It is time, I agree, but man last night was rough.
If heroin is worse I don’t know how anyone kicks it.
June 19th, 2008 21:34
OMG why do I keep calling you Susie???
Maybe because I’m sleep deprived. If there’s any demonstration that I’m not faking it, well, there you go.
June 20th, 2008 09:56
Oh, my. I have a feeling this will be my little one as well. I fear nightweaning and the screams, but would love a good nights sleep. It is amazing how persistent these children are…I wonder where they get it from
June 20th, 2008 13:40
No smugness here. I’ve got my fingers in my ears going lalalalala because I’m terrified of nightweaning. Yes, I’d love a whole night’s sleep, to sleep without someone’s face in my armpit. I’m dreading the crying and carrying on. My sympathies!
June 20th, 2008 13:52
Sanna would still be night nursing if I hadn’t had pneumonia and required (a) sleep and (b) the calories in my own body. She was just 24 months old when that happened. Four months later, she still wakes up in the night asking to nurse, and I roll over and say, “No nursing. It’s night. Cuddle instead?” Sometimes she takes to it reasonably. Sometimes, she does not.
I’m sympathetic. If you want to talk through night weaning and what we did, let me know.
June 20th, 2008 16:14
ugh. i know how you feel. the only time they are really into nursing is at night. so tired.
June 20th, 2008 23:17
So sorry. I did night wean mine and it was not easy with my daughter. We had a very gradual program and I now still nurse her around 5:00 or 6:00 AM when she asks but I am really happy to have my sleep back. And we did finally get to the point where she’ll go back to sleep with a pat and some empty reassurances, thank goodness. I hope you get there soon, too!
June 21st, 2008 07:27
You have my empathy and count me in the ‘I want sleep too club’.
My boys are 2 in ten days and they still night nurse 2-3 times. They also then continue to want to suck me dry - if I refuse they scream like banshees.I understand why you would give in.
Generally feeding them back to sleep is okay if it just one at a time but both stretch and pull me -ouch.
I love the bit above about face in my armpit … feet in the soft,bits.
June 24th, 2008 14:21
I have only one and she is nearly four. At some point in the last however many months, she stopped nursing in the middle of the night in favour of cuddling. Unless she needs the comfort that ‘milkies’ bring. She rarely wakes anymore and I am able to sleep with her and so it doesn’t pose that much of a problem. When she was 2, she still woke about 3 or 4 am regularly and nursed. I work full time and figured it wouldn’t be forever that she needed to nurse and, well, now it is rare. Good luck with whatever works best for your family in terms of night weaning.