Want to wean - dd not interested

Sharon8310

Tue, Sep 04 2007, 5:27 am

When do you let her nurse. How many times a day does she nurse? With my son I did not let him nurse out of the house and then I kept him very active and out of the house most of the day this cut it down to morning and night. I moved him out of my bed and the night nursing stopped. Than I gave him milk in a sippy cup in the morning eventully he stopped nursing.

Gsanmb

Sun, Sep 23 2007, 7:53 pm

I wouldn't necessarily recommend leaving the country for 2 days. Little kids have no sense of time and can really be quite devastated by such a thing, especially if she is used to nursing at her "comfort" moments (I.e. sleep related). Some kids can handle this, others really, really can't and the consequences can be really emotionally difficult.

With the morning nursing, I might suggest just getting up (as difficult as it seems!) and offering a bowl of cereal, cup of juice/milk, whatever. This is the only thing that really worked for us. With nap time, I did a lot of stroller walking! And sometimes also car rides, until napping was no longer associated with nursing. After a couple weeks we went back to sleeping in the crib/bed at naptime (this worked with all my kids).

Bedtime is harder. Perhaps gradually reducing the amt. of time, or forming a "new" association -- start nursing downstairs on the couch rather than in the rocking chair/bed, then stop, go upstairs/into the bedroom, read stories, tuck in, pat pat pat back, etc. It's likely not a good time to "leave to cry" because the combo of weaning and leaving to settle alone could be just too much for the baby. It will probably take several days to get a new pattern going. You could try a substitution if you want (warm milk in a sippy, then brush teeth, then stories, then bed or whatever). IME the bedtime one takes the longest but does eventually stop because it becomes less convenient and they want to move on to the "real" bedtime routine (which is in the place they go to sleep).

Some toddlers, not all, also respond to a "big girl/boy" substitution -- I.e. when they don't nurse at night anymore, they get a new fave stuffed animal or a trip to build-a-bear or something similar. She may be too young for that yet but you get the idea. Depends on the maturity of the toddler though.

Good luck mama!