Day 3
It went ok. River woke up at 4:40 crying. It took her 15 minutes to go back to sleep- she wasn’t very happy, and then slept for 10 minutes before waking up again and crying. After getting her back to sleep she didn’t wake up for the day until 7:30, which wasn’t bad.
Day 4
I’m hoping last night wasn’t a fluke, because it was amazing. She went to sleep a little later than she usually does 9:40 maybe, but didn’t wake up for the first time until 6:45! The sun was up so I nursed her, then she went back to sleep. I was so worried she’d be up for the day, since that’s how it’s been when she sees that the sun is up and “milk’s awake”. It’s 8:37 now and she’s still sleeping! I really hope this is the new way of things and last night wasn’t an isolated incident. I could get used to this lol!
So last night was day 2 of night weaning. It went pretty well! Again, I prepped River for what to expect with another rundown of “after bedtime milk goes to sleep until the sun comes up”. She woke up at 4:00 for the first time. She cried but seemed to understand that there was no milk (I think she may have halfheartedly signed milk once). It took 20 minutes for her to go back to sleep, but it could have been worse. She got up again at 5:15 (I think by this time she’s getting a little hungry, since she’s used to nursing all night), but I gently said milk was asleep (she didn’t ask, but I wanted her to understand). She messed around a bit but was back asleep in under 10 minutes. She got up for the last time at 7, and I said how the sun was up so milk was awake. I was hoping she’d go back to sleep but no such luck. I’m thinking maybe she’s beginning to associate milk being awake with her being awake? I hope not, especially as summer wears on and the sun comes up earlier.
Overall it’s going surprisingly well! We’ll see how tonight goes.
River is 21.5 months, and has never been a good sleeper. She’s always woken up in the night, but for a while now has been waking up every 2-3 hours to nurse, which is making me crazy.
I decided to do Dr. Jay Gordon’s night weaning technique, starting with step 2, since nursing to sleep wasn’t the problem, but rather just needing to nurse when she woke up in the night.
We started by yesterday evening talking about how she could have milk at bedtime, but after bedtime the milk was going to sleep until the sun came out. She seemed to understand, and we talked about it several more times before bed.
The first time she woke in the night was around 1:00. She cried for about 5 minutes when she couldn't have milk while I sang and patted her back. I told her that milk was asleep and she could have some when the sun came out. She eventually seemed resigned to it and laid down to sleep. The second time around 4:00 she cried for a little bit but then laid down after a while. She was up a lot between 4 and 6, crying a bit where I’d go in, or just laying in bed awake. At 5:45 she woke up again and I could see her sitting up in bed and signing “milk!” on the video monitor. I went in and again said how milk was asleep until the sun came out. I tried to give her some water but she wasn’t interested. Eventually she laid down and went to sleep.
She woke up again for the final time at 7:45, and I went in and said, "Look! The sun is up! milk is awake!", she nursed and was happy to go about her day. I was exhausted, but glad that it seemed the first night of night weaning went quite a bit better than I had anticipated.
Hopefully tonight will go well!
River turned 18 months today, which marks 18 months of breastfeeding for us. We had an easy time of it once we got past the first 6 weeks/3months. I had flat nipples and I was worried when I was pregnant if I would even be able to breastfeed, but it turned out to be a non issue thankfully. I'm so grateful for this community, especially since I didn't really have any support IRL for breastfeeding.
Our initial goal was to get to two years, and now we're almost there. Breastfeeding is such an awesome thing- especially now when my girl is on the go all day, it's a great time for her to chill and reconnect. I know it doesn't ensure that babies won't get colds/etc., but River has only had one small illness in all of her 18 months, which I absolutely attribute to breastfeeding antibodies.
I haven't night weaned, and at this point I don't know if I will (though time will tell). She still breastfeeds throughout the day every few hours, but it's quick, and honestly I like those little breaks to be able to sit down for a minute and read my Kindle (by the way, a Kindle is awesome while breastfeeding, since it can be easily operated one handed- it's when I get most of my reading done lol).
It's funny how when I first posted my three month ribbon and I would see people posting ribbons for 18 months and beyond, and it seemed so amazingly far away and nearly unattainable, but here we are, and the time has really flown by.
Now for some pics! All safe for work:
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x posted to
breastfeeding2.
Weight/length/clothing: We have a doctor’s appointment on Tuesday, but
right now I’m not sure on her numbers. She’s wearing 12 month pants
mostly because she has a little waist (although she kind of looks like
she’s wearing flood pants since she’s tall lol). 18 month shirts and 24
month footie pajamas. She also just got new shoes and is now wearing a
5 in shoes.
3. Food: She does well with eating for the most
part. We’re working on getting her to use a spoon- she can’t pick up
food with it but she’ll get it to her mouth. It’s cute because she’ll
put a couple beans (or whatever) on her spoon with her fingers then use
the spoon to eat it. She was off broccoli and a lot of veggies for a
while, but now likes eating them with a little dip (hummus or guacamole
or salad dressing) on them.
4. Sleep habits: Ugh, awful. The
past couple months have been really bad for sleep. It’s gotten better
the past week but still isn’t great. She wakes up every 2-3 hours and
sometimes has a hard time getting back to sleep. I think she’s having
nightmares maybe, because I’ve watched her and she’ll get back to sleep
and will be asleep, but then will start crying (while still asleep) and
wake herself up.
5. Likes and dislikes: “Running” everywhere,
going down slides by herself (it’s really cute- she pushes herself off
to go down, maybe other babies do this too, I don’t know, but it’s
adorable), “drawing” on her magnadoodle (a great investment by the way),
flipping the pages of books, ducks- she’s crazy for ducks, airplaines.
6.
Milestones: She’s great with gross motor skills- walking backwards and
forwards, she even walks around on her tip toes because she’s crazy.
Fine motor skills are good. She has really good receptive language
skills- she knows lots of words and animals and will bring them to me
when I ask (we have wooden animal magnets that she plays with all the
time), though her expressive language skills are not great. She only
really says mama, dada (gaga) and duck (guck). She tries to say
“Roomba” as well. She uses sign language, but I can’t get her to talk.
I’m not very worried about it, but we’ll see what her pediatrician says
on Tuesday.
7. What's driving you crazy, if anything: Just the
whole sleep thing. Some days there’s a lot of pointing and whining, but
it doesn’t really bother me- it kind of makes my husband crazy though.
8.
What's making you smile: She’s just so hilarious. Sometimes she’ll
have imaginary food that she’ll give us to eat, and she’ll come up and
hug and kiss us (which are newer, awesome developments).
9. How are you doing in general: Good. Tired, but good lol.
10. Are your health concerns going well: I think so.
11.
Anything else not covered in the above: I recently joined a mom’s group
off meetup.com. I haven’t done much with them yet, but I have several
dates coming up in the next few weeks. I’m hoping it’ll help me to get
other moms since I kind of feel like we’ve been hermits since River was
born. We’ll see how it goes since River is still too small to do a lot
and I have to be with her all the time at a playground or whatever.
It’ll be nice next summer when she can do more without help and will be
big enough to do more.
attachedparents I'm so happy that we did sign language with River.
We started primarily doing the sign “milk” when she was 6 months or so. It took a while to get in the habit of doing it every time. River started signing milk when she was 10 months I think. It was fantastic!
We taught “eat” when she was getting into eating more around 8 months. We started “diaper” around then too. She didn’t sign back until almost a year maybe (other than milk). At a year (or maybe earlier) we added more signs once she was getting the others. She picked up on “more” really quickly.
Now she’s 14 months and has been signing several signs for a while. She knows: milk, more, eat, diaper, finished, ball, shoes, dog, cat, and she has her own “signs” for mama, elephant, and bunny.
The newest ones she’s learned are dog and cat, which she signs all the time- if she hears a dog outside, or we take a walk and she sees one, or if she sees a dog or cat in a book or on tv, it’s really adorable.
Here’s a video I took the other day of River signing dog and cat.
It’s wonderful being able to communicate with her. I’m so happy we did sign language with her.
There was one terrible thing there- there was a little girl around 5 maybe, and she seemed to attach herself to me. She'd do different jumps on to the mat and kept saying, "Watch me do this one!" or whatever. It was so sad because her mom just stood in the corner not engaging her, and it seemed she was so desperate for someone to be interested in her and tell her good job. It was really sad.
Today when we were there, River needed a diaper as soon as we got there- even though I changed it right before we left. There was a fold out changing table in the bathroom we used, although we'd never used one like it before- River was terrified of it and totally freaked out. It was really strange. As soon as I picked her up though when I was finished she was fine. Poor crazy baby!
She also seemed to make a friend, a girl named Harley (which is funny since Andy is on a war against motorcycles that tear up and down our street). Overall I think it will be a good thing for her, and good for her to be around other babies.
She also has started signing "eat". It's really been an amazing week of development! :)
We've been doing parent and tot swimming lessons which she loves. We just ordered a water table so she can splash around on our balcony- I wish we had a yard so badly...
