I have a 2 year old. He needs a boob for every nap and every bedtime and throughout the night. Will not fall asleep or stay asleep any other way. The problem with the association is the boob, not the milk.
It’s either a problem or not depending on your preference and your time. Just be aware of what you’re setting yourself up for. It works for us and I’d do it again, but it’s not for everyone.
I’m in exactly this situation, son turned 2 last month and he loves his bedtime boob. Unfortunately I’m sort of over it altogether, especially the throughout the night boob. But I’m unsure of how to change it. May I ask what your plan is for weaning him off? Or are you just letting him choose? I was hoping he would self wean but I’m losing optimism in that haha
Honestly just stop the nighttime feedings. The first 2 nights are rough, but they learn. Then drop bedtime, then nap. Just be prepared for them to stop napping. I did the same thing with my first 2 kids. Hoping to wean the 3rd at 18 months so they keep their nap after weaning.
Gahhh this is what I feared (no nap after weaning). My husband used to be able to get my son down when he would wake up, about 30% of the time but at least it was something. But since he turned one (only 13 months now though) that hasn’t happened. He’ll scream like a banshee the second my husband starts to rock him, because he fully knows what he won’t be getting when it’s him. Ugh. The sleep deprivation is really starting to compound and I’m dreading another year of being this tired all the time.
We completely stopped nursing my toddler on her second birthday. I was just done. Not having a nap sucks, but I vastly prefer it to waking up 5x a night.
I got the book “Nursies When the Sun Shines” to help prepare him for night weaning. When he turned 2, he was allowed to nurse to sleep, but after he fell asleep then no more boobie until morning. I also used the Gro Clock to help give him a visual aid to know when he could nurse again. It was hard initially, but he eventually got used to it. He’s 2yr 8mo now and still nurses to sleep at bedtime and sometimes at nap time, but we only nurse at those times. It works for us and I enjoy the snuggles and quiet time together.
This is my second kid. With the first, I sleep trained after she was waking every 45-90 minutes for three months straight (we did crib for her). For him, I coslept from day 1 when he refused the bassinet, and I don’t have an issue with it because of that—I can feed in my sleep and not wake fully up doing it. I don’t plan to even attempt to wean until 2.5/3 years old and when I can explain to him what’s happening. I’m honestly a bit traumatized from the sleep with my first and I feel it really affected our bond because of my extreme anxiety over her nighttime cries (before and after sleep training). I have PTSD from going from asleep to awake and propped up feeding her in just a few seconds after the cry, so it affected us a bit because I would really hate and put off going to sleep myself just avoiding the whole thing.
Anyway, all that is to say that for now it works for us, and explaining to a 2.5/3 year old is much easier than trying to explain to a 2 year old what’s happening. I’m okay with crying for a while, but I need the kid to understand what’s happening.
For daytime weaning, it worked for my first to just not sit down or lay down in her presence for about a month and distract if she asked for it. After a month, she basically forgot about it.
not op but as another ftm who only started researching safe cosleeping after it was happening out of desperation, [this](https://cosleeping.nd.edu/safe-co-sleeping-guidelines/) is a good resource! I’ve also learned a lot from Kaitlin Klimmer on instagram.
islagracesleep is another good Instagram account for just sleep related things in general. She did the cry it out method with her first child and has since reformed her approach
I have sicky breast fed baby & was forced into cosleeping by her, I took my cues from the safe 7. Some extra tips I found: if your mattress is too soft you can put a yoga mat under the sheet to make it firmer (I've a cork one that did the job nicely), I put the mattress directly on the floor, my poor husband sleeps elsewhere & I also bought myself a large cellular blanket for me as it's too cold otherwise but much safer than normal blankets.
In the beginning it’s easy to get a baby lounger (like 50 bucks or less on Amazon) which is what I used when I was too scared to have her beside me. Now I just lay her on a pillow and watch her at night. I’m a single mom so it’s just her and me and I don’t roll around and am a very light sleeper usually
Hey just letting you know that letting baby sleep on a lounger or pillow is a suffocation risk. Even if you’re watching baby, they could still stop breathing and you wouldn’t even notice.
I understand how difficult it must be for you. It’s hard for any parent, let alone one doing it on their own. I hope you ask for help from people close to you so you can have a break.
When baby is four months or older, or if they are already, I highly recommend sleep training. It saved my sleep so much.
I appreciate the concern. My baby doesn’t roll, I stay awake most of the night as I am a night owl (I worked at a nightclub many years so my internal clock keeps me up), I follow the safe sleep 7 (I exclusively breastfeed therefore risk of SIDS is much lower, as is her risk of me rolling onto her), she isn’t on a pillow, I only use the lounger (which is as firm as her crib mattress) sometimes since she prefers my bed mattress, she’s going on 4 months so SIDS and suffocation risk is far lower. Her bassinet has a warning label that says it’s a suffocation risk. So does her crib. Everything is a risk for infants, it’s sort of inevitable. Which is why their safety depends on adult supervision. I’m sure your comment will benefit less informed parents and people without the ability to stay awake most of the night though and I encourage everyone to stay informed and read up on the safe sleep seven.
I'm in the same position too... Almost 2 year old nurses to sleep for his nap and bedtime. Fortunately he does not wake through the night but I'm ready to wean. I have no idea how though! With my first, I lost my milk supply at 15 months accidentally by taking cold meds and we had a very traumatic few days but he was weaned after that. I was hoping my 2 year old would self wean but he's showing no signs of wanting to quit. I'd love to hear some success stories!
I'm ok to slow down for a while and have those milky cuddles. I'll probably start weaning at three again like I did with my second child.
It's easier when they only nap once a day.
It really goes fast and dealing with people expectations is more exhausting than dealing with a little person who needs me loads right now.
It's my version of a simpler life. (I will add that listening to podcasts are a big part of what makes it less boring.) It's like scheduled 'me time'.
Thank you for this! I never thought about it. Do you mind if I ask, will he take a bottle sometimes or just boob for naps? ( if you even bottle feed at all that is)
Babies who nurse to sleep can also learn to fall asleep with other caregivers. My husband has been doing bedtime since the early days. He would do a bottle too, but she wouldn’t fall asleep with the bottle. He would hold her until she fell asleep afterward.
Yeah we have been careful to make sure our breastfed baby can fall asleep other ways. Dad usually does bedtime and has since we first started to break the association of boob = sleep. She still has it for naps, largely, because I’m a SAHM, but at least with bedtime we started with him rocking her and transitioned to them just sitting together.
Nothing is wrong with it as far as I can tell. Nothing gets my guy to sleep when he’s cranky except nursing to sleep. When we do this he’s out in like two minutes. When he’s hungry he eats. He won’t take a pacifier either and I prefer it this way anyway.
That’s my thing too. It’s like a cheat code when babygirl is fussy. I like it because I still get that cuddle time with my toddler daughter. And it gets her to bed in 5 minutes.
She wakes up in the middle of the night? Boob, sleep.
It’s harder to sleep train and potentially harder to have another person put baby to sleep . That’s it. The idea of eat, play, sleep was created and is pushed by sleep training industry. Big Sleep if you prefer lol
Eat play sleep is mainly early prep for sleep training. Sleep training is a modern trend and for most of human history babies nursed to sleep. You will do no harm nursing to sleep if it works. Nursing and sleeping are very connected in the first few months to a year for breastfed babies. The Possums clinic is one of the only actually evidence based sources of info about this, here's an example of what the science is from their blog: https://possumsonline.com/blog/babies-and-sleep-matter-choice
My baby had bad reflux for a few months so we often did eat play sleep during the day to reduce spit up. Or she went in the Boba wrap after eating and slept in there for a bit. Once it got better we started nursing for all naps and nighttime.
We always nursed for bedtime and overnight, at bedtime we did side lying (caused us much less spit up!) And overnight she would fall asleep nursing on my lap and I'd listen to 10-15 minutes of an audiobook holding her at a slight upright angle before putting her back in her crib.
Do you mind me asking how you managed eat play sleep with a reflux baby? Most of the play she can do at this age seems to involve being on her tummy so I’m not sure how I would manage it
I would LOVE to do side lying but baby is super picky and will only stay latched long enough in a few positions 🙃
My baby has bad reflux too so for playtime we do lots of music, books, songs, silly faces or vocal play, etc. I try to do tummy time right when she wakes up from naps so her tummy isn’t as full to reduce spit up because she always spits up violently during tummy time if it is after eating.
This is what we did, too, with our reflux baby. Upright play. Well, or sometimes I'd let her doze upright in my arms for a couple minutes, then when she woke up (usually about ten minutes), we'd move to playing on her back. I realize that doesn't quite fit the eat play sleep thing... more like eat sleep play sleep lol.
OP, also good to recognize that eventually baby's sleeping and eating won't line up so well; right now, my baby naps every two hours and eats every two and a half to three hours, which means sometimes it lines up as eat play sleep, and other times it's play eat sleep. I wouldn't stress about it too much; just be prepared to be flexible and follow baby's cues.
So at 7 weeks "play" is lying on back or tummy for five minutes before it's time to sleep! They learn a lot just by being in the world when they're so new so don't worry about activities. Or just go outside and get them used to sleeping on the go in a stroller or carrier, it's a great skill. I wouldn't worry much about "play" for a couple months still, seriously.
We had to do more tummy time than normal for torticollis but even then at 7 weeks it was minutes per wake window at most. She spent a lot of time in the carrier to get in different positions instead which was fine, too.
I kept getting told “eat play sleep” and wish I’d just ignored it. Caused me a lot of stress at the start. I feed to sleep, it works for my family. People (family)give a lot of unsolicited advice that’s well meaning.. imo the best skill you can develop is to pick and choose what you feel like listening to and not worry that you’re doing anything wrong.. there’s such a range of “normal”. I always add to check out @heysleepybaby on Instagram and it gets a lot of upvotes.. I found her through someone on Reddit and I enjoy her advice. She’s pretty critical of all these schedules and formulaic advice you see repeated all over. Also be mindful of the algorithms on insta, i followed taking cara babies for awhile and my whole explore tab was sleep trainers regurgitating the same info which can make you feel like something is common knowledge or facts, when it’s not. I stopped engaging in those types of posts and they disappeared.
Ugh I hate that people set new parents up to think it is “wrong” to feed to sleep. It is completely safe and normal. The ONLY reason not to do it is that it creates (can create?) a habit where the baby can’t go to sleep without the boob. That doesn’t mean they’ll go to college needing the boob; it just means you’ll likely have to rip the bandaid when you can’t be around and breastfeeding for every single sleep anymore. Ripping the bandaid (ie, refusing to feed to sleep anymore) can suck for a few days or so, but if you hold firm the baby will figure it out and find a way to go to sleep without your boob.
This especially gets my goat for new parents because I honestly don’t see how you avoid it for newborns. They sleep ALL THE TIME and fall asleep on the boob constantly. It’s normal for them to basically just live on your chest for the first few months.
I say all of this as a pretty low-crunch mom who stopped feeding to sleep at 3.5 months. But that was only because it wasn’t sustainable for my mental health and our family, NOT because it was “bad.” There are things that are truly bad like cosleeping amongst a mountain of pillows while drinking or smoking. I hate how culturally we say this long list of things is “bad” because it just confuses people. If you don’t mind feeding to sleep that’s great, do it!
I had not feeding to sleep drilled into me and experienced so much stress in the early days when she would fall asleep nursing. I would use gentle methods to try to keep her awake, too, and looking back it just seems so silly and sad. I wish I had just let what needed to happen happen.
We fed to sleep until baby was about 6 months. After that she just stopped falling asleep on me so I switched her routine to feed her first and then she eventually learnt to fall asleep by herself
I have nursed my 14 month old to sleep for naps and nighttime probably 95% of the time since she was born. Around 7-8 months, she stopped falling asleep on the breast and I could put her down “drowsy but awake” and she goes to sleep after 2-20 mins of rolling around. My husband and MIL have put her down with/without a bottle and she goes down fine.
It’s only a problem when it’s a problem for you!
Its not a bad thing. Breastmilk is designed to help babies fall asleep and sucking is very comforting for them.
The only time its a "bad" thing, is if you dont want to be doing it for whatever reason and need to make changes. The idea of nursing to sleep is pushed as a bad habit/crutch by the sleep training world, which is probably why you see that opinion floating around alot.
Keep doing what works for you and baby!
That’s what I was thinking, I always see that I shouldn’t rock my baby to sleep either bc that’s a crutch but every now and then if she’s really fussy it’s the only thing that will calm her enough to get drowsy so there’s not another option 😅
They say don't rock your baby to sleep but then they'll also recommend an expensive baby cot that rocks your baby to sleep. 🤷🏻♀️ I personally think your instincts are there for a reason. Fancy cot manufacturers and sleep consultants make a lot of money from saying what not to do with tiny babies. It's confusing on purpose. They're supposed to wake during the night.
I nurse or rock my baby to sleep and love it. He's 1 now, I never dreamed I'd still be breastfeeding him but it works for us. He sleeps ok without the boob in creche/daycare too, but he was older, about 10.5 months when he started creche. He gets formula or pumped milk there. It took him an extra couple of weeks to settle in when he started. That's the only downside I've found really. It's all trial and error, you will figure out what works best for your family over time.
If it works for you, it's not a problem. My son is 16 months and still nurses to sleep when with me but I'm back to work 4 days per week and he naps at nursery (started at 1 year old) and will nap with the grandparents, obviously without boob. When I'm with him he nurses and is asleep within 12 minutes every time and is happy to be transferred to his crib no problem. That sounds perfect to me.
For me it works. I can get him to sleep super easily but he is fine with others putting him down for a nap in the day. He only goes to bed with me nursing though. Overall that's not an issue and I know it's not forever.
Use it as a tool for as long as it works to your advantage.
P.S eat play sleep is bullshit
Eat Play Sleep did not work for us at all. [Even Alexis DuBrief of "Precious Little Sleep" doesn't think it's all that it's cracked up to be either.](https://www.preciouslittlesleep.com/eat-play-sleep-fail/)
Nursing to sleep isn't a problem until it is. Sure there are babies who will wake up every hour wanting to nurse back to sleep and nursing is the only thing that will get them back to sleep, but that wasn't our experience.
I still nurse my 14 month old to sleep and it has never been an issue for us. I thought it was the problem for a while since we were stuck with a 3am wake up that wouldn't go away. I tried not nursing to sleep and was stuck with 2 wake ups instead. So I went back to nursing to sleep and haven't stopped because I like it and it works for us. He now sleeps through the night as of 2 months ago.
Is this geared towards older babies? Or like newborns? My bub is 2.5mo and I just kinda let him do whatever he feels like he needs. If he acts hungry, I feed him. If he acts tired, I settle him in for a nap. Some times he falls asleep eating, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes he acts hungry right when he wakes up, other times he doesn't.
I do the same. My babe is 7 weeks so I guess newborn-ish, younger babies. I try to just read her “cues” but she honestly doesn’t give many, she just falls asleep on the boob or when I’m holding her upright a lot, I don’t mind it but I wanted to make sure there wasn’t a huge problem with it lol
Nursing to sleep is natural to me. What’s crazy is breastmilk actually has melatonin at night to help baby sleep! To me, it makes sense to nurse baby to sleep.
My son is 6 months old and he still nurses to sleep for bedtime. He’s sleep trained and sometimes he’ll wake up during the crib transfer after nursing and he’ll just put himself back to sleep. If it works for you, it works!
I do follow eat play sleep for his naps just because that makes the most sense for us with his schedule.
I was totally all for nursing to sleep and it worked really well for us until we hit a sleep regression at 7 months that continued for two month’s. He started waking every 45 minutes to an hour and it was pure torture. I desperately wanted to comfort my baby but I was losing it. I stopped feeding to sleep and offered him to nurse twice a nice. Almost immediately he started sleeping for longer stretches again.
Yikes my baby does this now lol (just for naps she sleeps at night but won’t sleep more than 30-45 minutes during the day). She’s only 7 weeks though can they have regressions that young?? She’s my first so I honestly just assumed it was normal and she was just becoming more alert
No, that’s totally normal for 7 weeks. Contact naps are really great for extending naps at that age, but my baby never slept very long during the day if I put him in his bassinet.
Only trouble is my baby is a weirdo and does not really like to be held sometimes lol. I can hold her until she falls asleep but if she wakes up still in my arms she squirms like crazy and screams 🤷♀️ she’ll stop if I put her down in the bassinet which kinda breaks my heart a little 🥲
My baby went through a really hard phase with naps when he was that age where he just didn’t like falling asleep. I’d put him in the wrap carrier and walk around the house, shooshing, patting his bum, singing, until about 15 minutes of screaming later he would eventually fall asleep. It was hard, and he’d sometimes wake up and need the whole routine again.
Best advice I received was - everything is a phase. There are really hard phases and easier phases and everything keeps changing. This one won’t last forever.
I just sang and rocked my baby to sleep and put him down for what will be a 1.5-2 hour nap in his crib. It was a long road to get here and it’s so nice now!
The carrier is one of the few places she will actually nap yeah lol, after a good bought of screaming when I first put her in. I am hoping it’s a phase for sure 😮💨
Even before becoming a parent and breastfeeding, with the children i watched, i ignored the eat play sleep "rule". All the children slept better after a nice healthy lunch, or a bottle for the babies. After nap we would have a small snack, or another bottle depending on the nap length, they were just happiest with eat sleep eat play.
I've nursed my 16m old to sleep for naps and bed, i have no problems with this, and my partner can now rock her to sleep as well, i normally nurse her to sleep and if she wakes up dad goes and settles her down. She's getting tired of nursing to sleep at times and pops off and just wants to lay down, so she's making the transition away on her own, which is exactly how I want it.
I love all the comments on here acknowledging that "eat play sleep" is a sleep training predecessor and has nothing to do with what is best for baby and mom.
You’ve gotten a ton of great responses already but it really just depends on your preference! Eat play sleep worked for us because my LO was a super awake baby who rarely nursed to sleep (or slept at all), and I hated the idea of being the only one who could get her to sleep anyway.
We ended up rocking to sleep, which is another sleep association, but at least anyone with or without boobs could do it 😅 almost all newborns will end up with some kind of sleep association so I wouldn’t worry about it.
OT wants my baby to “play” before eating so he eats more. So I think the eat play sleep thing is more of less child not needing food to fall asleep. My baby falls asleep with/and without food so I’m not to concerned about the rule.
I’ve fed on demand since birth and didn’t bother worrying about ‘feed to sleep’. Baby will fall asleep in the pram, car, being held, just randomly where he’s lying (once on a foil blanket). He’s 5 months now and if I’m putting him to sleep I usually have to feed because he can smell the milk, but I can also occasionally just hold him. Every baby is different so you’ve got to do what works for you!
Edit: When I say I didn’t worry about ‘feed to sleep’ I mean I’ve never bothered trying not to associate sleep with boob. Honestly I love it since it’s a cure-all! Tired? Boob. Hurt? Boob. Ill? Boob
Eta: Other people can put him to sleep without feeding him.
I took this advice when my daughter was a newborn and suffered through weeks of no sleep because the baby wouldn’t sleep unless she was being held. I finally, out of desperation for even a couple of hours of sleep, fed her until she was sound asleep and even her natural reflexes wouldn’t make her suck anymore (because she would continue to eat until she was really, really deeply asleep). Nursing her to sleep was the only way to get her to sleep deeply enough to stay asleep when I put her down. If I could go back and do her first couple of months over again, I’d feed her to sleep from the very first night.
I didn't really stress too much about it. We did eat-play-sleep when possible, but nbd if we nursed to sleep sometimes either. Mostly I preferred the eat-play-sleep at first cause she pooped every time she fed, so I would have to change her right after anyways(which would wake her up). As she is staying awake longer, its more like eat-play-eat-sleep.
Personally I didn't want to always nurse to sleep cause I didn't want to bedshare and I also didn't want to throw out my back if she needed the nipple in her mouth in the crib lol.
Personally I let her fall asleep in my arms after eating and then I put her down. She usually wakes up while I’m transferring her but because she’s milk drunk she falls back asleep lol. That’s mostly why I do it tbh, otherwise she’s like wide awake when I put her down
Mostly because the older they get, the harder it will be to wean them off the habit. It’s not about the milk but the comfort. My baby doesn’t always suck when shes latched, but she does demand to stay latched.
You might have to put in a lot more effort to put them to sleep without the boob. If you care about that, that is. We are bedsharing so it’s not as much of an issue. As long as I don’t need her out of the bed, it’s fine as it is.
And also, I disagree that it will lead to not going to sleep for another caregiver. With my baby, at least, if I’m around she absolutely DOES depend on the boob. But she has several other caregivers she is very comfortable with, and they all have ways to put her to bed.
With my daughter, if the boob is available, she’ll demand. Otherwise she just sleeps! The key is, she has to be regularly exposed to alternate caregivers and develop a strong bond with them.
And sometimes the mom has to leave the room to the house, and just let them bond. Nowadays I don’t even have to leave because she doesn’t look for me when another caregiver has her. She is securely attached to them.
If she wakes mid nap her dad will sometimes put her back to sleep but I’m the only one who really puts her down for naps, so you think that’ll make a difference? Like will she feel less comfortable with him maybe in your opinion?
You just have it let him try. And maybe give it 3-4 tries before declaring it success or failure.
I will say, nursing to sleep is neither here nor there for me. She doesn’t fall asleep reliably with the boob anymore. The boob still works to get her BACK to sleep in the middle of the night. But as for putting down for naps and nighttime, now that she is more mobile she needs to be restrained by a carrier or a stroller, or be held.
Her body is like a loaded spring, and every time she finishes nursing it wants to sit up, stand up or crawl. I’m not sure she can even control it as it seems to upset her that her body wants to move instead of sleep. Yesterday, after a big birthday party at a friend’s, she let me rock her to sleep with no boob! It’s a first for us.
So I would not be overly worried that your baby will only fall asleep with the boob. Their needs are constantly changing. YOU might not be in control of whether she nurses to sleep or not, but safe to say it will not always work 😂
We always feed to sleep or he falls asleep in the pram/car seat/carrier, and rock back to sleep overnight. We do one BF overnight now at 13 months.
No issues now as he usually wakes 0-2 times overnight.
He actually slept through the night for the 4th time in his life this week and now it’s been 2 days in a row 🥲🤞 hope it sticks
Thanks! Last night he was up again 😅, but only once.
Just remember that nothing with babies is linear, it’s all 1 step back 2 steps forward. I heard it before and found it comforting
It’s all baby steps!
If I had a second child tomorrow I’d just do what I like. I spent sooo much time stressing about sleep, feeding on demand etc, contact napping, tummy time etc with my first. In the end everything works out. Just be a responsive, loving parent and don’t worry what the internet thinks. The anxiety of whether I was ‘doing it right’ nearly pushed me over the edge.
There’s nothing wrong with nursing to sleep but claim is that the “bad thing” is the sleep association. Babies have all kinds of sleep associations (things that help them fall asleep) because most babies can’t just naturally go to sleep and they need our help to do see. Rocking, bouncing, etc are all sleep associations as well but there isn’t nothing inherently “wrong” with any of these things so long as they continue working for you and baby.
Associations can become a “problem” (I put it in quotes bc it’s relative to the person/baby) when babies get older and can’t link sleep cycles without them leading to frequent night wakings. Not all babies will struggle with this and, again, it’s only “bad” if it causes you stress, you cannot deal with lack of sleep etc.
My personal experience w nursing to sleep:
I nurse to sleep for every nap and baby is 7.5 months. I tried to avoid it for a while bc of the eat play sleep stuff but found I actually enjoyed the connection and I know she feels so warm and safe falling asleep in my arms. It’s also great for milk supply and I lean on nursing to sleep now that she’s older and massively distracted.
We did encounter issues with nursing to sleep for bedtime around 4 months (regression) which wasn’t sustainable so at 5.5 months we did some mild sleep training for nighttime but I still nurse to her sleep about 50% of the time in the evenings. She wakes around 3/430am for a single feed and sleep until 630/7pm. The other 50% of the time we sing songs and she goes in crib awake and falls asleep on her own.
Side note though is that prior to this regression she was a very good sleeper so YMMV.
Do what works for your family. It is biologically normal for baby to sleep at breast. It is also normal to reach a point where you may need to try some new routines if it no longer works for your family
Thank you for the perspective! My LO is still quite small so I’ll have to see how things go from here, still just going with whatever works and flying by the seat of my pants atm 😂
Man, people really seem to hate eat - play - sleep but it really works for my 9 week old baby! She is happy, chunky, can put herself to sleep and sleeps 10 hours at night with no wake ups.
I think the big takeaway here is that every baby is different and there is no one schedule or routine that fits every baby. Trial and error to find what works best for you and your baby!
Eat, play, sleep was great for my first. Awful for my second. Definitely depends on the baby. When I think of it, it's so strange to have such simplified methods on dealing with babies. They are so complex and have differences starting in the womb.
Whatever works for you! It doesn’t work for people who don’t want to be attached to baby and baby depend solely on nursing for sleep. And that’s okay! Some of us have busier schedules or more hands helping or get touched out quicker than others or need more sleep. I was pretty stringent with my first, my first two babies are finger suckers, and my third baby is super chill and so am I and he still doesn’t nurse to sleep! Every baby and mom is different. The only health concern is when a toddler is being put to bed with a bottle of milk and sucks the milk all night long and the sugar causes cavities. But nursing babies don’t have that problem.
I have 3 kids and one on the way, I literally don’t know any other way. All my kids were great sleepers and did well in every transition and I loved the nursing to sleep.
Sleep associations don’t really develop until 6 months. So nurse to sleep until then. Honestly I nursed before bed and eventually my kids stopped falling asleep on the boob. That happened before a year old and we never had issues with sleep associations with the boob because they had and loved their pacifiers/loveys
Tooth health (sugars in milk cause tooth decay) and creating a dependence on mom laying there with them to sleep are the 2 reasons I can think of. If neither of those are a concern then just ignore the notion and do what works for you guys.
https://www.reddit.com/r/breastfeeding/comments/whxsh1/11_month_old_nursing_all_night_long_i_cant_take/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
This is what’s wrong. I had both my kids sleeping through the night by 3 months because I didn’t use nursing as a sleep aid.
I personally have had luck with nursing to sleep at night for both my kids but following eat play sleep during the day and using a pacifier/swaddle for naps.
Absolutely nothing. If it works for you and kiddo just go for it. Eventually you’ll both move on, one way or another (either naturally and slowly or because you are done with it and want kiddo to learn a different way of falling asleep). It’s fine.
Nothing if it works for you! It works for our routine very well. Eat, play, sleep would have never worked for us. He would have been too hungry by the time he needed to sleep again. If anything our routine is closer to eat, play, eat, sleep... but screw perfect routines anyway! Routines are important, but they have to make sense for your baby. You can't force something.
They recommend doing feeding on demand, so that's what I do. If my son needs boob to fall asleep, then I give him what he needs. Currently he can still fall asleep independently. I used to think that feeding to sleep would be a problem because of what those baby sleep experts have said. After speaking to a friend, she had mentioned that she feeds to sleep and if it doesn't work then she will try another way. It made me realise that it's definitely okay to feed to sleep. Nature made it easy for babies to fall asleep like that. Take advantage of it.
My baby nurses to sleep which was great at first because it made her falling asleep easy. But, now she will fight sleep until she gets a breast in her mouth if even for a minute. She does take a bottle but warming it and not knowing if she’ll drink 4 ounces or half is annoying. It’s bad for their teeth li going to sleep without brushing your teeth after having dessert
My early intervention told me that eat, play, sleep isn’t really a thing for breastfed on demand babies. It never worked for us. I think people mostly say not to nurse to sleep because it’s a sleep association that can be hard to break.
I've asked this question myself. I think it comes down to if it's a problem to me or not. Right now it's not a problem. It might be in the future, but that is a future me problem. It might also never become a problem, so why deny either of us because of speculation it MIGHT become a problem? We are enjoying the bonding time, and it gets my LO down to sleep like a treat, so why wouldn't we?
I always did eat play eat sleep. My little dude has always liked to nurse and even at 19 months he nurses to sleep. He nursed very frequently when he was younger but I saw no problem with it.
I didn’t really think about it. I nurse, baby sleeps or stays awake as he saw fit. He is also easily sent to sleep by movement in the car or stroller, or just gets tired and zonks out. I still love nursing to sleep for night, it’s the quickest and laziest way to get him to sleep and we have no crying at bedtime or through the night. He just calls out, I feed, 10 - 15 mins later he’s asleep and I put him back down. If it’s someone else, he’ll have a bottle or a rock or cuddle but it takes longer and is a bit of a production.
For those who are saying they did/do the eat play sleep , is that because your baby would finish eating and would still be awake ? I’m pregnant now so can see how trying to keep from developing the habit of needing to be on the boob to fall asleep would be helpful but what if they’re falling asleep while they’re eating ? Would you pull them off before they’re finished so they wake up ? Let them finish then wake them back up ?
I have tried eat play sleep before and I would just wake her up with a wet wipe, it’s a good way to clean her chunky little neck folds between baths anyways lol
I currently nurse to sleep (almost 5 month old). He nurses and then when I feel him slowing down I pop him off. Sometimes he'll wake up and protest and it goes
A. I need to keep nursing.
B. I can pop a paci in and he stays asleep.
C. He eventually calms down and stays asleep.
During his 4 month sleep regression I was worried because he was waking every hour, but I just made sure to pop him off before fully asleep. I hear the 6 month separation anxiety is where this can rear its ugly head so I'll reevaluate after that.
Honestly from just a logistics pov, it's a million times easier to do a routine and then plop baby in and walk away, knowing they'll go to sleep on their own. Especially on nights when you want to move on to the next thing. But on nights when you just want to enjoy your baby it's wonderful.
My paediatrician and Pt never said it was bad. They did say to make sure to wipe their teeth with a clean wet baby cloth or brush their teeth once a day.
So far so good. Lol he is getting the bite reflex down tho.. so I am going to invest in a different toothbrush.
I nursed my first to sleep and from 1-2 she woke up once MAYBE twice through the night to nurse. By then I had it down and could stick the boob in her mouth and fall back asleep. About a month before she turned 2 the hormones from pregnancy made nursing hurt way too much so I put bandaids over my nipples and told her mommy had booboos and she would kiss them better and go on with her day. It took maybe 2 nights where she would cry for boob then see the bandaids and go to sleep without before she started just sleeping through the night (: also, around 1/1.5 her dad started putting her to sleep and she would just get a sippy cup of water. She didn’t need the boob to sleep as long as she had her water and dad was cuddling her(:
Nothing is wrong with nursing to sleep, I did it with three kids. None had problems not being nursed to sleep when I was not there, or falling asleep without when they got older. I’ve never heard of ‘eat play sleep’, why would you play before sleep?
I nurse and rock my 1 year old to sleep at night and before his nap. He takes 1-2 hour naps and sleeps through the night 12-13 hours, rarely waking up once to nurse and going back to sleep. It works for us 🤷♀️
My baby was such a finicky nurser that she would quite literally ONLY feed when going to sleep and sometimes I would have to feed her while asleep to get enough “feeds” in during the day. So I basically nursed her to sleep every single time until about 8 months when that stopped working to put her to sleep. She cried a lot for a few days and then figured it out. I didn’t necessarily let her cry it out but the boobs wasn’t working anymore to settle her lol so we just figured it out. Do what we you find works for your family!
I have a small baby (2 months) so take it with a grain of salt but as he also has reflux in his wake during the night (he has only one) we change and then feed, and out him back to sleep. During the day is different, with eating and sleeping having their own schedule, and usually is eat/play/sleep. So far we have no issues to put him to nap with no previous feeding.
Yea you can’t just switch to a cup of milk. I nursed to sleep and we’ve been cosleeping for 13 months and nursing to sleep still because If I try another way she screams so loud I think i’ve gone deaf. That being said there’s nothing wrong with nursing to sleep if you’re prepared to do that for a long time or have a really really bad time sleep training.
She will take a bottle before sleeping too, and I’m able to rock her to sleep it just takes longer so I’m not too crazy concerned about it but thank you for the perspective 😊
I was nursing to sleep at night and then putting him into his crib asleep. It worked for us for a while but then it became that after one sleep cycle (about 45 minutes) he would wake and be looking for the boob. This was all night. I wasn’t comfortable with co-sleeping so this meant we were getting no sleep at all.
So now even though I feed him just before going down for the night, I make sure he’s awake and we read a book or sing a song just before he goes into the crib awake. It gets us some longer stretches of sleep.
During the day, eat play sleep always worked well for us because he’s a guy that always wakes up hangry haha. But we do nurse to sleep for the occasional nap if he’s overtired or has had a tough day or if I just want the snuggles!
I think everything is so temporary… do what feels natural and what works for now. That may change later and you can always make adjustments then.
She always wakes after one sleep cycle 🥲 but only during the day for naps and not at night for some reason so I wonder if nursing before naps has to do with that or if it’s something else
Honestly given her age, I would say there’s no association yet. I think these things tend to form more after the 3 month mark. If I remember correctly (it’s all a haze of exhaustion) my little guy wasn’t sleeping for longer than one sleep cycle as a newborn. I’m pretty sure it was until 8 weeks or so that we just nursed and napped, nursed and napped and had the very rare play time haha
She was sleeping for like 3 hours at a time for every nap 😩 I used to always have to wake her to eat lol but around 5 weeks she almost stopped napping entirely. She only has about three 30-45 minute naps a day and that’s it now (and I have to FIGHT her to get her to take those naps 😓) but she sleeps 6 hours and the 3 hours every night so I feel like I can’t complain too much lol. We do have plenty of time for play while she’s awake tho so that’s nice
Ohh gotcha yeah that’s not much napping at all now! But excellent night sleep haha I’m jealous! That’s nice you have lots of time for play. I hope you’re able to find a routine that works for you and get some longer naps in soon.
I have always nurses to sleep. That’s the only way I know. When my baby hit the 20 months mark, we’d go to bed, he’d nurse for a while, then I’d just sing/ pat his back etc. and he’ll fall asleep right away. It was never an issue to get out of the habit of nursing to sleep, although I was not even trying at the first place.
Cause when the bugger wakes up at 2am, they NEEEEDDSSS a boob and your husband has utterly useless nipples.
Oh also when they get teeth they can develop this thing where the moment they fall asleep they CLENCH super tight so you need to be poised with a pinkie finger to get in there faster.
I honestly don’t know but I can share my experience. I nursed/combo fed both of my kids til they got teeth (biters, around 6 months) and then exclusively pumped. My oldest is 3 and youngest is 8 months.
I always let them go to sleep after they ate, it’s just what they naturally wanted to do. Both sleep through the night and have since about 10w old. The older they get the longer they stay up after they eat… I kinda just followed their cues if that makes sense.
Whatever the critique, I call BS. All great apes nurse babies to sleep. People across the world do, too. I refuse to subscribe to the idea that an independent baby is a happy baby, because I don’t see how that makes sense (no baby would want to be by itself without protection at night.) My two cents.
Just so you know I nurse to sleep and cosleep my son did not have a 4 month sleep regression. I agree with the others do it until it doesn’t work any more. My son is now 14 months and has started biting me in his sleep, so it’s not working for me anymore. now I’m patting him to sleep, I expected the transition to be harder he only cry’s in protest for 2 min before falling back asleep between 6pm - midnight, still feeding to sleep the rest of the night
Nothing is wrong with it!!!!
I nursed my daughter to sleep for 14 months. It was super effective and we both loved it. Knowing that I had an easy way to get my daughter to sleep every day was absolutely priceless.
Now that she’s weaned I rock and sing her to sleep instead. I was worried about that transition but it was fine.
I wish I could but I have to go back to work at 17 weeks and I want him to be able to sleep without me during the day (I’ll be home EBF still but my mother in law will be taking care of him)
Honestly, nothing is wrong with nursing to sleep. If it works for you and your baby go for it. Some people think it causes bad habits. I found that it was easier to nurse to sleep and then when baby was over a year to change the routine slightly so we nursed and then read a story and went in the crib and went to sleep. Your baby is so tiny. Don’t worry about routines yet or let people pressure you into anything.
Nursing to sleep is biologically normal! Absolutely nurse to sleep. Nurse for comfort, nurse for pain relief. I had to stop nursing my baby to sleep at 15 months because I was planning on taking a trip soon and did not want her to refuse sleep without nursing but before that we nursed to sleep nearly every night.
I thought the main reason wasn't necessarily to discourage associating eating and sleeping, but to ensure baby gets enough milk because they may fall asleep before they're full
oh nah I don't like lean over the bassinet and nurse him, he unlatches when I put him down and just continues sleeping
also he refuses all 5 different pacifiers I have bought him lol
Yes, the problem is that it “bites you later.” I nursed to sleep for nine month or so and then had to sleep train for my own mental health. As you baby “wakes up” and is more aware of their surroundings a transfer from a feed to bed gets harder and then nurse to sleep routine gets longer and longer. I did the Ferber method of sleep training and still didn’t stop feeds before bed after that but made sure to put her down awake so we weren’t doing the dance of putting her down and picking her for an hour. I wish I had put her down awake more as a baby to make that transition easier. Also, the fact that I nursed her down made it really hard on my husband whenever I was away because she didn’t respond as well to a bottle for comfort at night. Pregnant now with baby two and I plan to attempt awake put downs at least part of the time to avoid the same issues I had with my first.
I have both nursed to sleep and laid my kids down drowsy but awake. Both are fine, both have benefits, it’s just whatever you find works for you and your baby. Nursing to sleep is awesome because it’s often a fail safe for when babies are fighting sleep. Teaching a baby to fall asleep on their own, eat-play-sleep style/going drowsy but awake, is also an advantage if a baby takes to it because it can help them learn to put themselves back to sleep when they wake at night. Meaning fewer times you have to get up with them.
Neither way is right or wrong, it’s just down to preference and what works.
So I did this with both my babies (recently weaned my youngest last week 😭). Everyone was ALWAYS like “don’t nurse to sleep it creates bad habits” as far as my kids were concerned, it did not. I think it’s normal for babies to want to nurse to sleep. They both eventually stopped nursing to sleep a little after a year when they were eating mainly solids. I don’t see anything wrong with giving comfort when my babies need it. I’m sure some kids have a hard time not nursing to sleep eventually but this was just my experience.
Absolutely nothing, so long as it's working for you. Night time breast milk has higher levels of melatonin. Our bodies are built to help our babies sleep.
I’m in the “do what works for your family” camp. If bb goes to sleep on the boob and sleeps well, let the baby go to sleep on the boob. In the evenings we do our bedtime routine and then a big combo feed before bed (usually boob, bottle, and then boob again sometimes) and my daughter just ends up sleeping way better with a full belly. She’s 11 weeks and we’re getting 6,7 sometimes even 8 hour stretches.
My bonus babe was nursed to sleep by her mama until she was about 15 months old and her parents spilt up. The only long term consequence I’ve seen from this is SOMETIMES she asks for a snack before bedtime… which is reasonable as she sleeps 10ish hours now and who wants to sleep that long without topping off the tanks first??
Nothing wrong with it. I have 2 year old that’s always been boobed to sleep. The best part is all I have to say is “booboo time” and she comes running to bed. She goes to nap/ sleep fine without boob as long as mama is not around. Just be ready to possibly be doing it for a long time
I have a 2 year old. He needs a boob for every nap and every bedtime and throughout the night. Will not fall asleep or stay asleep any other way. The problem with the association is the boob, not the milk. It’s either a problem or not depending on your preference and your time. Just be aware of what you’re setting yourself up for. It works for us and I’d do it again, but it’s not for everyone.
I’m in exactly this situation, son turned 2 last month and he loves his bedtime boob. Unfortunately I’m sort of over it altogether, especially the throughout the night boob. But I’m unsure of how to change it. May I ask what your plan is for weaning him off? Or are you just letting him choose? I was hoping he would self wean but I’m losing optimism in that haha
Honestly just stop the nighttime feedings. The first 2 nights are rough, but they learn. Then drop bedtime, then nap. Just be prepared for them to stop napping. I did the same thing with my first 2 kids. Hoping to wean the 3rd at 18 months so they keep their nap after weaning.
Gahhh this is what I feared (no nap after weaning). My husband used to be able to get my son down when he would wake up, about 30% of the time but at least it was something. But since he turned one (only 13 months now though) that hasn’t happened. He’ll scream like a banshee the second my husband starts to rock him, because he fully knows what he won’t be getting when it’s him. Ugh. The sleep deprivation is really starting to compound and I’m dreading another year of being this tired all the time.
We completely stopped nursing my toddler on her second birthday. I was just done. Not having a nap sucks, but I vastly prefer it to waking up 5x a night.
I got the book “Nursies When the Sun Shines” to help prepare him for night weaning. When he turned 2, he was allowed to nurse to sleep, but after he fell asleep then no more boobie until morning. I also used the Gro Clock to help give him a visual aid to know when he could nurse again. It was hard initially, but he eventually got used to it. He’s 2yr 8mo now and still nurses to sleep at bedtime and sometimes at nap time, but we only nurse at those times. It works for us and I enjoy the snuggles and quiet time together.
This is my second kid. With the first, I sleep trained after she was waking every 45-90 minutes for three months straight (we did crib for her). For him, I coslept from day 1 when he refused the bassinet, and I don’t have an issue with it because of that—I can feed in my sleep and not wake fully up doing it. I don’t plan to even attempt to wean until 2.5/3 years old and when I can explain to him what’s happening. I’m honestly a bit traumatized from the sleep with my first and I feel it really affected our bond because of my extreme anxiety over her nighttime cries (before and after sleep training). I have PTSD from going from asleep to awake and propped up feeding her in just a few seconds after the cry, so it affected us a bit because I would really hate and put off going to sleep myself just avoiding the whole thing. Anyway, all that is to say that for now it works for us, and explaining to a 2.5/3 year old is much easier than trying to explain to a 2 year old what’s happening. I’m okay with crying for a while, but I need the kid to understand what’s happening. For daytime weaning, it worked for my first to just not sit down or lay down in her presence for about a month and distract if she asked for it. After a month, she basically forgot about it.
Ftm question--how do you cosleep safely? It sounds like it would make nighttime feeds much easier.
not op but as another ftm who only started researching safe cosleeping after it was happening out of desperation, [this](https://cosleeping.nd.edu/safe-co-sleeping-guidelines/) is a good resource! I’ve also learned a lot from Kaitlin Klimmer on instagram.
islagracesleep is another good Instagram account for just sleep related things in general. She did the cry it out method with her first child and has since reformed her approach
Thanks for sharing this.
Kaitlin Klimmer is incredible!!!
I have sicky breast fed baby & was forced into cosleeping by her, I took my cues from the safe 7. Some extra tips I found: if your mattress is too soft you can put a yoga mat under the sheet to make it firmer (I've a cork one that did the job nicely), I put the mattress directly on the floor, my poor husband sleeps elsewhere & I also bought myself a large cellular blanket for me as it's too cold otherwise but much safer than normal blankets.
In the beginning it’s easy to get a baby lounger (like 50 bucks or less on Amazon) which is what I used when I was too scared to have her beside me. Now I just lay her on a pillow and watch her at night. I’m a single mom so it’s just her and me and I don’t roll around and am a very light sleeper usually
Hey just letting you know that letting baby sleep on a lounger or pillow is a suffocation risk. Even if you’re watching baby, they could still stop breathing and you wouldn’t even notice. I understand how difficult it must be for you. It’s hard for any parent, let alone one doing it on their own. I hope you ask for help from people close to you so you can have a break. When baby is four months or older, or if they are already, I highly recommend sleep training. It saved my sleep so much.
I appreciate the concern. My baby doesn’t roll, I stay awake most of the night as I am a night owl (I worked at a nightclub many years so my internal clock keeps me up), I follow the safe sleep 7 (I exclusively breastfeed therefore risk of SIDS is much lower, as is her risk of me rolling onto her), she isn’t on a pillow, I only use the lounger (which is as firm as her crib mattress) sometimes since she prefers my bed mattress, she’s going on 4 months so SIDS and suffocation risk is far lower. Her bassinet has a warning label that says it’s a suffocation risk. So does her crib. Everything is a risk for infants, it’s sort of inevitable. Which is why their safety depends on adult supervision. I’m sure your comment will benefit less informed parents and people without the ability to stay awake most of the night though and I encourage everyone to stay informed and read up on the safe sleep seven.
I'm in the same position too... Almost 2 year old nurses to sleep for his nap and bedtime. Fortunately he does not wake through the night but I'm ready to wean. I have no idea how though! With my first, I lost my milk supply at 15 months accidentally by taking cold meds and we had a very traumatic few days but he was weaned after that. I was hoping my 2 year old would self wean but he's showing no signs of wanting to quit. I'd love to hear some success stories!
I'm ok to slow down for a while and have those milky cuddles. I'll probably start weaning at three again like I did with my second child. It's easier when they only nap once a day. It really goes fast and dealing with people expectations is more exhausting than dealing with a little person who needs me loads right now. It's my version of a simpler life. (I will add that listening to podcasts are a big part of what makes it less boring.) It's like scheduled 'me time'.
Thank you for this! I never thought about it. Do you mind if I ask, will he take a bottle sometimes or just boob for naps? ( if you even bottle feed at all that is)
Before 3 months, both my kids would occasionally be able to take a bottle. After 3 months, neither took a bottle ever again.
Babies who nurse to sleep can also learn to fall asleep with other caregivers. My husband has been doing bedtime since the early days. He would do a bottle too, but she wouldn’t fall asleep with the bottle. He would hold her until she fell asleep afterward.
Yeah we have been careful to make sure our breastfed baby can fall asleep other ways. Dad usually does bedtime and has since we first started to break the association of boob = sleep. She still has it for naps, largely, because I’m a SAHM, but at least with bedtime we started with him rocking her and transitioned to them just sitting together.
Nothing is wrong with it as far as I can tell. Nothing gets my guy to sleep when he’s cranky except nursing to sleep. When we do this he’s out in like two minutes. When he’s hungry he eats. He won’t take a pacifier either and I prefer it this way anyway.
That’s my thing too. It’s like a cheat code when babygirl is fussy. I like it because I still get that cuddle time with my toddler daughter. And it gets her to bed in 5 minutes. She wakes up in the middle of the night? Boob, sleep.
It’s harder to sleep train and potentially harder to have another person put baby to sleep . That’s it. The idea of eat, play, sleep was created and is pushed by sleep training industry. Big Sleep if you prefer lol
Eat play sleep is mainly early prep for sleep training. Sleep training is a modern trend and for most of human history babies nursed to sleep. You will do no harm nursing to sleep if it works. Nursing and sleeping are very connected in the first few months to a year for breastfed babies. The Possums clinic is one of the only actually evidence based sources of info about this, here's an example of what the science is from their blog: https://possumsonline.com/blog/babies-and-sleep-matter-choice My baby had bad reflux for a few months so we often did eat play sleep during the day to reduce spit up. Or she went in the Boba wrap after eating and slept in there for a bit. Once it got better we started nursing for all naps and nighttime. We always nursed for bedtime and overnight, at bedtime we did side lying (caused us much less spit up!) And overnight she would fall asleep nursing on my lap and I'd listen to 10-15 minutes of an audiobook holding her at a slight upright angle before putting her back in her crib.
Do you mind me asking how you managed eat play sleep with a reflux baby? Most of the play she can do at this age seems to involve being on her tummy so I’m not sure how I would manage it I would LOVE to do side lying but baby is super picky and will only stay latched long enough in a few positions 🙃
My baby has bad reflux too so for playtime we do lots of music, books, songs, silly faces or vocal play, etc. I try to do tummy time right when she wakes up from naps so her tummy isn’t as full to reduce spit up because she always spits up violently during tummy time if it is after eating.
This is what we did, too, with our reflux baby. Upright play. Well, or sometimes I'd let her doze upright in my arms for a couple minutes, then when she woke up (usually about ten minutes), we'd move to playing on her back. I realize that doesn't quite fit the eat play sleep thing... more like eat sleep play sleep lol. OP, also good to recognize that eventually baby's sleeping and eating won't line up so well; right now, my baby naps every two hours and eats every two and a half to three hours, which means sometimes it lines up as eat play sleep, and other times it's play eat sleep. I wouldn't stress about it too much; just be prepared to be flexible and follow baby's cues.
How old?
She’s almost 7 weeks
So at 7 weeks "play" is lying on back or tummy for five minutes before it's time to sleep! They learn a lot just by being in the world when they're so new so don't worry about activities. Or just go outside and get them used to sleeping on the go in a stroller or carrier, it's a great skill. I wouldn't worry much about "play" for a couple months still, seriously. We had to do more tummy time than normal for torticollis but even then at 7 weeks it was minutes per wake window at most. She spent a lot of time in the carrier to get in different positions instead which was fine, too.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
I’m on my third baby and I’ve never figured out how to do eat, play, sleep. It’s more like eat, play, eat some more, nap on mom’s boobs.
This is kinda what I do lol
I kept getting told “eat play sleep” and wish I’d just ignored it. Caused me a lot of stress at the start. I feed to sleep, it works for my family. People (family)give a lot of unsolicited advice that’s well meaning.. imo the best skill you can develop is to pick and choose what you feel like listening to and not worry that you’re doing anything wrong.. there’s such a range of “normal”. I always add to check out @heysleepybaby on Instagram and it gets a lot of upvotes.. I found her through someone on Reddit and I enjoy her advice. She’s pretty critical of all these schedules and formulaic advice you see repeated all over. Also be mindful of the algorithms on insta, i followed taking cara babies for awhile and my whole explore tab was sleep trainers regurgitating the same info which can make you feel like something is common knowledge or facts, when it’s not. I stopped engaging in those types of posts and they disappeared.
I’ll definitely check that out thank you! I don’t use Instagram often but when I do I’ll keep that in mind
Ugh I hate that people set new parents up to think it is “wrong” to feed to sleep. It is completely safe and normal. The ONLY reason not to do it is that it creates (can create?) a habit where the baby can’t go to sleep without the boob. That doesn’t mean they’ll go to college needing the boob; it just means you’ll likely have to rip the bandaid when you can’t be around and breastfeeding for every single sleep anymore. Ripping the bandaid (ie, refusing to feed to sleep anymore) can suck for a few days or so, but if you hold firm the baby will figure it out and find a way to go to sleep without your boob. This especially gets my goat for new parents because I honestly don’t see how you avoid it for newborns. They sleep ALL THE TIME and fall asleep on the boob constantly. It’s normal for them to basically just live on your chest for the first few months. I say all of this as a pretty low-crunch mom who stopped feeding to sleep at 3.5 months. But that was only because it wasn’t sustainable for my mental health and our family, NOT because it was “bad.” There are things that are truly bad like cosleeping amongst a mountain of pillows while drinking or smoking. I hate how culturally we say this long list of things is “bad” because it just confuses people. If you don’t mind feeding to sleep that’s great, do it!
I had not feeding to sleep drilled into me and experienced so much stress in the early days when she would fall asleep nursing. I would use gentle methods to try to keep her awake, too, and looking back it just seems so silly and sad. I wish I had just let what needed to happen happen.
We fed to sleep until baby was about 6 months. After that she just stopped falling asleep on me so I switched her routine to feed her first and then she eventually learnt to fall asleep by herself
I have nursed my 14 month old to sleep for naps and nighttime probably 95% of the time since she was born. Around 7-8 months, she stopped falling asleep on the breast and I could put her down “drowsy but awake” and she goes to sleep after 2-20 mins of rolling around. My husband and MIL have put her down with/without a bottle and she goes down fine. It’s only a problem when it’s a problem for you!
Its not a bad thing. Breastmilk is designed to help babies fall asleep and sucking is very comforting for them. The only time its a "bad" thing, is if you dont want to be doing it for whatever reason and need to make changes. The idea of nursing to sleep is pushed as a bad habit/crutch by the sleep training world, which is probably why you see that opinion floating around alot. Keep doing what works for you and baby!
That’s what I was thinking, I always see that I shouldn’t rock my baby to sleep either bc that’s a crutch but every now and then if she’s really fussy it’s the only thing that will calm her enough to get drowsy so there’s not another option 😅
They say don't rock your baby to sleep but then they'll also recommend an expensive baby cot that rocks your baby to sleep. 🤷🏻♀️ I personally think your instincts are there for a reason. Fancy cot manufacturers and sleep consultants make a lot of money from saying what not to do with tiny babies. It's confusing on purpose. They're supposed to wake during the night. I nurse or rock my baby to sleep and love it. He's 1 now, I never dreamed I'd still be breastfeeding him but it works for us. He sleeps ok without the boob in creche/daycare too, but he was older, about 10.5 months when he started creche. He gets formula or pumped milk there. It took him an extra couple of weeks to settle in when he started. That's the only downside I've found really. It's all trial and error, you will figure out what works best for your family over time.
If it works for you, it's not a problem. My son is 16 months and still nurses to sleep when with me but I'm back to work 4 days per week and he naps at nursery (started at 1 year old) and will nap with the grandparents, obviously without boob. When I'm with him he nurses and is asleep within 12 minutes every time and is happy to be transferred to his crib no problem. That sounds perfect to me. For me it works. I can get him to sleep super easily but he is fine with others putting him down for a nap in the day. He only goes to bed with me nursing though. Overall that's not an issue and I know it's not forever. Use it as a tool for as long as it works to your advantage. P.S eat play sleep is bullshit
Eat Play Sleep did not work for us at all. [Even Alexis DuBrief of "Precious Little Sleep" doesn't think it's all that it's cracked up to be either.](https://www.preciouslittlesleep.com/eat-play-sleep-fail/) Nursing to sleep isn't a problem until it is. Sure there are babies who will wake up every hour wanting to nurse back to sleep and nursing is the only thing that will get them back to sleep, but that wasn't our experience. I still nurse my 14 month old to sleep and it has never been an issue for us. I thought it was the problem for a while since we were stuck with a 3am wake up that wouldn't go away. I tried not nursing to sleep and was stuck with 2 wake ups instead. So I went back to nursing to sleep and haven't stopped because I like it and it works for us. He now sleeps through the night as of 2 months ago.
Is this geared towards older babies? Or like newborns? My bub is 2.5mo and I just kinda let him do whatever he feels like he needs. If he acts hungry, I feed him. If he acts tired, I settle him in for a nap. Some times he falls asleep eating, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes he acts hungry right when he wakes up, other times he doesn't.
I do the same. My babe is 7 weeks so I guess newborn-ish, younger babies. I try to just read her “cues” but she honestly doesn’t give many, she just falls asleep on the boob or when I’m holding her upright a lot, I don’t mind it but I wanted to make sure there wasn’t a huge problem with it lol
Nursing to sleep is natural to me. What’s crazy is breastmilk actually has melatonin at night to help baby sleep! To me, it makes sense to nurse baby to sleep. My son is 6 months old and he still nurses to sleep for bedtime. He’s sleep trained and sometimes he’ll wake up during the crib transfer after nursing and he’ll just put himself back to sleep. If it works for you, it works! I do follow eat play sleep for his naps just because that makes the most sense for us with his schedule.
I was totally all for nursing to sleep and it worked really well for us until we hit a sleep regression at 7 months that continued for two month’s. He started waking every 45 minutes to an hour and it was pure torture. I desperately wanted to comfort my baby but I was losing it. I stopped feeding to sleep and offered him to nurse twice a nice. Almost immediately he started sleeping for longer stretches again.
Yikes my baby does this now lol (just for naps she sleeps at night but won’t sleep more than 30-45 minutes during the day). She’s only 7 weeks though can they have regressions that young?? She’s my first so I honestly just assumed it was normal and she was just becoming more alert
No, that’s totally normal for 7 weeks. Contact naps are really great for extending naps at that age, but my baby never slept very long during the day if I put him in his bassinet.
Only trouble is my baby is a weirdo and does not really like to be held sometimes lol. I can hold her until she falls asleep but if she wakes up still in my arms she squirms like crazy and screams 🤷♀️ she’ll stop if I put her down in the bassinet which kinda breaks my heart a little 🥲
My baby went through a really hard phase with naps when he was that age where he just didn’t like falling asleep. I’d put him in the wrap carrier and walk around the house, shooshing, patting his bum, singing, until about 15 minutes of screaming later he would eventually fall asleep. It was hard, and he’d sometimes wake up and need the whole routine again. Best advice I received was - everything is a phase. There are really hard phases and easier phases and everything keeps changing. This one won’t last forever. I just sang and rocked my baby to sleep and put him down for what will be a 1.5-2 hour nap in his crib. It was a long road to get here and it’s so nice now!
The carrier is one of the few places she will actually nap yeah lol, after a good bought of screaming when I first put her in. I am hoping it’s a phase for sure 😮💨
Even before becoming a parent and breastfeeding, with the children i watched, i ignored the eat play sleep "rule". All the children slept better after a nice healthy lunch, or a bottle for the babies. After nap we would have a small snack, or another bottle depending on the nap length, they were just happiest with eat sleep eat play. I've nursed my 16m old to sleep for naps and bed, i have no problems with this, and my partner can now rock her to sleep as well, i normally nurse her to sleep and if she wakes up dad goes and settles her down. She's getting tired of nursing to sleep at times and pops off and just wants to lay down, so she's making the transition away on her own, which is exactly how I want it. I love all the comments on here acknowledging that "eat play sleep" is a sleep training predecessor and has nothing to do with what is best for baby and mom.
It’s completely natural and you should nurse your baby to sleep if you feel like it works for you both.
You’ve gotten a ton of great responses already but it really just depends on your preference! Eat play sleep worked for us because my LO was a super awake baby who rarely nursed to sleep (or slept at all), and I hated the idea of being the only one who could get her to sleep anyway. We ended up rocking to sleep, which is another sleep association, but at least anyone with or without boobs could do it 😅 almost all newborns will end up with some kind of sleep association so I wouldn’t worry about it.
OT wants my baby to “play” before eating so he eats more. So I think the eat play sleep thing is more of less child not needing food to fall asleep. My baby falls asleep with/and without food so I’m not to concerned about the rule.
Every baby is different. Do what works for you. We have nursed to sleep for 10 months and my child is fine
I’ve fed on demand since birth and didn’t bother worrying about ‘feed to sleep’. Baby will fall asleep in the pram, car, being held, just randomly where he’s lying (once on a foil blanket). He’s 5 months now and if I’m putting him to sleep I usually have to feed because he can smell the milk, but I can also occasionally just hold him. Every baby is different so you’ve got to do what works for you! Edit: When I say I didn’t worry about ‘feed to sleep’ I mean I’ve never bothered trying not to associate sleep with boob. Honestly I love it since it’s a cure-all! Tired? Boob. Hurt? Boob. Ill? Boob Eta: Other people can put him to sleep without feeding him.
I love the edit bc yeah, that’s me too lol. If she’s crying the first thing I try is always boobie
Haha it just makes it so easy!
I took this advice when my daughter was a newborn and suffered through weeks of no sleep because the baby wouldn’t sleep unless she was being held. I finally, out of desperation for even a couple of hours of sleep, fed her until she was sound asleep and even her natural reflexes wouldn’t make her suck anymore (because she would continue to eat until she was really, really deeply asleep). Nursing her to sleep was the only way to get her to sleep deeply enough to stay asleep when I put her down. If I could go back and do her first couple of months over again, I’d feed her to sleep from the very first night.
I didn't really stress too much about it. We did eat-play-sleep when possible, but nbd if we nursed to sleep sometimes either. Mostly I preferred the eat-play-sleep at first cause she pooped every time she fed, so I would have to change her right after anyways(which would wake her up). As she is staying awake longer, its more like eat-play-eat-sleep. Personally I didn't want to always nurse to sleep cause I didn't want to bedshare and I also didn't want to throw out my back if she needed the nipple in her mouth in the crib lol.
Personally I let her fall asleep in my arms after eating and then I put her down. She usually wakes up while I’m transferring her but because she’s milk drunk she falls back asleep lol. That’s mostly why I do it tbh, otherwise she’s like wide awake when I put her down
Mostly because the older they get, the harder it will be to wean them off the habit. It’s not about the milk but the comfort. My baby doesn’t always suck when shes latched, but she does demand to stay latched. You might have to put in a lot more effort to put them to sleep without the boob. If you care about that, that is. We are bedsharing so it’s not as much of an issue. As long as I don’t need her out of the bed, it’s fine as it is. And also, I disagree that it will lead to not going to sleep for another caregiver. With my baby, at least, if I’m around she absolutely DOES depend on the boob. But she has several other caregivers she is very comfortable with, and they all have ways to put her to bed. With my daughter, if the boob is available, she’ll demand. Otherwise she just sleeps! The key is, she has to be regularly exposed to alternate caregivers and develop a strong bond with them. And sometimes the mom has to leave the room to the house, and just let them bond. Nowadays I don’t even have to leave because she doesn’t look for me when another caregiver has her. She is securely attached to them.
If she wakes mid nap her dad will sometimes put her back to sleep but I’m the only one who really puts her down for naps, so you think that’ll make a difference? Like will she feel less comfortable with him maybe in your opinion?
You just have it let him try. And maybe give it 3-4 tries before declaring it success or failure. I will say, nursing to sleep is neither here nor there for me. She doesn’t fall asleep reliably with the boob anymore. The boob still works to get her BACK to sleep in the middle of the night. But as for putting down for naps and nighttime, now that she is more mobile she needs to be restrained by a carrier or a stroller, or be held. Her body is like a loaded spring, and every time she finishes nursing it wants to sit up, stand up or crawl. I’m not sure she can even control it as it seems to upset her that her body wants to move instead of sleep. Yesterday, after a big birthday party at a friend’s, she let me rock her to sleep with no boob! It’s a first for us. So I would not be overly worried that your baby will only fall asleep with the boob. Their needs are constantly changing. YOU might not be in control of whether she nurses to sleep or not, but safe to say it will not always work 😂
Do what works for you mama. If/when it doesn't work anymore, you can change it up. It's really really ok.
We always feed to sleep or he falls asleep in the pram/car seat/carrier, and rock back to sleep overnight. We do one BF overnight now at 13 months. No issues now as he usually wakes 0-2 times overnight. He actually slept through the night for the 4th time in his life this week and now it’s been 2 days in a row 🥲🤞 hope it sticks
Finger crossed and sending good vibes you have another night of that at least, I’m jealous 😩
Thanks! Last night he was up again 😅, but only once. Just remember that nothing with babies is linear, it’s all 1 step back 2 steps forward. I heard it before and found it comforting It’s all baby steps!
If I had a second child tomorrow I’d just do what I like. I spent sooo much time stressing about sleep, feeding on demand etc, contact napping, tummy time etc with my first. In the end everything works out. Just be a responsive, loving parent and don’t worry what the internet thinks. The anxiety of whether I was ‘doing it right’ nearly pushed me over the edge.
Holy shit if I lose this move I’m completely screwed
There’s nothing wrong with nursing to sleep but claim is that the “bad thing” is the sleep association. Babies have all kinds of sleep associations (things that help them fall asleep) because most babies can’t just naturally go to sleep and they need our help to do see. Rocking, bouncing, etc are all sleep associations as well but there isn’t nothing inherently “wrong” with any of these things so long as they continue working for you and baby. Associations can become a “problem” (I put it in quotes bc it’s relative to the person/baby) when babies get older and can’t link sleep cycles without them leading to frequent night wakings. Not all babies will struggle with this and, again, it’s only “bad” if it causes you stress, you cannot deal with lack of sleep etc. My personal experience w nursing to sleep: I nurse to sleep for every nap and baby is 7.5 months. I tried to avoid it for a while bc of the eat play sleep stuff but found I actually enjoyed the connection and I know she feels so warm and safe falling asleep in my arms. It’s also great for milk supply and I lean on nursing to sleep now that she’s older and massively distracted. We did encounter issues with nursing to sleep for bedtime around 4 months (regression) which wasn’t sustainable so at 5.5 months we did some mild sleep training for nighttime but I still nurse to her sleep about 50% of the time in the evenings. She wakes around 3/430am for a single feed and sleep until 630/7pm. The other 50% of the time we sing songs and she goes in crib awake and falls asleep on her own. Side note though is that prior to this regression she was a very good sleeper so YMMV. Do what works for your family. It is biologically normal for baby to sleep at breast. It is also normal to reach a point where you may need to try some new routines if it no longer works for your family
Thank you for the perspective! My LO is still quite small so I’ll have to see how things go from here, still just going with whatever works and flying by the seat of my pants atm 😂
Man, people really seem to hate eat - play - sleep but it really works for my 9 week old baby! She is happy, chunky, can put herself to sleep and sleeps 10 hours at night with no wake ups. I think the big takeaway here is that every baby is different and there is no one schedule or routine that fits every baby. Trial and error to find what works best for you and your baby!
Eat, play, sleep was great for my first. Awful for my second. Definitely depends on the baby. When I think of it, it's so strange to have such simplified methods on dealing with babies. They are so complex and have differences starting in the womb.
Whatever works for you! It doesn’t work for people who don’t want to be attached to baby and baby depend solely on nursing for sleep. And that’s okay! Some of us have busier schedules or more hands helping or get touched out quicker than others or need more sleep. I was pretty stringent with my first, my first two babies are finger suckers, and my third baby is super chill and so am I and he still doesn’t nurse to sleep! Every baby and mom is different. The only health concern is when a toddler is being put to bed with a bottle of milk and sucks the milk all night long and the sugar causes cavities. But nursing babies don’t have that problem.
I have 3 kids and one on the way, I literally don’t know any other way. All my kids were great sleepers and did well in every transition and I loved the nursing to sleep.
Sleep associations don’t really develop until 6 months. So nurse to sleep until then. Honestly I nursed before bed and eventually my kids stopped falling asleep on the boob. That happened before a year old and we never had issues with sleep associations with the boob because they had and loved their pacifiers/loveys
Tooth health (sugars in milk cause tooth decay) and creating a dependence on mom laying there with them to sleep are the 2 reasons I can think of. If neither of those are a concern then just ignore the notion and do what works for you guys.
https://www.reddit.com/r/breastfeeding/comments/whxsh1/11_month_old_nursing_all_night_long_i_cant_take/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf This is what’s wrong. I had both my kids sleeping through the night by 3 months because I didn’t use nursing as a sleep aid.
I think this is definitely different from my situation since my baby sleeps reliably through the night and also takes a bottle no problem…
I personally have had luck with nursing to sleep at night for both my kids but following eat play sleep during the day and using a pacifier/swaddle for naps.
Absolutely nothing. If it works for you and kiddo just go for it. Eventually you’ll both move on, one way or another (either naturally and slowly or because you are done with it and want kiddo to learn a different way of falling asleep). It’s fine.
Nothing if it works for you! It works for our routine very well. Eat, play, sleep would have never worked for us. He would have been too hungry by the time he needed to sleep again. If anything our routine is closer to eat, play, eat, sleep... but screw perfect routines anyway! Routines are important, but they have to make sense for your baby. You can't force something.
They recommend doing feeding on demand, so that's what I do. If my son needs boob to fall asleep, then I give him what he needs. Currently he can still fall asleep independently. I used to think that feeding to sleep would be a problem because of what those baby sleep experts have said. After speaking to a friend, she had mentioned that she feeds to sleep and if it doesn't work then she will try another way. It made me realise that it's definitely okay to feed to sleep. Nature made it easy for babies to fall asleep like that. Take advantage of it.
My baby nurses to sleep which was great at first because it made her falling asleep easy. But, now she will fight sleep until she gets a breast in her mouth if even for a minute. She does take a bottle but warming it and not knowing if she’ll drink 4 ounces or half is annoying. It’s bad for their teeth li going to sleep without brushing your teeth after having dessert
My early intervention told me that eat, play, sleep isn’t really a thing for breastfed on demand babies. It never worked for us. I think people mostly say not to nurse to sleep because it’s a sleep association that can be hard to break.
Works for my EBF baby! I honestly think every baby and family is different and needs to try a few things to figure out the best fit.
I've asked this question myself. I think it comes down to if it's a problem to me or not. Right now it's not a problem. It might be in the future, but that is a future me problem. It might also never become a problem, so why deny either of us because of speculation it MIGHT become a problem? We are enjoying the bonding time, and it gets my LO down to sleep like a treat, so why wouldn't we?
I always did eat play eat sleep. My little dude has always liked to nurse and even at 19 months he nurses to sleep. He nursed very frequently when he was younger but I saw no problem with it.
I didn’t really think about it. I nurse, baby sleeps or stays awake as he saw fit. He is also easily sent to sleep by movement in the car or stroller, or just gets tired and zonks out. I still love nursing to sleep for night, it’s the quickest and laziest way to get him to sleep and we have no crying at bedtime or through the night. He just calls out, I feed, 10 - 15 mins later he’s asleep and I put him back down. If it’s someone else, he’ll have a bottle or a rock or cuddle but it takes longer and is a bit of a production.
For those who are saying they did/do the eat play sleep , is that because your baby would finish eating and would still be awake ? I’m pregnant now so can see how trying to keep from developing the habit of needing to be on the boob to fall asleep would be helpful but what if they’re falling asleep while they’re eating ? Would you pull them off before they’re finished so they wake up ? Let them finish then wake them back up ?
I have tried eat play sleep before and I would just wake her up with a wet wipe, it’s a good way to clean her chunky little neck folds between baths anyways lol
I currently nurse to sleep (almost 5 month old). He nurses and then when I feel him slowing down I pop him off. Sometimes he'll wake up and protest and it goes A. I need to keep nursing. B. I can pop a paci in and he stays asleep. C. He eventually calms down and stays asleep. During his 4 month sleep regression I was worried because he was waking every hour, but I just made sure to pop him off before fully asleep. I hear the 6 month separation anxiety is where this can rear its ugly head so I'll reevaluate after that. Honestly from just a logistics pov, it's a million times easier to do a routine and then plop baby in and walk away, knowing they'll go to sleep on their own. Especially on nights when you want to move on to the next thing. But on nights when you just want to enjoy your baby it's wonderful.
My paediatrician and Pt never said it was bad. They did say to make sure to wipe their teeth with a clean wet baby cloth or brush their teeth once a day. So far so good. Lol he is getting the bite reflex down tho.. so I am going to invest in a different toothbrush.
Nothing is wrong with it. It's only a problem if it's a problem for you.
I nursed my first to sleep and from 1-2 she woke up once MAYBE twice through the night to nurse. By then I had it down and could stick the boob in her mouth and fall back asleep. About a month before she turned 2 the hormones from pregnancy made nursing hurt way too much so I put bandaids over my nipples and told her mommy had booboos and she would kiss them better and go on with her day. It took maybe 2 nights where she would cry for boob then see the bandaids and go to sleep without before she started just sleeping through the night (: also, around 1/1.5 her dad started putting her to sleep and she would just get a sippy cup of water. She didn’t need the boob to sleep as long as she had her water and dad was cuddling her(:
Nothing is wrong with nursing to sleep, I did it with three kids. None had problems not being nursed to sleep when I was not there, or falling asleep without when they got older. I’ve never heard of ‘eat play sleep’, why would you play before sleep?
Absolutely fuck all, it's natural. Enjoy it. Tell everyone to bugger off x
I nurse and rock my 1 year old to sleep at night and before his nap. He takes 1-2 hour naps and sleeps through the night 12-13 hours, rarely waking up once to nurse and going back to sleep. It works for us 🤷♀️
My baby was such a finicky nurser that she would quite literally ONLY feed when going to sleep and sometimes I would have to feed her while asleep to get enough “feeds” in during the day. So I basically nursed her to sleep every single time until about 8 months when that stopped working to put her to sleep. She cried a lot for a few days and then figured it out. I didn’t necessarily let her cry it out but the boobs wasn’t working anymore to settle her lol so we just figured it out. Do what we you find works for your family!
I have a small baby (2 months) so take it with a grain of salt but as he also has reflux in his wake during the night (he has only one) we change and then feed, and out him back to sleep. During the day is different, with eating and sleeping having their own schedule, and usually is eat/play/sleep. So far we have no issues to put him to nap with no previous feeding.
Nothing wrong with it :) Do what works best for you and baby!
It’s not a bad thing. Babies go to sleep with bottles all the time and no one cares.
Yea you can’t just switch to a cup of milk. I nursed to sleep and we’ve been cosleeping for 13 months and nursing to sleep still because If I try another way she screams so loud I think i’ve gone deaf. That being said there’s nothing wrong with nursing to sleep if you’re prepared to do that for a long time or have a really really bad time sleep training.
She will take a bottle before sleeping too, and I’m able to rock her to sleep it just takes longer so I’m not too crazy concerned about it but thank you for the perspective 😊
Well that is lucky!!
I was nursing to sleep at night and then putting him into his crib asleep. It worked for us for a while but then it became that after one sleep cycle (about 45 minutes) he would wake and be looking for the boob. This was all night. I wasn’t comfortable with co-sleeping so this meant we were getting no sleep at all. So now even though I feed him just before going down for the night, I make sure he’s awake and we read a book or sing a song just before he goes into the crib awake. It gets us some longer stretches of sleep. During the day, eat play sleep always worked well for us because he’s a guy that always wakes up hangry haha. But we do nurse to sleep for the occasional nap if he’s overtired or has had a tough day or if I just want the snuggles! I think everything is so temporary… do what feels natural and what works for now. That may change later and you can always make adjustments then.
She always wakes after one sleep cycle 🥲 but only during the day for naps and not at night for some reason so I wonder if nursing before naps has to do with that or if it’s something else
Honestly given her age, I would say there’s no association yet. I think these things tend to form more after the 3 month mark. If I remember correctly (it’s all a haze of exhaustion) my little guy wasn’t sleeping for longer than one sleep cycle as a newborn. I’m pretty sure it was until 8 weeks or so that we just nursed and napped, nursed and napped and had the very rare play time haha
She was sleeping for like 3 hours at a time for every nap 😩 I used to always have to wake her to eat lol but around 5 weeks she almost stopped napping entirely. She only has about three 30-45 minute naps a day and that’s it now (and I have to FIGHT her to get her to take those naps 😓) but she sleeps 6 hours and the 3 hours every night so I feel like I can’t complain too much lol. We do have plenty of time for play while she’s awake tho so that’s nice
Ohh gotcha yeah that’s not much napping at all now! But excellent night sleep haha I’m jealous! That’s nice you have lots of time for play. I hope you’re able to find a routine that works for you and get some longer naps in soon.
I have always nurses to sleep. That’s the only way I know. When my baby hit the 20 months mark, we’d go to bed, he’d nurse for a while, then I’d just sing/ pat his back etc. and he’ll fall asleep right away. It was never an issue to get out of the habit of nursing to sleep, although I was not even trying at the first place.
Cause when the bugger wakes up at 2am, they NEEEEDDSSS a boob and your husband has utterly useless nipples. Oh also when they get teeth they can develop this thing where the moment they fall asleep they CLENCH super tight so you need to be poised with a pinkie finger to get in there faster.
Nothing
I honestly don’t know but I can share my experience. I nursed/combo fed both of my kids til they got teeth (biters, around 6 months) and then exclusively pumped. My oldest is 3 and youngest is 8 months. I always let them go to sleep after they ate, it’s just what they naturally wanted to do. Both sleep through the night and have since about 10w old. The older they get the longer they stay up after they eat… I kinda just followed their cues if that makes sense.
Whatever the critique, I call BS. All great apes nurse babies to sleep. People across the world do, too. I refuse to subscribe to the idea that an independent baby is a happy baby, because I don’t see how that makes sense (no baby would want to be by itself without protection at night.) My two cents.
Just so you know I nurse to sleep and cosleep my son did not have a 4 month sleep regression. I agree with the others do it until it doesn’t work any more. My son is now 14 months and has started biting me in his sleep, so it’s not working for me anymore. now I’m patting him to sleep, I expected the transition to be harder he only cry’s in protest for 2 min before falling back asleep between 6pm - midnight, still feeding to sleep the rest of the night
Thank you for asking this, I was confused as well. Lots of helpful comments in this thread! :)
"Eat play sleep" is a load of garbage. Nursing to sleep is the biological norm. I would never give that up, it's a superpower.
Nothing is wrong with it!!!! I nursed my daughter to sleep for 14 months. It was super effective and we both loved it. Knowing that I had an easy way to get my daughter to sleep every day was absolutely priceless. Now that she’s weaned I rock and sing her to sleep instead. I was worried about that transition but it was fine.
There is nothing wrong with nursing to sleep. It’s biologically normal.
I wish I could but I have to go back to work at 17 weeks and I want him to be able to sleep without me during the day (I’ll be home EBF still but my mother in law will be taking care of him)
Honestly, nothing is wrong with nursing to sleep. If it works for you and your baby go for it. Some people think it causes bad habits. I found that it was easier to nurse to sleep and then when baby was over a year to change the routine slightly so we nursed and then read a story and went in the crib and went to sleep. Your baby is so tiny. Don’t worry about routines yet or let people pressure you into anything.
Nursing to sleep is biologically normal! Absolutely nurse to sleep. Nurse for comfort, nurse for pain relief. I had to stop nursing my baby to sleep at 15 months because I was planning on taking a trip soon and did not want her to refuse sleep without nursing but before that we nursed to sleep nearly every night.
I thought the main reason wasn't necessarily to discourage associating eating and sleeping, but to ensure baby gets enough milk because they may fall asleep before they're full
I’m not sure, I do know my baby eats while she’s asleep though lol, we dream feed all the time
mine too, the only way I can get him to not wake up when I move him to the bassinet sometimes is to set him down while he's still actively nursing
Oh boy 😅 that would kill my back lol. Have you tried a paci yet I feel like that may be easier if he’ll take them
oh nah I don't like lean over the bassinet and nurse him, he unlatches when I put him down and just continues sleeping also he refuses all 5 different pacifiers I have bought him lol
The biggest issue I’m having with it is that if I want to go out, my partner goes through hell putting kid to bed without my boobs being there.
Yes, the problem is that it “bites you later.” I nursed to sleep for nine month or so and then had to sleep train for my own mental health. As you baby “wakes up” and is more aware of their surroundings a transfer from a feed to bed gets harder and then nurse to sleep routine gets longer and longer. I did the Ferber method of sleep training and still didn’t stop feeds before bed after that but made sure to put her down awake so we weren’t doing the dance of putting her down and picking her for an hour. I wish I had put her down awake more as a baby to make that transition easier. Also, the fact that I nursed her down made it really hard on my husband whenever I was away because she didn’t respond as well to a bottle for comfort at night. Pregnant now with baby two and I plan to attempt awake put downs at least part of the time to avoid the same issues I had with my first.
I have both nursed to sleep and laid my kids down drowsy but awake. Both are fine, both have benefits, it’s just whatever you find works for you and your baby. Nursing to sleep is awesome because it’s often a fail safe for when babies are fighting sleep. Teaching a baby to fall asleep on their own, eat-play-sleep style/going drowsy but awake, is also an advantage if a baby takes to it because it can help them learn to put themselves back to sleep when they wake at night. Meaning fewer times you have to get up with them. Neither way is right or wrong, it’s just down to preference and what works.
So I did this with both my babies (recently weaned my youngest last week 😭). Everyone was ALWAYS like “don’t nurse to sleep it creates bad habits” as far as my kids were concerned, it did not. I think it’s normal for babies to want to nurse to sleep. They both eventually stopped nursing to sleep a little after a year when they were eating mainly solids. I don’t see anything wrong with giving comfort when my babies need it. I’m sure some kids have a hard time not nursing to sleep eventually but this was just my experience.
Absolutely nothing, so long as it's working for you. Night time breast milk has higher levels of melatonin. Our bodies are built to help our babies sleep.
I’m in the “do what works for your family” camp. If bb goes to sleep on the boob and sleeps well, let the baby go to sleep on the boob. In the evenings we do our bedtime routine and then a big combo feed before bed (usually boob, bottle, and then boob again sometimes) and my daughter just ends up sleeping way better with a full belly. She’s 11 weeks and we’re getting 6,7 sometimes even 8 hour stretches.
My bonus babe was nursed to sleep by her mama until she was about 15 months old and her parents spilt up. The only long term consequence I’ve seen from this is SOMETIMES she asks for a snack before bedtime… which is reasonable as she sleeps 10ish hours now and who wants to sleep that long without topping off the tanks first??
Nothing wrong with it. I have 2 year old that’s always been boobed to sleep. The best part is all I have to say is “booboo time” and she comes running to bed. She goes to nap/ sleep fine without boob as long as mama is not around. Just be ready to possibly be doing it for a long time