By 6-8 months your baby is fully ready and capable to be completely done with eating at night. Dr. Sears suggests that some parents really enjoy feeding their babies at night and will happily continue offering night feeding sessions until the child stops waking up on their own. If you are one of these mythical “I love waking up in the middle of the night” parents, best of luck to you. Personally I don’t know any people like this. And I think they’re really rare. Like unicorn rare.
But my point is that by this time your baby no longer needs to consume lots of food at night and is fully capable of getting all their calories in during daylight hours. And while a few babies will organically drop all their night feedings without any assistance from you, the vast majority of babies will continue to wake up routinely for a nursing session or bottle for years. So you can live with night feedings for the next 3 years, or you can take some simple and effective steps to gently wean your baby off their night feeding habit.
Start by choosing the feeding that is the least fun for you (typically this is the “dear God why are you awake it’s freeking 2:00 AM” feeding). Use the relevant process outlined below to completely wean off one feeding. Repeat.
Night Weaning for Breastfed Babies
- Gradually reduce the amount of time baby gets on the breast by 1 minute every 1-2 days. For example if your baby nurses 10 minutes a side (for a total of 20 minutes), start popping him off at 9 minutes, 8 minutes, etc.
- By the time your baby is only nursing for 2-3 minutes he may stop waking up all on his own. WHOOPIEE!
- If your baby STILL wants to nurse then you have a few options on how to handle it:
- A) Send daddy in for 1 minute of low-key soothing. Daddies are miraculously good at this. Also? They don’t smell like food. Babies are much more adaptive at getting the “no more food for you buddy” message from Dads.
- B) Let him complain. This should NOT be a nightmare CIO scene. Most babies who have been gently decreasing their milk consumption are now USED to not eating at this time. Left to their own devices they typically complain for 5-10 minutes and then fall back to sleep.
- When you are done feeding your baby at X time of night you are DONE. Don’t let teething/colds/travel get you back on the night feeding menu. If this happens you need to start over again. Do not pass GO. Do not collect $200.
Night Weaning for Bottle-fed Babies
- Offer 2 oz less of formula. So instead of an 8 oz bottle, offer a 6 oz bottle. Then a 4 oz bottle. Etc.
- -OR- Dilute the formula by reducing the amount of formula in the bottle by 1 scoop but leave the amount of water the same. So instead of 8 oz of water with 4 scoops of formula you would offer 8 oz of water with 3 scoops of formula.
- Continue decreasing the dilution of the formula until the bottle is 100% water. (Or continue offering less formula in the bottle – 6 oz, 4 oz, 2 oz). After 1-2 days of “only water” bottles, no more bottles.
- At this point your baby will probably stop waking up for this feeding all on their own. If not read the tips above (for breastfed babies) on how to proceed.
- When you are done with a given feeding you are DONE. No more bottles at that time of night. The kitchen is closed.
I’ve done this with many families over the years and it works shockingly well. Don’t believe me? Try it. Then come back next week and share your success story in the comment section!
There are a few small caveats to night weaning that I want to share….
The Dreaded Early Morning Feeding
Why?
Because babies often respond to giving up the 5:00 AM feeding by deciding instead to start the day. I think the problem is that a) it’s close enough to their normal wakeup time b) they’re used to waking up at that time already and c) they’ve gotten enough sleep that basic exhaustion won’t just whisk them back to dreamland.
I have no magic solution to this dilemma. Try weaning off the early morning feeding and see what happens. Your baby may continue to sleep happily until their normal wakeup time. Your baby may figure out how to fall back asleep at 5:00 am with a little gentle soothing encouragement from you or your partner. Or your baby may flatly refuse to go back to sleep without being fed.
If the latter then you can decide if you want to simply concede defeat and continue with the 5:00 AM feeding rather than wake up in the early dark of the morning. Personally I think an extra hour or two of sleep is worth dealing with the 5:00 AM feeding. If you’re nursing I would strongly encourage you to give your baby a bottle instead at this hour so you and your partner can take turns.
Night Weaning Isn’t Working
What worked/didn’t work for you? Leave a comment below!
{photo credit: DonkeyHotey and Stephen Heron}
Thank you for these articles! We are well on our way to getting our 9 month old to sleep through the night. We had used CIO and it worked wonders when he was 6 months. We somehow reverted back to bad habits and we are back to square one. The only difference is that when we leave the room now, he sits or stands in his crib and wont lay himself back down. Any tips on how to deal with this?
Our daughter did the same thing in the crib. She would stand up and cry and cry. I know it’s a no-no but what helped her was discovering how much she liked to sleep on her belly. Luckily she was close enough to a year old I tried not to stress too much about it. When I was doing research I also read to just keep laying them down until they get the point. Going in the room made the crying so much worse for us but all babies are different I guess.
My 7 month old who came out sleeping is now not sleeping at nights! She is waking up like every 3 hours to nurse! I have let her cry for like 15 min once and there was no backing down on her part! I was tempted to have my husband give her a bottle at nights since who wants to waste their time with waking up for that not the breast! Haha help me!!!
I am in the same exact boat, however my now 7 month old has been waking up anywhere from ever 45 minutes to every three hours since around month 4. I do cosleeping and have just about lost my mind to sleep deprivation. I think I may have to start trying these methods.
Phoebe, I am in the EXACT same boat. 7.5 months old and co-sleeping, the midnight snacks were becoming so convenient that last week she was getting up up to NINE times a night! So finally I got fed up, put her in her crib, followed sorta a combination of this and a couple other methods that worked for us (I couldn’t let her cry more than 20 minutes, but the Ferber method of going in every 5 was only making her more upset), and she’s only been getting up to eat once a night since the first night! Even though I wanted her in my bed with me forever (for now haha), I am SO happy I got through that first night of hell and sorta even wish I had started this earlier. Now I just need her to sleep past 6 am (anyone have tips? lol)
Good luck!
What time are you putting her to bed? A too late bed time can make a baby wake early. You might try increments of 15 minutes earlier and see it that works!
Katie, my daughter is 8 months and I need help! What combination worked for you??
This is my son. Waking every 2 hours like clock work. He is put down awake for his days sleeps & bed time & goes off without protest.
But then every 2 wakes & I have to resettle with a quick feed or rocking.
Any help would be appreciated
Hi I’m just reading your comment and being n exactly the same boat just now with my seven month old I’m wondering if anything worked for you. I’m struggling…..
Yes we are in the same boat as well! Right around 6.5 months she started this. Would love to know how it changed.
Ok so if baby activly nurses for 5 mins and comfort sucks for 5 mins (total 10 mins). We start shaving of a min every few days right. what do we do when baby starts hyperventilating screaming once popped off?
I face the same issue with my 13 month old!!! Did you find something that helped?
DD has never been the best sleeper, and truthfully has always been gassy from day one. She was EBF until she wasn’t gaining weight and then supplamentef with formula. In the past month she’s woken up incredibly uncomfortable and will only sleep when being held! I hate to try to sleep train right now because I feel like she’s in pain. She has had a few miracle nights where she went down drowsy and went to sleep on her own and where she only woke up once and where she nursed and went back down without problems and slept until her typical wake up time. But mostly we are holding her all night, trying to put her in her crib only to have to wake up minutes later upset! Any advice?!
How old is DD? My daughter had terribly painful gas. I would wake to her struggling for relief in her bassinet. However, she outgrew it as her digestive system developed. Here are some things that did help: making sure she burped after after nursing/bottle feed, even if she fell asleep – that gas needs to come out! and massage and leg bicycles helped moved trapped gas.
Question. Once our son wakes up for his first night feeding (and all following feedings) should we put him back down in the crib or bring him in bed with us like we use to do until he masters the initial falling asleep in the crib?
Our little 8 month old dude goes to bed every night on his own (not bragging) with no fussing, BUT then he’s awake for 2-3 night feedings. I’m mostly done breastfeeding and do one bottle feeding and the other as breastfeeding (usually 4am..the death hour) but seriously have no clue if the guy is getting anything. He still suckles and is happy even if I put him down a little awake. Going to try the slow decrease in minutes and formula and see what happens! Oh… and gonna sub dad in way more than I normally/ever do. I’m just already awake and awaken faster than dad does so it seems easier to just do it myself… until the next day rolls around and I’m a grinch. Fingers crossed this works!
I am in the same position! Did night weaning this way work for you? Dad works early and long hours, so I probably won’t sub him in…
Hello! We are looking to night wean our 10.5 month old soon. I’ve been exclusively pumping since biting became a huge issue 2 months ago, so he gets bottled breast milk. Will the method of diluting his night bottle with water work for breast milk, or is that strategy only meant for formula?
Hi, is an almost 5 month old too young to try night weaning from one feed as per suggestions above?
My son is waking 3 times a night still – 10.30pm, 1.30-2am & between 4-5am and I feed him back to sleep each time as he seems hungry! I’d love to drop the 1.30am feed and just feed him during the two other wake ups.
Thanks for your advice!
Have you started introducing solids yet? My son was the same, and we realized it was because he really was hungry. Since then he wakes only once a night now. Which we are currently working on. Good luck! I know the exhaustion!
Thanks for the reply Andrea, no we hadn’t thought of that but it probably makes sense as their tummy’s expand and they are growing/developing so much during this time!
What did you introduce and when at this early stage? Much controversy around introducing solids too early but may ask GP or Paed if this could be a good option.. it’s so tiring!!!
Thanks 🙂
“The dreaded early morning feed” – this is us. My 5 month old goes all night in his own room without being fed until 5 am. Sometimes he will wake up and we rock him back to sleep, other times he sleeps through. When he wakes up around 5, I bring him in our bed and nurse him and he falls back to sleep for another two hours. We’re having a really hard time teaching him to fall asleep on his own, so the controlled crying method is in our not-so-distant future. Should we focus on doing the sleep training for bedtime, but continue the 5 am feed in our bed until he eventually drops the feed? Or should we switch to a bottle, feed him when he wakes up and then put him back in the crib to let him fall back asleep on his own?
Hi! as long as he’s sleep trained at bedtime, you can do what you prefer for the 5am feed. For me, personally, I preferred giving a bottle for the early morning 5am feed and having him go back to sleep in his crib. I preferred it because figured a bottle would be easier to wean off of later in the future instead of trying to wean off both nursing and cosleeping at that time. maybe you could nurse and put him back into crib?
I have a newly one year old baby boy who still insists on one night feeding between 3-5am- he’s a chunky baby and i know he does not ‘need’ it. He is sleep trained in that he puts himself to sleep for naps and bedtime. CIO doesn’t seem to work- I am totally okay with that method but he just doesn’t seem to ever go back to sleep. So i know it is basically a habit we have to break but since he is breastfeeding and my husband cannot help at night…It is hard for me to NOT feed him when i go in at night. I am really ready to be done with this nighttime feeding.
I have a 11 month old baby, that would sleep all night long in his crib between 3-6 months. Now he’s refusing his crib and wants to sleep with us in the bed. If we try to but him in his crib while he’s asleep he wakes up and wraps his arms quickly around my neck. We’ve tried sleep training him but the whole “put him down while he’s drowsy but awake” doesn’t work out because he quickly just starts crying. And doesn’t calm down. Also he either just sits right up or stands and cries and it seems like he doesn’t know how to lay down. We let him cry it out one night hoping that he would just fall asleep, but he legit cried from 9pm-5am. And at one point he did stop crying for 2 hours. When I went in to check up on him he was sleeping while sitting down and when his body gave up and tipped over he woke up and continued crying. I don’t know what to do anymore. Anyone have a stubborn baby like me.
DD is 9.5 months old. I have been trying to ST her for almost 3 weeks now. Staying in the room didn’t work. Fading didn’t work. No we are at Leave & Check close to executing extinction as check timing I’ve stretched it to every 15-20 minutes.
The thing is she is really overtired but she tends to sit and sleep. Seems to be waiting for my return. I have to repeatedly lie her down from my 15-20 check visit. The moment I step out of the room, she will stand up in her crib and cry for 5 minutes before sitting down and going into the sit and sleep mode. It’s been 4 days since she has been sitting and sleeping. It took between 40 minutes to 2 hours to finally lay her down for her sleep. Nap usually last only 30-60 minutes while BT usually last 1.5 hours after lying down before the whole cycle repeats then she will got for 2-3 hours of sleep then a night wake with a “feed cry” and go for another 3 hours of sleep then another disturb sleep then an hour or two of sleep to her official dawn wake up.
I know that she is way overtired and has sleep debts piled.
Any advice on how to solve her sit and sleep issue? CIO doesnt seem to work because she will just sit and sleep to wait.