Re-intro and 11 month help needed

Hello all

I used to be on here ALL the time with ds#1 and I'm now returning to the
place I trust most for sound advice. We live in Scotland, dp me and the 2
boys. Ds1 is now 3.5 and ceased nursing of his own choice when I was 28
weeks pg with ds2 so we missed the tandem nursing experience. And right now
I'm glad....

Please can you help. Ds2 is 11 months old tmw and is still almost
exclusively bf. He screams like anything if a spoon comes his way with food
on, will not finger food anything that's remotely wet or sticky, so all he's
prepared to let past his lips is an occassional nibble on a rice cake, or 10
grains of rice done 1 grain at a time. He ate 4 little florets of broccoli
2 days in a row a month ago and at last I thought we were getting somewhere
but that phase passed. He's a fairly big lad at 23lb but he's breastfeeding
seemingly all the time - 6 times during the day and every hour at night.
The bit at night is now really wearing me down after 8 weeks because he
doesn't just nuzzle on - he kicks n squirms and sticks his toenails right
where it hurts and pinches. I'm tired and resentful. Should we just
forcefeed the solids? It seems so wrong but when will he up his calories
from somewhere other than me?

TIA
--Poppy

On 2006-10-31 06:45:59 +0800, "Poppy" said:

Hello all

I used to be on here ALL the time with ds#1 and I'm now returning to
the place I trust most for sound advice. We live in Scotland, dp me
and the 2 boys. Ds1 is now 3.5 and ceased nursing of his own choice
when I was 28 weeks pg with ds2 so we missed the tandem nursing
experience. And right now I'm glad....

Please can you help. Ds2 is 11 months old tmw and is still almost
exclusively bf. He screams like anything if a spoon comes his way with
food on, will not finger food anything that's remotely wet or sticky,
so all he's prepared to let past his lips is an occassional nibble on a
rice cake, or 10 grains of rice done 1 grain at a time. He ate 4
little florets of broccoli 2 days in a row a month ago and at last I
thought we were getting somewhere but that phase passed. He's a fairly
big lad at 23lb but he's breastfeeding seemingly all the time - 6 times
during the day and every hour at night. The bit at night is now really
wearing me down after 8 weeks because he doesn't just nuzzle on - he
kicks n squirms and sticks his toenails right where it hurts and
pinches. I'm tired and resentful. Should we just forcefeed the
solids? It seems so wrong but when will he up his calories from
somewhere other than me?

TIA
--Poppy

Eek, I sympathise. The reason we night weaned my son was because he
wasn't eating much solids during the day at all. He is, however, at 17
months of age still 3 lbs lighter than your 10 month old!

What worked for us was to have DH get up to him at night, and for me to
be nowhere in sight until around 3 or 4am. We only did this about two
months ago, though. I had to get over the huge guilt I had for even
considering it - and that took months.

We do what we have to do to get the most sleep. In your case I
wouldn't worry about the food aversion unless you suspect allergy, as
his weight is great and he's obviously thriving on breastmilk. If
you're starting to resent him though, then it's time to fix it.

Either hang in there and wait for him to decide when he wants to eat,
or make some changes. Unfortunately we don't have a crystal ball to be
able to tell you what the 'right' thing for him/you is, and we don't
know how long it's going to last - we can only sympathise and let you
vent whenever you need to

Jo

--
Woman, Wife, Mother, Midwife

I'd encourage finger foods, ditch the spoon completely, sounds like he
doesn't like it and if you just present him with finger foods he might eat
more if he's not had to fight the spoon first. There are tons of different
foods you can try, bread (no spread if he doesn't like things sticky),
toast, bread sticks, broccoli, carrot, green beans, other vegetables,
cheese, pieces of hard boiled egg, the list goes on...

I'd also consider partially night weaning him pick a window of time,
whatever is best for your habits and his, of about 6hrs, or 4hrs if that
seems more manageable and do not nurse in that time, he'll be cross at
first, but he should get the hang of it.

You can also encourage good nursing, think of positions where he can't get
his toenails where it hurts, or make a kind of bag out of a blanket and put
his legs in that. Treat uncomfortable nursing in the same way as biting,
which is usually something like put the baby down and walk out of the room.

Cheers

Anne

You might like the article on my website
"Mother-led Weaning/Tantrums"
http://www.ncf.ca/~an588/par_home.html (scroll down to bf section)

I suggest: don't bother trying to get him to eat, let
him go at his own pace. However, set limits on the nursing.
Likely if you cut back on nursing he will start to eat;
but it sounds like what you want is more sleep, and if
for example you refuse to nurse him at night and manage
to get more sleep and he still doesn't eat, that would
be fine with you I guess. He'll eat eventually.

Maybe the first limit you need to set is the toenails.
You can be firm. You can stop nursing immediately if
any toenails touch you. (Or, as others suggest, put
blankets and stuff in the way.) He can learn to nurse
nicely. You can set limits so he either nurses nicely
or doesn't nurse. You can be in control and set the
rules. It may work best if you start by enforcing
rules in the daytime (no touching me in any way
while nursing, for example, or no moving while
nursing) and then enforce the same rules at night.

If a child falls asleep while nursing, my theory is that
if they wake slightly, they expect to still be nursing,
so in order to fall back to sleep they need/want to nurse
again. But if the child falls asleep while not nursing,
perhaps while alone, then they are not surprised to wake
slightly and find that they are not nursing or are alone,
and can fall asleep again. So one thing to try is not
nursing at bedtime. That is, you can nurse just before
the child lies down to sleep, perhaps getting the child
into a half-asleep state, but have the child actually
fall asleep while not nursing. Maybe have the father
handle bedtime, then gradually extend the fraction of
the night that you're not available.

It's easy to get into the habit of always responding to
a child's cries as if they're emergencies. However, it's
good to think clearly about setting priorities. Your sleep
is important. Being there to reassure your child in the
night is also important IMO for the child's emotional health,
but in this situation you need to balance how important it
is with how important your sleep is. The child can learn
different habits. You or the child's father can reassure the
child with your presence without necessarily nursing. He may
protest vigorously but that isn't the end of the world.