Sooner or later, the infant will have to be weaned from night feedings. Regular night awakenings cause a lot of hassle and inconvenience for parents - after all, it is they who have to feed the child if he needs food in the middle of the night. Moreover, night feedings are often required by both breastfed babies and infants who are bottle-fed.
What is the reason that the child requires food at night? The fact is that young children have not yet developed the habit of sleeping 8-10 hours, as adults. Newly born babies are accustomed to continuous intrauterine feeding, so their sleep can last 3-4 hours - at the end of this period of time they wake up from hunger. Moreover, even older children - from one to two years old - often wake up in the middle of the night out of habit, wanting to eat or just chat with their parents. Is it worth giving up night feedings, and if so, how to do it right?
- If your baby is breastfed and you are not going to wean him, you should not completely remove night feeds. In the mother's body, the hormone prolactin, which is responsible for the quality and volume of lactation, is produced precisely at night. By completely avoiding night feedings, you will face the problem of a lack of breast milk. But you can reduce the number of night feedings to one time.
- A baby who is bottle-fed also often bothers parents at night. Some parents prefer to leave a bottle of warm mixture in the crib next to the baby, hoping that he will find it on his own, but even in this case, one bottle is not enough - and as a result, you still have to wake up. Therefore, it is better to completely wean such babies from night feedings.
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Remember that the least likely children to wake up in the middle of the night are children who have eaten a heavy meal before bedtime. Therefore, sometimes, to wean from feeding at night, it is enough just to transfer the evening complementary foods to the latest time. Another effective way is warm baths with soothing herbs (motherwort, valerian, hops, lavender) or essential oils.
Some babies wake up in the middle of the night not only and not so much for the sake of feeding, but for the sake of feeling tactile contact with mom or dad. Try to communicate with your baby as much as possible during the day - for example, often wear it on a sling or in your arms. Sooner or later, night feeds will no longer be necessary.
