How to Get My 10 Month to Eat More During the Day, and Not Nurse at Night

Hi L.,
At 10 months your son should be able to make it through the night without waking to eat. He may be doing this more out of habit than hunger. It might be time for you to wean him from his middle of the night feedings. Here's what my husband and I did with our son, who was about 5 1/2 months at the time. When we did this he was waking two to three times per night to nurse. I started reducing the amount of time he nursed every night ( you could do every other night if you would prefer, it will just take a bit longer) So if you have been nursing him for 6 minutes every 4 hours, only offer 5 1/2 minutes of nursing tonight. When there are multiple feedings per night, you also increase by 15 minutes per night, the amount of time between feedings. So you would do 5 minutes of nursing every 4.25 hours tomorrow, 4 1/2 minutes every 4 1/2 hours the next night, and so on. We found this method in Dr. Richard Ferber's book (which made a lot of sense to me, you may want to try reading it to see what you think), and it worked really well for us. According to the book, most kids stop waking to eat before you can reduce them down to nothing, my son stopped waking to feed after 4 or 5 nights. I thought a gradual approach was better than just trying to quit cold turkey, which seemed pretty awful to me. Unless your son is under nourished during the day, is underweight, or has some other medical complication, I don"t think there is any reason he would need to nurse in the middle of the night, so don't feel bad about eliminating it.

Also, make sure when you go in to feed him, you keep it as utilitarian as possible, no lights, no conversation, just nurse and back to bed. You want to show him that nighttime is for sleeping.

Also, something I noticed while I was nursing, my son was far more effective at getting milk than my breast pump, so don't necessarily assume that since you can only pump 4 oz, that he only gets 4 oz when he nurses. If you are really concerned go ahead and offer an extra feeding during the day, your milk supply will catch up in a few days, or offer formula if you aren't able to nurse.
Good luck!

Hi, L..
Good for your balancing breastfeeding and working for so long! That isn't an easy task. You're right on the money about replacing those calories at night with calories during the day. Your baby is smart enough to let you know by fussing when the watered down bottle doesn't fill him up. :) You might try squeezing in an additional full bottle somewhere, or you could try adding a couple ounces to each bottle. If you have extra, previously pumped milk, that would be the first choice. If not, formula is a safer choice than water.
After increasing his daily intake, you might find he still awakens just to be with you. A great book for helping babies sleep longer is Good Nights by Jay Gordon.
A quick milk supply increase idea is to massage your breasts while you pump. This has been shown to increase quantity, and increase fat content (which makes babies feel full longer).
A.
www.breastandbottlefeeding.com

Definitely the Fenugreek and oatmeal if you are worried about supply. Try 3 capsules 3 times a day, and be prepared to smell like maple syrup. You can increase the dose as needed, and wean yourself off as needed.
I would try pumping more, and feeding him more often. I think at 10 months my son was eating every 4 hours or so. He was getting at least 4 feedings a day, however much he got. The solids are just practice right now, so make sure that he gets his milk first too, and then offer solids.
Also, would wait when he would wake up at night. At first it was 5 minutes, then 10 minutes. After about 4 days, he was sleeping though the night. He was much younger than your son when I did this, so I am sure that your son will do just fine through the night.

My daugher is now passed the bottle phase of life, but she never took more than 4oz ever! If I made 6 she would sometimes take 5, but for the most part I would always dump 2oz out. She was a good eater of other foods so I just never worried. Her weight was great, so I just let it go...

I would say cut out the juice... it is empty calories for sure. And your idea of adding formula is smart. We gave our daughter one formula bottle before bed (rest of the day was breast), so she would go to sleep with something that would hold her for the night and it worked great. She started to sleep through the night. If he has never had formula you might have to mix it for awhile until he gets used to the taste.

Good luck!

Don't use water, get a second opinion first, my doctor said that messes up a baby's electrolites!! Try baby cereal right before bed mixed with your breast milk.

I increased my milk supply by drinking a malt (ovaltine) with yeast and pumping more often. It worked for me.

Ok I too am a full time working mom to a 10 month old boy. Here is my routine: Breastfeed in the a.m., pump around 9:30 - I only get about 2 ounces - my milk is about gone - then I take that 2 ounces with me to day care when I go at lunch time and breast feed him. They give him that milk with his cereal in the afternoon around 3 pm. Then I breastfeed around 4 usually, but sometimes I don't need to. Then he breast feeds at bedtime and he sleeps through the night. He eats 3 meals as well.
I don't have as much milk as you it sounds like, so my son must be eating less, and still sleeps through the night, so I am guessing he just has different needs. I don't know that your milk supply will have anything to do with it. When he eats in the middle of the night, isn't there less available in the morning? That's how it works for me anyway, so he just wants a more frequent feeding. Personally I can't understand the logic of your pediatrician's advice to mix with water.

On the subject of increasing your milk supply I have had really good results with Fenugreek. it works in a couple of days. I also drink about 100 ounces of water a day, no caffeine, and eat oatmeal every morning. All of these things seemed to help my milk production. (but it is still low!)

Sometimes the nighttime feedings are about food, and sometimes they are about the baby wanting to spend time with his mother. maybe he misses you and wants to see you at night. Nothing wrong with that.

honestly I doubt that he is really hungry. By that age babies should be able to go all night with out eating. So you could try just letting him cry it out. It would most likely only take a night or two to break him from the habit of waking up to nurse. My daughter was the same way until I completely weaned her from nursing at night. Only then did she start sleeping all night long.

I am also a working/pumping mom. My son just turned one and it still nursing a couple times at night! We co-sleep, so I don't mind much and don't plan to night wean him for a little while because 1) I think the night nursing helps my milk supply since he is much more effective than the pump at extracting milk, 2) he is not eating substantial solids yet (he eats a variety of food, just not much of it), and 3) I like the cuddle time with him since I am at work all day. I pump 2-3 times per day and my son takes 3 4oz bottles of breastmilk while I'm at work. Now that he is one, I plan to only pump twice/day and top them off with whole cow milk if I didn't pump enough milk (today 2 oz cow milk 10 oz BM).

I just want you to know that it is VERY common for breastfed babies to still nurse at night at 10 month. If it is not a problem for you there is no reason that you need to night wean him. In fact, many breastfeeding advocates recommend waiting until after 1 year to night wean. That said, if it is causing problems for you, it sounds like your son is eating solid food pretty well and you could probably follow a sleep training method to get him to sleep through the night. I agree with what the others has said about increasing your supply. Did anyone mention gatorade? I've had some luck with that too.

Good luck to you! You've done a great job making it this far! It's not easy to work full time and pump!

ETA: you might need to add another nursing session druing the day. Are you already nursing in the morning, as soon as you get home from work and again before bed? If you can't increase you supply for the pump, nuring regularly during those times should signal to you body to produce milk at those times.

Hi Lanie - just echoing what others are saying here, but 10 months is exactly the age when I cut my son's night feedings out all together. We had a couple of rough nights where he still woke out of habit but after that, he never woke again (unless something was wrong). What we did was what Bridgette suggested to you. I simply started cutting the amount of time I breast fed him by a minute or two every night until I was down to four minutes. Once you're down to four minutes, the next night, you simply cut it out. You can do this with a bottle also, if you're bottle feeding him at night. When your son wakes at his normal time to feed and you've weaned down to the four minute mark, have your hubby (if possible) just go in and tell him it's night-night and time to go back to sleep. My DH even picked our son up that first night we cut out the feeding because the night feedings are as much about needing affection as it is needing nutrition. So he went in and rocked him back to sleep that first night. The next night, he just rubbed his back and said to go back to sleep. The third night, my son woke up at his usual time but then just went back to sleep. I think it really helps not to have the mom go in because then they can smell the milk on you and it's not very fair. It's scary thinking your baby is lying there hungry but I promise you, at this age, he's just gotten USED to taking in those calories at that time. He doesn't need them. Once he stops taking in the calories at night, he will automatically start taking in a bit more during the day. But I would stop watering the bottle down because all that does is cause his tummy to feel "fake full".

Good luck!