This is the second week of her Sleep Training part 2. It officially started after our cruise holiday with Royal Caribbean. She is now going to be 15 months old, eating and enjoying solid food. My supply had dwindle since she turn 1 years old, I have a feeling she still latch on mainly for comfort so I started planning for this sleep train+ weaning off project during new year.
Step 1 To make her drink non-breast milk
She hates bottle. After trying for almost half a year of different brand and size of bottle and teat, we gave up and accepted the fact that she hates bottle. So once she turn 1 years old, we started trying fresh milk in cup with straw. She seems to like it, in some good days she can drink 120ml. However, my mother-in-law who is the main caregiver didn't like the idea that she is drinking cold drinks at such a young age, and blame her frequent running nose to the fresh milk. So we tried to give her formula milk in cup with straw instead. By chance, we manage to find one brand that she like, yeah! Simultaneously, we tried full cream milk in small packet. From all the trial and error, we found out that she likes strawberry milk, don't like chocolate milk. Just before the cruise during the last week of Feb, we have scheduled in 3 drink milk session in a day, either formula or packet full cream milk: breakfast, tea-break and supper. She still don't drink much, her usual intake is one packet of milk a day, that is about 250ml.
Step 2 Night time sleep without latching
After holiday is good time to instil new habits, because we have to re-instil old habits anyway after holidays. I decided to focus on night time sleeping, as I can outsource nap time to my MIL ;p. So for the past 2 weeks, I avoided to be with her during her nap time in the morning and afternoon. The bedtime routine is supper, read a story, change her diapers, off the light, on her bedtime light cum lullaby music, put her in her bed and kiss goodnight. The plan is to not offer until she forget about latching.
Result so far:
First night is terrible, I think she cried hysterically for half hr or so, refused to stay in her bed, she wanted me to carry and bring her to our room to sleep with us (post-holiday syndrome, we sleep together during the cruise holiday). I tried to sing lullaby to her, hug her and comforted her once in a while, tried to stay calm and firm. After a battle of about one and a half hour, she finally fall asleep on my head. I was too tired, so I rested my head on her mattress while sitting beside her bed watching her cry. She crawled to me, hug my head and cried for a while, then out of a sudden she stopped . After remaining still in that uncomfortable position for a minute or so, I carefully moved her hands and body away, she was already soundly asleep.
Subsequent nights got better, there were some nights she missed her afternoon naps, so she was very tired and fell asleep very fast. This weeks' improvement is significant.Once I announce to her that it's sleeping time after reading a story to her, she will climb up to her own bed and wait for me. There is no more crying, maybe a bit of whimper when she can't sleep after a while. She still take about an hour to fall asleep, she still needs me to be beside her before she falls asleep. But I am already happy that she no longer expect to be latched on to sleep, even when she wakes up briefly in the middle of night, she can go back to sleep very soon once she is assured that I am with her. I hope she will be able to make herself fall asleep faster soon.
Step 3 Nap time
Nap time is always a challenge. This will be next week homework and will be updated in Sleep Training part 3. I suppose she is already used to the idea of not latching at all, but I have not thought of a good nap time routine yet. Hmm...
