encouraging weaning while tandem nursing?

[beckstar]

my little dude is 27 months old and an AVID nurser....in fact, he nurses/asks to nurse more than his 6 mo sister...he was nighweaned during my pregnancy (we cosleep, all of us) but began waking to nurse again after baby came...im thinking maybe cuz i had milk again...or just force of habit since he was adjusting to siblinghood...its a guessing game, really.

i am getting pretty overwhelmed nursing the both of them and would like to start encouraging him to wean...the only thing is i have NO CLUE how to do that since his sister is still nursing mostly...we've started solids slowly...but im in no rush.

my first guess is to nightwean again w/ daddy's help...then eventually move him to his own room/bed and keep bringing him back there if he wakes up...but thats a different edge of the sword since we practice AP and truthfully i should be letting him cosleep as long as he wishes to by those standards...

i suppose what im asking is for pointers, stories of how YOU did it, etc.

knock me out mamas!

[MinkaK]

Well I am tandem nursing too but Ds doesn't nurse at night. He also night weaned at my insistance during my pregnancy but we just soothe him back to sleep when he wakes ( we all also cosleep). Now he will HAPPILY drink all my milk so I have started to only have dd nurse first then he can have the leftovers so to speak. (though there are times they both nurse)If my breast is empty he usually isn't too interested in staying on. I also try to play with his noisy toys when I feed her, and when she is done I don't offer any to him and if he asks I try to engage him in something else first. Not sure if any of that helps but that is what is going on here.

[duck411]

In the same situation here.... and I am a tad overwhelmed

[jeebee]

double post

[jeebee]

Bumping this because I'm wondering how it went with you guys? My newbie is 1 mo and honestly my ODD is really getting to me with wanting to nurse all the time. She will nurse all morning in bed with me and then not eat breakfast :-( She gets mad when the baby wants to nurse and i won't let her do it too. She pushes her head away sometimes which makes me sad. I usually let her nurse twice a day and the rest of the day try to distract her but it's so impossible when there is another little person doing it right in front of her. I am aiming for weaning in the next 3-6 months, how did it happen for you?

[beckstar]

well, pearl just turned nine months old and i think ocean might finally be 'done'...i say this because i had him weaned for about three weeks, with lots of asking and crying...then he got sick and i figured it would be better for him to get the antibodies...so i nursed him once a day for a week or so...its now been about four or five days...

i noticed a huge increase in his appetite after not nursing him...but i truly feel like tandem nursing during the early months really helped with the adjustment to his new sibling...so i encourage you to at least try for a few more months...

but your older daughter is not too young to learn nursing manners. you can tell her if she is pushing her baby sister she will not get to nurse, etc. and perhaps you can designate her own private nursing session with the little goes down for a nap or what not...the cool thing is that the older they are, the easier they are to reason with...

hoping it evens out soon. its very very crazy in the early days...or at least it was for me.