nightweaning

Reading my recent rants, it seems like my life revolves around the sleep habits of BabySon. This is unfair, as he's a charming little man. He laughs easily, smiles with his entire body, and loves people more than any toy. He's a little champ - we've begun feeding him some solids, and while he'll make the most horrible icky faces when new foods are introduced, his curiousity outweighs his distaste every time so far. Also? He cut his first two teeth with nary a fuss. No drooling (at least no more than most days), no screaming in the middle of the night, no weeks of fussy behavior - just a little surprise for mommy one morning when he chomped down on my finger.

That said, the current challenge is night weaning. My dear sweet little one loves to nurse off to sleep. I think that much of the pre-sleep angst over these many months is related to the times when his favorite tonic fails and he has to figure out some other way to enter dreamland. I've been lucky that since day one he would easily fall back to sleep in the middle of the night with a little nip...but this has also created the current situation. I'm done being awakened every two hours to help him back to sleep when I know he can sleep longer between feedings.

So last night it began. When he woke up after two hours, I rocked him. And rocked him. While he cried and pleaded and nuzzled into my chest. Heartbreaking doesn't begin to describe it - I had what he wanted right there, hidden only by a thin bit of fabric. I whispered to him, soothing words, incomprehensible words describing exactly why he couldn't have what he wanted. A couple of times he almost dozed off, but he's a persistent one, this boy of mine. Daddy came in after a while and took over. After what seemed like ages (but was really 30 minutes) I nursed him to sleep.

Will this work? Can I reprogram him to either a) spread out his feedings or b) fall asleep some other way or c) all of the above? I know on an intellectual level that this is a good start (and good practice for the pinnacle of childrearing - consistency), but at 3am when I'm holding a pleading, sad little baby it feels cruel.