Weaning two boob loving boys

Weaning was something I was worried about but looking forward too all at the same time. After a few initial bumps in the road I found the process of breast-feeding reasonably easy, but didn't really enjoy like a lot of mums do. The boys were two hourly feeders for a long time and I felt like I constantly had them attached to me, for them then to go and puke all that milk back up - thanks reflux! I basically felt like I was on a roundabout of feeding that I couldn't get off. So after 6 months I was done with it, I wanted to get to a year but it just wasn't something that made me happy anymore.  I was told the easiest way to wean was to drop a feed every week/few days or day, whatever time frame worked with you. I started with the night-time feeds as those I already liked to share with Jay by pumping and us feeding them with bottles, it also one of the feeds that is "most comforting" to the boys, so would be the hardest to get them to give up if I left that till last. Over the course of their sixth month I dropped a feed once a week till eventually I was just feeding them in the morning. The morning feeds lasted for a few weeks then one day they just weren't interested in the boob anymore and that's it, off they went on their happy way to their new relationship with the bottle...and OH MY is it a deep and loving relationship!


I have to say it was a relief when it was done and it wasn't a battle, I had had enough battles with Collic and Reflux! So nice to have some personal space back and not two wriggly babies grappling for my boobs!

The boys are 2.5 now and for the last 2 years those Nuggets have LOVED their bottles. More than they loved my boobs, which was another huge love at that! Bot Bot's as they are commonly referred to in our household have been a life saver in so many situations.


From 6 months till a year the boys drank Heinz Nuture formula, but as you know it's expensive so as soon as they hit 1 I moved them onto cows milk. We were lucky again the boys loved cows milk and were happy to ditch the formula right away. We started the boys on Silver Top Anchor milk as it is partially non-homogenised, which means it's closer to it's original form and full of fat, great for growing boys! Farmer backgrounds on Jay's side of the family were very happy with this decesion as it wasn't something that had occured to me utnill they mentioned it.




At about a year and a half I toyed with the idea of dropping bottles all together, all the articles I read said it would be easiest to do it at this stage rather than waiting and that they didn't need them anymore. BUT I was far too scared to do it, the bottle was such a source of comfort for them. If they woke in the night and I couldn't settle them (which was very often) the bottle would calm them right down and off they would go back to sleep. Who wants to give that up? Not this twin mama, sleep and calming tools are so important to me! Looking back now we probably should have done it, as the boys are still obsessed with their bottles and there is no way we will be getting rid of them anytime soon.Which makes me feel guilty like I didn't make the right decesion and I should have gone through the hard yards then, as now it will be MUCH harder as they can talk and demand a Bot Bot.  The boys go through on average between 9-11 litres of milk a week! We have a second fridge in the garage that is devoted to holding all their milk. We moved to Anchor Blue when they hit 2 as they decided they liked to have their milk cold (fussy little men) if they had it during the day. The fatty cream in the Silver Top meant that it wouldn't flow through they bottles if it wasn't warm.


Bottles is one of those crutches they have now that I flip-flop between feeling bad about or not caring. I mean it's a great way for them to get a big dose of calcium, when they are whiny and having an off day I can give them a bottle and get 10 minutes of peace (great for my sanity), it settles them in the night if they are having a bad sleep and well, we never had dummies so it's not like they have lots of other crutches we have to get rid of. But at the same time I stress about it thinking are they too old to be having bottles, is it bad for their teeth,  the added cost to our weekly shops, cleaning all the bloody bottles, is it just a habit and could it get worse? I just generally have the typical mum guilt thinking the main reasons I want to keep the bottles is because it makes MY life better. Funny the internal battles we have right?  Doesn't make it any easier when you get the "oh they are still having bottles!" comments!

So for now the bot bots stay, screw what people think as they do make my life easier and the boys love them. Can't be that bad right?  Have you had bottle loving kids and how did you get them off them? Weaning from bottles is going to be way harder than it was weaning from the boobs!

Go The Fuck To Sleep

Have you heard about that "storybook" Go The Fuck To Sleep? That's how I have felt all weekend about my children. Pretty much muttered it under my breath yelled it at almost all sleep times for the past 4 days. The boys are usually OK sleepers. Ok in the fact they can self settle (but don't always choose to do it) and generally sleep through the night (just not recently). But they aren't long nappers, never have been, and are early risers. The latter of which I am sadly not. Jays been away in Sydney for four days so I have been flying solo, and sure enough the boys can smell the fear and decide to act up. They have a really nasty habit (just plan naughty behaviour) of getting out of their beds in protest of going to bed, laying on their backs and KICKING their feet against the door and screaming really loudly...and I ignore them. You may think I'm mean ignoring their cry and obvious upset, but I swear they aren't, they just want to protest in the loudest, most aurally confronting way possible! The last few nights they have ramped this up a notch and really gone for it. It seriously sounds like the door is about to fall of its hinges. Yes I can hear you now, go in and tell them off, persist and they will stop, lay in there till they fall asleep....tried all that! My kids bizarrely don't do well with me in their room, they fuss even more and have scary spider sense. I can lay there for an hour and would bet anything they were asleep. I move in the slightest to leave and one will sit straight up and say Mama?! WTF, how did you hear me/why aren't you bloody asleep after an hour? GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP! I know they fall into a deep slumber in way less time when I'm not in their room, so why not when I'm there? Anyway, I disgress. This banging is so so loud and is really intense if you aren't used to it/havent hard the little buggers go for it. On Friday I was talking to my friend Rebecca on the phone after I put the boys to bed and they banged, banged and banged for 25 minutes before they gave up! She couldn't believe it. I think it just spurned us both on to talk about how our children had been horrors the last few days. I love my kids, but gosh they can run rings around you!

So settling to sleep has been a nightmare, nap times have been super short (and we all know nap time is the best time of the day when you are tired and flying solo!) and they have been waking REALLY early like pre 5am early, and wanting come into "mummys bed". It's like they know I am more of a pushover when Jays away, and in my head letying them in is a good idea! They will sleep better and we will all get nore sleep right? wrong! I  then spend a night awake being kicked, pushed and susshing babies to sleep as its suddenly more fun to stay awake and climb over me. Fail. Anyway the point of this blog is to vent, venting is good, so that honour falls on you. Thank you! Sadly there is not some magic answer at the end of this blog to stop my kids kicking in the door and sleep in till 7am. If you think you have one please feel free to share below!

Jays home in 1 hour, and he is on the drive show on Hauraki this week, so no breakfast slot 4am starts for him. Which means...you guessed it. This mama is getting a sleep in! Boom!