Flexible breastfeeds help make toddler sleep easy

It's normal for toddlers to fall asleep with a breastfeed

Toddlers often fall asleep with a breastfeed. This is biologically normal, and makes sleep easy.

Breastfeeding doesn't only bring your little one the extraordinary nutritional and myriad other bioactive protections which are offered up with the living tissue of your milk. Breastfeeding is a form of sensory motor nourishment. From an evolutionary perspective, breastfeeding meets both these fundamental biological needs. It usually doesn't help to think about these two roles of breastfeeding as if they are separate.

Toddlers like to fall asleep with breastfeeds because breastfeeding causes

• A rise in the neurohormones of relaxation and sleepiness due to milk in the tummy. (Not all breastfeeds transfer much milk and this is normal too.)

• Dialling up of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is the ‘rest and digest’ part of the involuntary nervous system.

• Deep relaxation and enjoyment from sucking, which is soothing for your small child's nervous system and dials down the sympathetic nervous system. Sucking also dials up the parasympathetic nervous system.

• Physical closeness and loving interaction, which dial down your toddler's sympathetic nervous system.

For as long as you are choosing to breastfeed, from a biological perspective breastfeeding remains a crucial part of your child's sleep ecosystem. You can find out why breastfeeding your toddler to sleep doesn't cause bad habits here.

What are frequent flexible breastfeeds?

If you are a breastfeeding woman, offering your toddler the breast just whenever you think it will dial her down makes sleep easiest for your family. Your breast becomes a powerful tool for keeping the days as easy as possible. This has a wonderful side benefit: the sleep regulators (both the body clock and sleep pressure) kick in easily in a dialled down toddler.

Offering frequent flexible breastfeeds is so helpful for families that it really is a #1 toddler-sleep superpower.

Your little one's sleep needs decreased throughout the first year of her life. Now, your toddler will only drop off to sleep at the breast when the sleep pressure is very high, and this happens less and less often during the day as she grows older and naps disappear. But many women breastfeed their small child off to sleep right throughout toddlerhood. They find it easiest. When they are ready to stop – they wean.

Breastfeeds don't need to last long

Often you'll hear that a breastfeed is like a meal-time, when your toddler should fill up on milk. But this isn't true, and places pressure on both yourself and your small child.

Toddler breastfeeds can be surprisingly quick, a brief and powerful fix of sensory motor nourishment, up close and connected to your body. But there'll be other feeds when you're happy to settle down into a relaxed long breastfeeding cuddle together. The main thing is to feel you can use the breast to dial your toddler down, whenever you want to. You might also offer the breast again even though you offered just a short time ago! If you don't want to offer the breast at any particular moment, shift your toddler's focus onto a richer sensory motor adventure, most easily achieved by being outside the house!

Recommended resources

Flexible breastfeeds help make toddler sleep easy

Breastfeeding your toddler to sleep doesn't cause bad habits

How to support a breastfeeding woman so that toddler sleep isn't entirely up to her?

Would it help your toddler's sleep to delay or space out breastfeeding in the night?

Would weaning or increasing the amount of solids your toddler eats help with sleep?

What to do about toddler sleep when you're ready to wean from the breast?

What to do about daytime sleeps when you're weaning your toddler?

Would night weaning help your toddler sleep better?

Selected references

Veile A, Miller V. Duration of breast feeding in ancestral environments. Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-3-319-19650-3_818: Springer, Cham.; 2021.

Sellen DW, Smay DB. Relationship between subsistence and age at weaning in "preindustrial" societies. Human Nature. 2001;12:47-87.