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sleeping - plus advise!!! x
hi everyone!
i am feeling a bit deflated as my lo is now 4 months and is not anywhere near sleeping thru night!
i make up 7oz bottles and he sometimes drains others may take 6oz he has these about 8am, 11.30/12ish, 3.30/4ish, 7.30pm and the dream feed about 11pm
he then wakes in the night between 4.15 and 5am usually more the 4.15am - i try just putting dummy in and some nights he seems to settle back so i go loo etc and by time im done and had some water he is awake so i try again and hover and he wakes so as im tired and toddler gets up about 6.6/30am i just wana get back to bed - so i feed but then he is hard to settle looks wide awake, finially goes off but by then toddler up!
a friedn of mine has baby few dys older and she feeds at 8 then just waits for baby to wake and he doesnt wake till 5.30am so she feeds then he goes another few hours.................perhaps i should try this but i think he will wake abouyt 1ish then again at 5ish and then will be hard to get off so i will end up doing 2 night feeds.............
what does everyone else do?
also tried hungry baby milk in late night feed in hope will at least go till morning from that feed but he refussed bottle crying so gave normal and he took it so that didnt work!
xxx
i am feeling a bit deflated as my lo is now 4 months and is not anywhere near sleeping thru night!
i make up 7oz bottles and he sometimes drains others may take 6oz he has these about 8am, 11.30/12ish, 3.30/4ish, 7.30pm and the dream feed about 11pm
he then wakes in the night between 4.15 and 5am usually more the 4.15am - i try just putting dummy in and some nights he seems to settle back so i go loo etc and by time im done and had some water he is awake so i try again and hover and he wakes so as im tired and toddler gets up about 6.6/30am i just wana get back to bed - so i feed but then he is hard to settle looks wide awake, finially goes off but by then toddler up!
a friedn of mine has baby few dys older and she feeds at 8 then just waits for baby to wake and he doesnt wake till 5.30am so she feeds then he goes another few hours.................perhaps i should try this but i think he will wake abouyt 1ish then again at 5ish and then will be hard to get off so i will end up doing 2 night feeds.............
what does everyone else do?
also tried hungry baby milk in late night feed in hope will at least go till morning from that feed but he refussed bottle crying so gave normal and he took it so that didnt work!
xxx
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Replies
You can try dropping the dreamfeed but how much is your lo taking ? Mine used to take the bulk of her milk at the DF, around 6 ozs, it wasnt until she dropped to just taking an ounze or two that I dropped it and she was around 8 months old.
Its really up to you think it will help then give it a go, but as hard as it is surviving on broken sleep it could just simply be that your lo needs the df and the early morning feed.
I am actually a bit relieved to read your post as Toby is nowhere near sleeping through either. I usually have to do 2 night feeds, at about 2 and 5, but last night he went 11 - 3:30 - 7, yay!
I read another thread about this a few weeks ago and there were some LOs doing what Mason is doing at 6 months! So not wanting to scare either of us but it seems completely normal.
If you're going to feed him anyway I would maybe bite the bullet and feed him as soon as he wakes so you have a better chance of getting some more sleep before your toddler (sorry I've forgotten his name) wakes up. Then in a week or so try settling him back with a dummy instead of feeding and see what happens?
I have friends whose babies have been sleeping through for ages so I know how you feel! I think we just have to play the hand we've been dealt
Good luck - if you find something that works please let me know!!!!
charlotteb - yey thats much better if he went 11, 3.30, 7 then at least only getting up once! did you dream feed or did he wake for that 11 feed?
last night was all up for leaving him and see when he wakes but hubby said he is not going to suddenly drop 2 bottles in a sense and we want him to drop early morning(night) feed not the dream feed which is right - so he fed him last night like normal but he fell asleep on sofa and woke at 12 so fed him then... he still woke at 5.10 for feed - i put dummy in whilst got bottle and he went off for half hour so fed bout 5.45am as the house was still asleep i put him back down, he only went off about 6.30 when toddler woke but then he came in !
the thing is today as he had a feed at 5.45am in a sense thats his morning feed - so gave him the rest 3oz at 8.30 but now thinking if he now only has 11ish, 3ish, 7.30 and df then he has dropped a bottle today...................
ooo i am confussed!
did toby have lots of wind/colic problems? do you have him own room? when he wakes does he feed and go straight down?
xxxxxxxx
Thinking back to when my LO was small, I used to get myself in such a panic about if she had had the 'right' amount of bottles in a day, or the recommended amount (ie X ozs per 1lb weight) and very often she was nowhere near, other times she was over. To be honest, once I stopped panicing about it (whcih took me a while - I used to feed her before bed working out the amount she needed to get her up to recommended levels in the 24 hours!) things were much easier. I accepted that she was sometimes hungrier than others and would take what she wanted.
She was only a couple of weeks old when I put her in her own rom. We used to bath her at about 5.30, then feed her her bottle in her room, in the dark (just a low nightlight and blackout blind), with her music playing softly, and she would go down about 6.30/6.45. I never did the dreamfeed thing, I tried it a couple of times but she was always so tired that she never took more that a couple of ounces and I was still getting up in the night as well as staying up till 10.30 to do the DF. She would then wake anytime between 12.30 - 2, when I would do the same, give her her bottle in her room in the dark but no music, wind her and put her straight back down. No talking to her or anything. After a few weeks that feed started getting later and later (3, then 4, then 5) and I started cutting the amount down when it got to around 5am, dropping it an ounce every 2 or 3 days, down to 2 ounces and then she started sleeping through to about 6.30/7.
We did have an episode where we used a dummy for a short spell but it was ridiculous, getting to the stage where I was getting up about 15 times a night to put the dummy in, so we did the controlled crying thing and tok it away conpletely, whcih was really hard for about 3 nights. We replaced it with a comfort blanket, which she still has now.
Have you thought about starting to wean him if he is about 16 weeks? It might help as he will be that bit fuller for longer. Perhaps at lunchtimes (12ish) now you could start weaning him and then give him is bottle after food. Once that it established you could add in tea as well at about 4ish, along with a bottle and then he may sleep through a little better.
I hope things get better for you soon hun and that I ahve said something a bit useful! xx
I have tried dreamfeeding (I am BFing) but just can't seem to manage it - he always wakes. So now I just wait for him to wake himself - he usually has a feed at about 7ish and will then wake sometime between 10-11.
He is currently sleeping in his moses basket in our spare room because at the moment we have no nursery as it is in tatters (shower upstairs leaked through nursery ceiling, builders will hopefully be finished next week as he is starting to outgrow the basket!!). I am sleeping in there with him while OH sleeps in our room - that way I don't have to do much when feeding in the night other than roll over and pick him up, and OH gets a good nights sleep before work (he sleeps with us on Friday and Sat nights). I am desperately hoping that he starts sleeping through before he has to go in the big cot as we can't move it out of the nursery (we built it in there) and I REALLY don't want to have to keep going between our room and the nursery for feeding in the middle of the night!
After the night feeds I wind him, swaddle him back up (I used to keep him swaddled for the feed but these days he escapes his swaddle every time so I have to re-do anyway!) and then put him back in his basket. Usually I change his nappy after every feed but at night I only do it if he has done a poo. Sometimes he goes to sleep right away, other times he needs to suck on his dummy for a bit but otherwise he goes right to sleep. This works for any feed between 10pm and about 5am, but if he wakes after that he is like Mason and wants to start the day!
Last night was our best ever (touch wood again!). He fed at 7pm, 10pm, 3am and 7:45am. So just one middle of the night feed - bliss! Am hoping that it is the start of something great
However I am all confused about today just like you - from the 7:45am he fed at about 11am. I am BFing on demand but he is usually every 3 hours during the day like clockwork - will it now be 2pm, 5pm, 8pm, 11pm?? Maybe I should bring one of those forward? Or just wait and see what happens? Whatever I do it will be wrong and I'll end up wishing I hadn't, I just know it...
C