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Sleeping through

Just wondering when i can expect my baby to start sleeping for longer? He's quite good at night but the longest stretch we've had between feeds is 5 hours, and that was a one-off, it's normally more like 3-4.

He's only 7 weeks tomorrow, but i've seen elsewhere that babies a similar age are sleeping better, however could this be because they are bottle fed so are fuller longer? Ryan is exclusively breastfed.

xxx

Replies

  • i think formula fed babies do sleep longer as the fomula is heavy and takes a long time to digest although my son was bottle fed and didnt! i also think its a lot to do with your baby and if they can self settle when the do wake



    we are 15 weeks in and DD sleeps 6:30 til 10 then 10:30 til about 3:30 then til about 6:30. this is our best so far although most of the ladies at my breastfeeding group with babies of similar age are getting between 9 and 11 solid hours i suppose i'm just unlucky to have 2 children that dont like to sleep through! every growth spurt for us has resulted in 2 hourly feeds at night hoping we are past that one!
  • Each baby is so different. My son is BF and is coming up to 13 weeks. He normally sleeps between 6-8 hours at night then wakes to feed and back to sleep. He is a very good sleeper though and goes down awake and settles himself. At around 7 weeks he was still waking after about 5 hours. I would always try and cluster feed in the evening to try and get as much in him as possible, don't know whether this helped but it felt right at the time.
  • well my son is 3 months today and the very best hes done is 10pm to 5am. he did this at 10 weeks for nearly a week and then started waking again more frequently. so guess it was a blip that week. he now wakes once or twice a night and sleeps between 3 and 5 hour stretches. apparently this is normal and many babies dont sleep though until much older, especially breastfed babies. im trying to gow with the flow now and enjoy the middle of the night cuddles.
  • My LO is 11 weeks and exclusively BF. He goes from 7.30pm up until anything from 0030 to 0400, then always feeds four hours after that feed. So this results in sometimes one, sometimes 2 night feeds, his longest stretch being anything from 5-9 hours. He cant do another long stretch after that first one though.



    In the day he mostly feeds 1-2 hourly so i guess he gets his calories in the daytime.



    Back at 7 weeks he did a 4.5 hour stretch till midnight and then 3 hourly till the morning, so similar to your LO.



    I think henry has done pretty well for saying he's been fully breast fed. I imagine a 12 hour stretch is a long way off - i think some dont do that till they are eating food, and probably 8-9 hours is most i can hope for. So apart from antisocial timings hes doing the right things. Hes never fed earlier than midnight for his first night feed so dont think we are going to be doing anything convenient like 10pm-7am! I think ill always be up in the later early hours but i can cope with him going through to 4/5am and i think, eventually (i hope) he'll get to the point he's doing this most nights. He goes straight back off afterwards to a more sane hour and because ive had a long stretch up until then it doesnt feel so bad. Plus if he goes this long i often wake before him with a boob that feels like it will explode! :lol:
  • Tigerlily just to let you know henry is still fully bf and last week (11 weeks old) he managed 1930-0600, then last night, 12 weeks on the dot he slept 2000-0700! Im really pleased although its mixed in with nights where he wakes at different times - so i dont expect a pattern - but i know its physically possible for him now.



    I was awake though with very full boobs! x
  • Wow, that's good sleeping Alfie! I've started dropping his 11pm feed now. Used to wake him up for it when i went to bed. So now he tends to drop off anywhere between 7-9ish, depending when he had a nap during the day, and as long as i don't wake him accidentally when i go to bed he sleeps til about 3 at the earliest, but could be later. The other night he went from 9.15 to 4.45, which was fab, then i put him back down, wide awake and he chattered away to himself while i went back to sleep! Didn't have to get him up until 8.15 that morning, and even then he didn't ask to be got up, he was just wide awake and smiling at us through the bars of his crib!

    xxx
  • hi tigerlily



    sounds like you are heading the same way henry and i went, we were doing similar at 9 weeks, now at 12 weeks last 3 nights are 12 hour stretches! So it can happen! Next we'll have teeth and then increased hunger through getting bigger...I just feel like im constantly bf in the day (im not complaining due to the good nights) but if the night gets that way too i will think about weaning. Ive never faltered in my resolve to feed him myself but i think after christmas if he's still feeding hourly i will consider some solids. In the end i may need a bit of time occasionally to do things for more than half an hour without a screaming baby! Plus in the end it must be very wearing for henry to feel so hungry all the time!



    he'll be 4 months at xmas and ideally id like to make 5...had a bad day today, crying round asda, had to feed him in asda cafe on my own then like an idiot could not find the car in the car park (i am a bit dumb so this is not uncommon, pre baby i just wandered round and found it) the screaming reached such a pitch i gave up and went in m and s and fed him in their cafe, without even buying anything image !! found the car after, lol, but henry has just grizzled all day. I think its a combination of hunger and hating the car seat. But we can't go anywhere without him going in it and i have to get out daily now, henry still not really interested in toys and the days are long! I know i should treasure the time but am always willing him on. will be do nice when he can do a tiny bit more and be interested in things. I wonder if this might make him go a bit longer without feeding too.



    Sorry for the rant! x
  • I know how you feel. I keep thinking it'll be nice when he can do a bit more, but then when he's all snuggled up with me i just don't want him to stop being a baby, and feel the weeks are going by too fast! It is hard when they need feeding when you're out. Not sure i'd be brave enough to sit somewhere without even buying something! I'm really proud of myself for keeping bf up though, as it was such a struggle to begin with! I've started putting him on a bottle of ebm for his evening feed which hubby has been doing. Started this at 6 weeks, but had to have a break so i could store some ebm, otherwise we didn't have enough for him and he had to keep coming back to me. Last 2 nights though he's had the bottle then hubby's got him to sleep, so i might be able to venture out for an evening soon!

    xxx
  • Hi Ladies,



    My LO is now 13.5weeks & tends to go to sleep around 8-9pm (we start getting him bathed, dressed etc about 7.15 but he often takes awhile to go off in his crib. He has been sleeping between 8 & 10 hours a night for the last week which I'm really happy with. We were struggling a few weeks back as he always wanted to nurse to sleep, would wake when put down in crib then work himself into such a state I'd end up feeding him back to sleep - this could repeat several times until tiredness got the better of him! In the end we decided to try him with a dummy on the occasions where he wouldn't drift off by himself & seemed to be getting worked up. This worked well & he started getting to sleep by 9pm instead of 11pm. Now he sometimes needs the dummy but other times he will play in his crib before drifting off by himself or a cuddle will do image . Ideally I had hoped not to use a dummy but it's really helped and we try to remember to only give it as a last resort - however admit we have used it in situations where we're out & I can't physically feed him (i.e. the queue of tesco, on a short bus journey). Alfie, I'm a regular in our M&S cafe & if I needed to stop and feed him I would!



    Tigerlily, prior to this recent increase in sleeping we were similar to yourselves with one or two feeds in the night.



    Good luck



    Linds
  • thanks ladies. The m and s stop was out of desperation! Henry was purple and screaming - people kept looking at me disapprovingly like i was hurting him or something! Grrr! I had bought some things in the shop and had the carrier bags to prove it, i knelt down to find my wallet in the queue and henry just upped the volume so much i thought sod this! It was late afternoon and lots of tables so just plonked myself down. Annoyingly, a girl at the next table said really loud, "you see thats why i gave up breast feeding!!!"not helpful. I would love bubba to take a bottle of ebm - but he just pushes it out with his tongue, have tried a dummy to see if this could teach him, the same thing happens. I'm not sure i'd want to give his last feed by bottle as i think henry loves the night time snuggle off to sleep (so do i)i will keep trying but otherwise will aim to get him started on a beaker at 6 months.



    linds76 sounds like you're doing fab with your LO. I had the same problem with henry, he'd go down, open his eyes. The crying would start 5 mins later. I'd feed him and the cycle would continue. It only took a couple of nights of taking longer each time for him to give it up.One night i had to listen for 15 mins which was hard, i think thats the limit, but it worked. I would love to use a dummy! I dont think before you have a baby anyone really likes the idea of it, but i know if henry would take to it it would be so useful for the times im out with him and desperate. Henry has taken to thumb sucking and in a way that might be worse as when he's older i cant wean him off his thumb! He doesnt always have the coordination to get his thumb in though bless him.



    xxx
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