4 month old waking every two hours to feed, help!

[lolalotta]

Hi, my four month old has gone from waking every 3 to 4 hours to every 2 to feed at night!!! I'm not sure how much longer I can take it... Could it be a growth spurt? Or is it because she has two teeth coming through?
She is exclusively bf. Not sure what to do, I am too tired to comfort her back to sleep without feeding (feeding her gets her back down quite quickly),but I am worried that I am encouraging a habbit of waking/ feeding with this frequency. DP works really long hours and has an hour commute to and from work so I don't feel it would be right/safe to ask him to help when he has work the next day though he does get up on weekends for nappies, winding etc.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
P.S: Some of the wakings are due to wind, not sure how to help her with that, worried it is something in my diet.

[LovelyDear]

do you eat lots of grapes? i used to find that gave my babies wind. and avoid caffeine. i think you might just have to wait this one out. At most it'll be 8 weeks until she starts solids, and gets a bit fuller. i found a dummy helped enormously with one child, not at all with the other. nighttimes only i promise. I wouldn't worry at this stage about forming habits; maybe if it's still a problem at 6 months you could start to be a bit more 'mean' and put up with some crying. others may (will) totally disagree with me of course.....

[lolalotta]

Thank you for your response!
I do Avoid grapes but do eat lentils regularly (I am vegetarian) If it is this Im a bit stuffed! Lots of my home cooking involves lentils! I do drink caffine-free tea but I do eat chocolate in the evening, maybe I should give this up![sad}

[tinks27]

try infacol for wind.i had to persevere with it for every feed for a week before seeing results, but amazing difference in getting burps up. i did AFTER not before a feed.
might help with the wind.my LO was v windy!

[FlightofFancy]

I could have written your post! My DS (4 months this week) has recently gone from waking just once in the night to regular 2 hourly. I think he's actually hungry every time as well - and, like you, I can't be bothered to try other ways to get him back to sleep - when a 10 minute feed is my fastest way back to bed!
I don't have a solution I'm afraid (though I've just got a copy of the no-cry sleep solution based on recommendations on here). I'm just gritting my teeth and hoping it's a phase!

[LovelyDear]

i have to say i think the evening choc made a difference to mine too. but it may be you're willing to take risk - i know i was! no idea about the lentil thing, unless you are desperate i would try other things eg infacol first.

[Maranello]

lolalotta, have a look at this and/or google "four month sleep regression". it's really, really common for babies to do this. they have a growth spurt and lots of developmental changes at this time, so if you can just go with it for a little while, it WILL pass.

my 6mo dd did this at 4mo - it lasted a fortnight and i was ready to weep... but then it was over and her sleep got a lot better from then on.

oh, and there's not really much evidence to suggest that what you eat affects the baby (though i'm not disputing that some people do find this!). take a look here - i think you're ok with those lentils (and chocolate is obligatory for bf).

[FlightofFancy]

Forgot to say, I'm also struggling with the long lunchtime nap - and it seems to really make a difference how much sleep he has during the day. If I can get him to have a good long nap, then he sleeps better at night.

[neolara]

Very common for 4 month old babies to become hideously distacted during feeding during the day and to make up their calories during the night.

You could try feeding during the day in a dark, quiet room where there is nothing to look at or listen to. I couldn't read a book as my dd tried to grab it. TV and radio was also out as she lost concentration while feeding. Once I started doing the above, my dd stopped waking every 1 1/2 hours for food at night and went back to every 3 hours or so.

[AngelDog]

4 month sleep regression/growth spurt:

here andhere

[lazzaroo]

Have the same situation with my now 5 month old. Started waking frequently about 2-3 weeks ago. Put it down to combination of teething and growth sprut but hoping it would have passed by now...it hasn't!!!

I tend to start off the evening with good intentins of trying to settle bt as night goes on (and iredness increases!), I reach her out of cot and feed straight away!

She is also incredibly distartced during daytime feeds and has always been reluctant to nap...too nosey for her own good.

[rubia]

oh I am so glad to have found this thread, I thought I was going mad! this is my first ever post although I have been 'lurking' mumsnet for some time.
Last week DS (ebf) was sleeping 7pm -6ish with a quick feed at 3, then Saturday night (his 19wk birthday)he wouldn't settle, became inconsolable and vomited spectacularly....and has since then been waking every 2 hours all night. I thought it was something I ate, teething or the fact we were at the in-laws(overstimulated) but it hasn't improved now home. And he does seem genuinely hungry....I have resorted to co-sleeping to make feeding easier.
thanks for the links on sleep regression, it is really so helpful to not feel so alone in the midst of the sleep deprivation....especially when all my post-natal group babies seem to be sleeping through.

[FlightofFancy]

Hi Rubia - yes, we've had spectacular vomiting as well, and I think a tummy bug (some vile poo!) and that doesn't help. If it's any help, the vomiting/fussing seems to have calmed down a bit and that's made daytime feeding easier, though the nights are still very hit and miss!

[lolalotta]

Rubia, FlightsofFancy, any inprovement regarding nights? My lo was up 5 times last night... not sure how much longer I can hack this. She still is struggling with wind, which I think is waking her up a lot of the time and then she needs mummy to comfort her, help her get back to sleep.I am going to try cutting lentils out of my diet this week and see if this helps her...
Let me know how you have been getting on!

[FlightofFancy]

Hiya,
Not much I'm afraid! His feeding during the day has got much better, and I'm working like mad on the lunchtime nap (today was repeated circuits of the local park!). Last night he was up three times (though the last time, I was so tired that by the time I'd woken up and realised, he'd gone back to sleep ). The night before it was 4...

Having read the sleep solution book, it suggests a few things - first setting your 'objectives' - for an ideal case but also for a 'livable with' situation. I'm aiming to get him down to two night wake ups to start with - 2-2.30ish and 4.30-5ish, then a single night wake-up again (probably around 3am), as I think sleeping through is way too ambitious for ebf babies.

Then, you pick a few 'solutions' to try to achieve this - so, I'm trying to make sure he has enough sleep during the day and also to make sure he has enough to eat between 7-7, as I'd started spacing out feeds, so think he probably was having to little during the day and not enough at night. Going to see what difference that makes over the next week or so - as I tend to chop and change what I'm doing based on my latest theory about every 2 days, which I suspect doesn't help!

If you're struggling with wind, it might be worth trying some gentle tummy massage - I've done baby massage classes, and there's a series of movements you can do to help with colic/wind. It's a bit of a faff, as you do it 2-3 times a day, but can be done at nappy change time. Not certain it works, but again, it makes you feel like you're doing something about it!

(sorry about essay - can touch type, so posts tend to get long quite quickly!)

[RubyBuckleberry]

i found 4-6 months really hard - constantly hungry it seems, although he was going through babygros like nothing else!

i gave ds a massage everynight and he has been pretty good on the digestion stakes i think (could be chance though tbh)

there is plenty of time for tinkering about with sleep isshoooos, if i had it all again, i would just feed him everytime - he is back to one/two wakings now for big feeds - i haven't done anything really - he has just grown out of it. one weekend we actually co-slept as i just couldn't bear it!

and flghtoffancy i had the same thing where i'd lie there and think - i can't move - i'll just wait a few minutes to see what happens, and then i would look at my watch and it was two hours later really weird!!!

[InmaculadaConcepcion]

Well, it shows they can re-settle themselves, if nothing else!!

On the wind massage front - I find doing a gentle but firm circular motion on my DD's tummy (concentrating on the right side especially) then lifting both her legs right up a few times tends to release some impressive farts. I do it 3 times and stop if nothing's coming or continue if she's flatulating nicely until it all seems out. Less of a faff than the I LOVE YOU massage (which she doesn't seem to like), pretty effective and can be done at each nappy change...

Good luck - my DD wakes up four times a night for feeding too.... groo....

[bluesatinsash]

oh thank God its not just me!! The whole feed over attempting a dark o'clock re-settle wins every time!

DS2 is nearly five months and EBF. He was always fed twice during the night but recently that has been getting more and more

I'm going to read the links kindly left here but having spoken to another Mummy who's lo is roughly the same age and reading Baby Whisperer again it talks about increasing the days feeds from 3 to four hourly so baby takes more at each feed = more 'day time' calories = less night time wakings.

I've started today spacing our DS2's feeds so lets see how tonight goes...

Glad its not uncommon I was starting to think my milk was losing its goodness

[princessmel]

ds2 is doing the same atm. He is 28 weeks.

Was going from 8pm till 4am.....not any more! No end in sight.

[bluesatinsash]

Bella - wandered over to 'sleep' section and found reassuring thread here

One of the posters copied a section from kellymom.com (I love that site!) here which has reassured me no end.

Have spaced Ben's feeds out today and managed an afternoon nap at in-laws so feeling better. Ben also took good big feed at bedtime and he actually needed sung to sleep as didn't drop off in an oxytocin-induced breast milk slumber.

We'll see how it goes tonight x

[bluesatinsash]

whoops copied this in here by mistake - was 'bigging up' this thread to another poster on another thread exit stage left...

[Hobbsey1976]

Omg my little girl has just started this I thought maybe due to me not producing enough milk? Please comment all help ??