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Parenting

4 month sleep regression/growth spurts

8 replies

Luckystar1 · 25/11/2016 10:52

DD is 16 weeks. Never been a great sleeper, but has recently upped the ante on chipping away at my sanity by waking every 1-2 hours nightly.

Obviously I'm thinking 4 month sleep regression (great....). I also understand there is a growth spurt at this time too.

Now I've been feeding DD at every waking as I obviously don't want to negatively impact a growth spurt, but similarly I don't want to continue in this vein if it's no longer a growth spurt, as I'd prefer (if it's regression related) to pat her/give dummy/whatever...

I've been down this road with DS and I don't want to repeat it in honesty!

So.... for how long should I call it growth spurt???

I need to start getting some form of sleep soon.

Also, as a result of the constant night feeds she's barely eating in the day, which I'm getting seriously annoyed with as I know it's just leading to a cycle of night feeding which is unsustainable for me.

She is ebf. She will not go 'down' in the evening at a time that I could feasibly stay awake to try a dream feed. I have no wish to bedshare...

Any hints/tips/advice??

OP posts:
Heirhelp · 25/11/2016 15:42

With DD if I could get her to go back to sleep then she was not hungry but by this pint she was ff and remember you are more likely to know if your child is hungry than a random on the internet.

Sweetpotatoaddict · 25/11/2016 15:51

I could have written your post!!
Baby slept through from 1 week, until 16 weeks when they woke every hour. We're now at five months and it's easing slightly. Trying to get some sort of daytime routine established which I'm hoping might solve some of the multiple wake ups.
The same thing happened with ds which continued until we put him into his own room, and it reduced to 3 wake ups and then around 8 months we did some sleep training using shush pat technique. I don't want to repeat it.

Luckystar1 · 25/11/2016 16:06

Oh Sweet you are so lucky! We were nowhere near sleeping through I was up at least 4 times a night prior to this. I'm severely sleep deprived!!

OP posts:
TimeForCakeAgain · 25/11/2016 16:13

If you can get her back to sleep at some of the wake ups without feeding then I would go with that. She will hopefully feed more in the day if she is hungry. However she may want the comfort to get back to sleep as much as the food. I still struggle to get my 8 month old back to sleep without a feed, although thankfully it is now once or twice a night. Hope you get some more sleep soon.

Sweetpotatoaddict · 25/11/2016 19:10

I know couldn't quite believe it but then got a wake up call in more ways than one.
I'm trying to feed a bit more during the day so hopefully looking for milk less overnight. I don't mind the wake ups if in turn they go back down and take a proper feed. It's when you get a half hearted suck, and then screaming for 30mins I get a little frustrated.

Luckystar1 · 25/11/2016 19:21

I'm desperately trying to feed in the day but she's having so much at night and she's so distractable during the day, it's proving very difficult!!

OP posts:
Sweetpotatoaddict · 26/11/2016 09:26

They are so tricky when they are developing so fast. Thankfully my dd is too greedy to be nosey during a feed. I've started feeding lying down at night, I'm not keen on cosleeping though, but I'm sure I'm dosing while she feeds.

scrumptiouscrumpets · 26/11/2016 12:27

I'm having a similar problem at the moment, DS2 is waking every three hours at the moment (he'd do six hours and then three before that) and I have now decided it can't be a growth spurt anymore (in my experience, these only last a few days and more importantly, feeds during the day aren't reduced), so I am going to try settling him without a feed. I'm dreading it though!

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