could this night feeding schedule work?

How old is your baby? I fed my baby just before they went to bed (around 7.30), then just before i went to bed (around 11pm) then let baby dictate, which when very young was usually again a 3am then around 6/7am when we were up for the day. So if baby wales for a feed after 4am let your partner give a bottle then? I mean I don’t think you can shoehorn your baby into your respective sleep patterns you have to see what the baby needs.

Ime they let you know when they want to be fed. Mine did all fall into a schedule eventually but it was very much led by them and in their own time.

Is the baby here yet? They tend not to follow a schedule when newborn!

I exclusively expressed for a year. The overnight feeds are the most important for establishing and maintaining supply. I had to express every 3 hours regardless for the first 4 months at least.

@flakersbakerbabies don't follow a schedule, esp in the early days - there is cluster feeding etc and they don't know night from day. My baby is nearly 4 months and goes through phases of patterns of night feedings but they don't stay the same for long. You will need to be flexible

Erm, kindly, babies come with their own unique ideas about what they like and what doesn’t. You can’t “hack” their innate needs without massive trade offs elsewhere.

How do you know how often the baby will feed? They do what they like and if you plan to breastfeed a newborn you honestly just go with it, feed as often as they want, skin to skin. Learn to feed lying down, cosleep, prepare to feed regularly in the night as that’s important for keeping your milk up. It’s fine to think ahead but I bf both of mine and did all the nights and it always felt like a good use of time, certainly far better than the pointless insomnia of the third trimester I had both times!

You can’t really breastfeed on a schedule, breastmilk is supply and demand and how much your baby will want to feed depends on many factors (how hungry, growth spurts, needing comfort, etc etc), none of which are in your control. Evening and night time feeding is also really important for building your supply, and often when babies feed the most, and any feeds you don’t do (because DP is giving expressed milk for example) it’s telling your body you don’t need milk then so supply will reduce. If you really want to breastfeed your best bet for at least the first 3-4 months is just to feed responsively. Maybe have DP give one bottle a day so baby is used to having a bottle if that’s important to you.

My best friend had a similar sleep schedule between her and her DH although it wasn’t crafted around feeds, just the hours that each one slept. They were exclusively FF though which made it easier as it didn’t matter who was doing the feeding so much. I didn’t BF either but I thought that the overnight feeds were quite important, especially in the first few weeks in terms of establishing supply.

No, they wont eat if they’re not hungry. Or none of mine would anyway.
And if they’re hungry they’ll not be up for waiting whether they’re ‘due’ a feed or not.

You probably could aim to combi feed with dad doing a couple of feeds in the early morning so you get a bit of sleep in a stretch -

however

you will probably wake up anyway if you hear the baby / dad crashing around making bottles for the baby while it cries

you may be woken up at 6am by massive painful breasts

if breastfeeding on demand the baby is likely to change feeding schedule week by week so you can’t really count on it

It completely depends on what kind of baby you get.

Baby may breastfeed constantly until 11pm and then sleep until 3am. Or they may feed every 2 hours…. Some babies do a long first stretch and some a longer second stretch.

It gets easier to share these things later on when baby is older and you understand what their individual needs are.

Night time breastfeeding is also important for building up the milk supply.

@flakersbakerinitially I was recommended to feed or express at least every 3 hours.

Why are you concerned about this at present, out of interest?

Depending upon the child, the phase of the moon, the prevailing wind and whether there was the letter Y in the day, anything from 10 minutes to about 35 if I was lucky. This did improve slightly after 19 months to about 2 hours as long as I didn't blink or breathe too hard. DD2 slept better and did about 3 hours at a time for the first few weeks, which stretched to 5-6 at about 3 months.

Depending upon how much your baby actually wants to feed or have comfort, your supply will quickly match and you could be woken up by the sensation rather than the baby. Stock up on savoy cabbage leaves to chill and use to cool down engorgement enough to get a let down reflex (shrugging your shoulders and drinking water encourages it) and if they still sell Sticklebrick toys, they're great for avoiding blocked ducts.

Yeah, you can’t plan it yet.

3 hours is usually the max.

with DS I expressed and DH did the 3am feed, I did the rest. We didn’t pick the time, DS did. DH enjoyed it, though… to be honest I was always awake anyway, even if I was in my knees with tiredness, I couldn’t seem to sleep until they were.

DD has not let DH do any night feeds at all; won’t accept expressed milk, bottles, or generally DH after bedtime.

Plan the nights out when baby is here and there seems to be a routine, but then also note that it changes a LOT in the first year, with all the leaps and regressions, so it’s sort of a living plan rather than anything concrete.

You can plan all you want but baby may have ither ideas.
If you want to stretch the window of not feeding then baby will cry very loudly or be unsettled and you may not want that
And with a newborn you will just go with the flow
So sure make a plan as much as you like but dont expect to be able to stick to it for many months

I exclusively BF for a year and there was never ever a routine and he wouldn't take a bottle. Could be 2 hours sometimes more but if he went longer over night I would wake-up in agony with boobs full to the brim. Obviously that slows down once they require less breast milk.

Then there is the cluster feeding. However after a while I could feed him, put him to bed then sleep until he woke me but I went to bed early as possible.

You going to have to be prepared for newborn stage and lack of sleep. Snatched sleep.broken sleep. You can save up to pay for day and or night time help.

You aren’t factoring in post-natal hormones etc. I was on
my own for most of the week as DH worked away so I just had to get on with it. I’m a night owl to the stage of being vampiric and previously needed at least 10 hours a night. I just prioritised keeping the pair of us alive when DH was away……..

Please get yourself to some sort of antenatal class. Not just for the helpful info, but for the people you may meet there that may become your biggest support in those early days.

OP it’s a baby not a train schedule.

No a new born doesnt adhere to any schedule. It can feed every hour and two hours in the first weeks are normal.

You are talking about a much older baby.

Babies have small stomachs and will feed when hungry. You will just have to feed when needed.

I suggest you read a few books as you are in for quite a shock if you think you can schedule a newborn.

I think 3h was a dream when both of mine were tiny, much closer to 2h overnight for the first few weeks.

Use what's left of the pregnancy to start a longer bedtime routine for you - go to bed with DH - or even earlier. The longer you're in bed resting, the more likely you'll be able to get more sleep, even if it's in 90 minute chunks. Don't stay up until 1am watching shit TV to give the 'laat' feed before settling down for the night as you'll still be awake several times after that.

You can't make a baby sleep so you need to train yourself to get to sleep earlier. I wish someone had told me that.