To think you don't need to set an alarm for night time feeds?

[Babybunny88]

One of my friends was told by her hv to never let a young baby go over four hours without a feed, including during the night, so she wakes the baby to feed him. I know this is generally advised but AIBU to think setting an alarm for every fours hours at night isn't necessary? Don't get me wrong we all have different parenting styles and Im not judging anyone who does this, just genuinely interested in what other mums netters think. I never did this with my daughter and only got up to feed her during the night when she cried. I let her sleep and she let me know when she was hungry.

As I say "I had to do this" because the nurses in SCBU told me to, as he was too sleepy and jaundiced to wake himself (even when I woke him, he fell asleep as soon as he latched on, sigh!).

A hungry baby won't necessarily have the strength to wake you with their cries. For some babies this advice is sound and necessary. Even if a baby is healthy, if it gives the parent piece of mind to know they've been fed frequently. I never set an alarm with mine, but the first time he slept through I was petrified there was something wrong as it was so unusual!

Ditto what sheep said - DTs were 3lb 31 weekers, they were too sleepy to feed and would not have woken to be fed. In fact, they never cried for milk, ever. So we set an alarm to feed and fed them every three hours. They were schedule fed in SCBU hourly, then two hourly via NGT so I guess they never learnt to cry for milk but, if you had a healthy, term baby of a good weight I can see that perhaps it wouldnt be necessary.

I think this is good advice after the first 24 hours for the first couple of weeks especially for jaundiced and sleepy babies, not needed after this unless the baby has a specific problem.

An NCT friend had a sleeper, slept through immediately. They were advised to wake her for a feed halfway through the night, and they did.

I was told every two hours with DD as she was born at 35/6 weeks (she was still 6lb). I did this it and nearly had a breakdown with lack of sleep. I think it was one of the reasons I didn't breast feed for long as I just needed help with the night feeds to be able to function any more.

I did it for the first four weeks. Dd fed at 7pm, 11pm by dh then I had an alarm for three am and seven am for those feeds.

As others have said, in some circumstances it's necessary. But don't think it's vital for all babies.

This does remind me of someone I met who set her alarm every 2 hours in the night so she could change her LO's nappy!

I did this until the MW came round (I left hospital after a week) I told her about it and she said 'why on earth would you do that? If she's sleeping, let her sleep!'

So I did and from 1 week old she only woke for 1 night feed after her 10.30pm one