Are all bad sleepers breastfed?

[sharkstale]

DD, breastfed until 18 months. Horrific sleeper until we stopped.

DS, combi-feeds, but wants to be glued to my boob all night every night. Even worse sleeper.

Due to the fact that sleep improved instantly when I stopped bf DD, it makes me want to stop bf DS now at 8 months, believing breastfeeding is the issue.

What are your experiences please?

Yabu - bf is not the issue
Yanbu - stop bf and get some decent sleep.

Me and my friend had our babies at the same times-ish each time x3. We both breastfed all 3, she combined fed her second.

Mine were absolutely awful sleepers (first the worst and third the best so maybe some parenting upskilling involved too), but her 3 were all revoltingly good sleepers all the way through. I was sick with envy.

So did mine, although I only had one.

I told HV at about 8-9 weeks that I was waking him up to feed him at 2am. She was horrified.

He's remained a good sleeper, as a toddler I put him to bed in the evening and not a peep until he woke at about 7am. EBF until six months with only occasional BF mid-afternoon until about 14 months, then I couldn't be arsed with that and stopped completely.

It's just the baby you get, not the method of feeding. If I'd had another they could have been completely different.

What do you mean by “bad sleeper”?

I’ve had 2 bf babies and 1 bottlefed. I don’t think there is a correlation but the bf 2 were terrible sleepers and the bottlefed baby was not. Having said that, the bf 2 are much less susceptible to illness now (again, perhaps unrelated). Of my DTs, the bottle fed one has had 4 sick days since starting school, the bf one has had none.

It might be the problem. It might not.

I had two that were ebf and two that were combi fed. Best sleeper by far was (and is) fed to sleep. Eldest sleep massively improved once I nightwear her, but middle two no change to waking up, but it took longer to get them back to sleep so was more disruptive for me.

Sleep disruption can be due to all sorts of things. At 8 months I'd say probably stick with it for now and review later on. It's more likely to be illness/teething if its really awful at that age. See how things go? (I realise its easy to say that now im out of the terrible dungeon that is horrifically broken nights....)

It’s also the biological norm for babies to wake often in the night. Op doesn’t want this to happen she wants her baby to sleep for longer stretches! Understandably.

My son was mostly bottle fed from a few days old (mix of expressed milk and pre mix formula) and he’s been a pretty good sleeper

No, my first exclusive BF slept through from 6 weeks and my second combi fed was about 10 months. The problem with BF however is that they use it for comfort not necessarily hunger, I was lucky both mine were able to self soothe (thumb suckers) which I believe was the trick to sleeping well.

Seems like from friends, as well as the people l know from antenatal and baby groups

My bottle fed daughter was a horrific sleeper. She only really started sleeping through the night aged 8 😭 and even now she can’t sleep alone.

They use bottles to soothe also. It’s not exclusive to breastfeeding. My daughter 100% did.

We had a rocky start with BF, she was badly tongue tied which wasn't fixed until she was 3 weeks old. So I pumped during the day and bottle fed at night. Even when she did latch we carried on with that because being full to the brim really helped her sleep at night.

no i sleep trained both my exclusively breastfed babies at 6/7 months and both went on to be brilliant sleepers

I breastfed all of mine initially and their sleep was different from the get go. DC1 the best down to DC3 the worst!

Mine is an awful sleeper, always has been. Hes formula fed.

But parents have a choice. Thankfully!

DS was formula fed. Still a bad sleeper and he’s 4 🥴

It is natural for babies to sleep little and often. Breast milk generally facilitates optimum sleep for the baby. Mumsnet seems to be dominated by those who advocate sleep training but it is a fairly new US and UK led activity that focuses on US on mother being able to get to work early.
I think this NCT paper is good as it does contain references
www.nct.org.uk/information/baby-toddler/caring-for-your-baby-or-toddler/should-i-sleep-train-my-baby

My 2 month old is breastfed and she’s a great sleeper, she only wakes up once around 3am (granted we only go to bed about 11/12 and get up at 7 as she dozes in the evening while we watch tv). During the day she won’t let me put her down and I get nothing done but that’s a different story lol.

I think statistically breastfeeding mothers actually get more sleep on average than their formula feeding counterparts.

Every baby is different. Ds was a good sleeper outside of one night feed waking and was ebf. Personally I found it super handy being able to have him in the next to me and bring him in to my bed for a nurse when he needed one while I dosed. If I had to get up and sort bottles etc I think I'd have found it much harder to get back over.

What I do think is important is ensuring any issues that can contribute to colic are addressed like tongue tie or cmpa etc.

BF both of mine for a year. They both slept through by 6 weeks. I didn’t dare have a 3rd!
I think it’s just luck really.

Breast fed all three of my boys & they were all sleeping through night at three months.

Don’t think it’s a breast/bottle thing- think all of the little ones are their own person & we are all different 😀

My bf baby was an awful sleeper but ff baby slept well but looking at the comments it seems as this is coincidence

Breastfed both mine. First was an awful sleeper and still at nearly 6 will 9/10 end up in my bed at some point. Second is a great sleeper.

Random in my experience.
My BF baby slept about 9 hours a night at 3mo. Then regressed at 5mo. Then slept through the night from 1.5-2.5yrs. Then stopped sleeping through the night again (arggghh!) and still only sleeps through the night about 1/4 of the time at 4.