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Feeding at night but not bothered during the day?!

3 replies

BCFirstTimeMum · 04/09/2018 08:55

Hi Ladies,

My little man has just turned 5 months and for the past 2 - 3 weeks we’ve been suffering with an increase in nights wakings and feedings!
We were lucky in that from about 3.5 months he was (not always but) mostly sleeping from 8.30/9pm through to 3/4am feeding then going back to sleep until 7/7.30am.

Then the last 2-3 weeks he’s taken a major step backwards... he goes to bed between 7&8pm depending on when he woke up. Then he sometimes wakes around 9pm for food, then again about 1am, then 3-4am and then sometimes won’t resettle properly until 5.30/6 and is up between 7&8am. It’s exhausting! He feeds at nearly every single night waking sometimes taking upward of 10oz between bedtime and morning.

Consequently though he now won’t take his morning bottle. Sometimes only having 1-2oz until after his morning nap where he will have 3/4oz before solids!

His daily routine is not that strict but follows a 3 nap pattern (morning 30-45mins, lunch 1.5-2hours, afternoon 30-1hr), he has solids before lunch nap (small bowl of purée) but I always offer milk first. I FF and offer the bottle throughout the day but the most he takes at a feed now is about 4oz (he used to take 6-7oz). I think he’s still getting enough milk for his age but the majority now comes at night!?

Do I need to introduce an evening meal of solids? Try decrease the night feedings so hopefully he will eat more during the day? If so how have you done this?

Has anyone else experienced this and if so how did you drop the night feeding?!

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
JiltedJohnsJulie · 04/09/2018 16:26

Please don’t introduce more solids OP, I think solids just could be the route of the problem. The NHS guidelines say to introduce the third meal between 8 and 9 months so there’s definitely no rush.

If anything I’d drop a meal and see if that encourages to take more of his milk during the daytime instead of at night Smile

Tillytrotter123 · 05/09/2018 22:51

I could have written this post! My DD is 6 months old and she’s waking countless times in the night however in the daytime she is pushing her bottle away and doesn’t appear hungry. Have you tried hungry baby milk? I think that’s helped me slightly with keeping her fuller.

BCFirstTimeMum · 06/09/2018 09:17

I only give him a little bit of purée about 1.5 hours before his lunch nap and he is really enjoying it. So definitely won’t be introducing a third meal yet. I just thought that another small amount or some baby porridge mixed with his milk might help in the evening. He’s getting around 30oz of milk in a day just at least 1/3 comes from night feedings...

He use to do 5 x 6/7oz bottles in a 24hr period (one being a 3/4am feed). Now it’s small amounts as/when. So confusing and frustrating.

I have tried Hungry Milk for his evening bottles but I don’t know if it made any difference. Did you find it helped?

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