is it inevitable that there will be more night wakings if BFing?

[curlyLJ]

The reason I ask is that I have been using this forum for some time now, and it seems that most of the posters who complain of being up lots in the night, or sleep issues all seem to BF?

Most people I know in RL with kids have FF and most 'claim' that their DCs were sleeping through quite early (six months at the latest). which I don't know if it's really true, but there must be something in it...

My DD is EBF (well I have just this week started to introduce some mixed feeding) and used to sleep well (between 2 and 4 months) going from 9pm-5am without waking! It has gone to pot ever since she hit 4 months and we are back to 2 or more night wakings, at least.

Is it really the case that BFing = more night wakings, or is it a myth?

I had the same experience as AppleAndBlackberry, EBF baby slept through the night as soon as I stopped waking her for 4am feed (about 6 weeks). But i did give her a dream feed at 10.30-11 until around 6 months when I started BLW.

But I doubt she was ingesting enough food to make much difference in the early days, so wonder if she would have been Ok without the dream feed? No idea really, but she was never a baby that demanded much, so had to be more routine based to make sure she took enough milk.

I've read that bf babies are more easily roused between sleep cycles ie they are more likely to fully waken than ff babies. Some people think this is a helpful behaviour for their survival and one of the reasons why bf babies are less at risk of SIDS.

I think some (but not all!) co-sleeping babies do wake more often because they can smell the milk and know the source is right at hand.

And I some bf babies (co-sleeping or not) do wake more often than they might in the 'hope' of getting fed even if they're not particularly hungry. I think this is more to do with their mothers getting into the habit of always feeding when they wake up as the easy route to getting them back to sleep. Certainly this was the case with my DS at 7 months - once I stopped feeding every time he woke, he stopped waking half so often. But obviously it doesn't apply to tiny babies who need feeding pretty much every time they wake.

But I read the same study as Ruby saying that bf mothers get more sleep (41 or 49 mins was my recollection :))

Among my friends, the 2 worst sleepers are bf, and the 2 best sleepers are bf. Most of the ff babies I know are pretty good sleepers, but most started out bf and were pretty good sleepers then too.

I think babies sleep through when they sleep through - not sure feeding method has much to do with it. My 3 were all exclusively bf and I was v lucky - they slept through approx 7pm to 7am ish from 8, 10 and 12 weeks respectively. I was lucky I know, but formula doesn't necessarily = good sleepers and bf doesn't necessarily = bad sleepers. Like the previous poster I think much of it has to do with the fact that when bf you tend to feed more on demand and bottle feeders tend to feed more to a pattern, so if a FF baby wakes in the night soon after the last bottle the parent might not immediately feed whereas bf mother more likely to put the baby straight to the breast and so that's what the baby comes to expect. I certainly never left mine to cry but in the night I didn't necessarily feed immediately when they woke either - I would try to resettle without a feed and only fed if that didn't work. It seemed to work.

My dd is 5 months and is exclusively bf. From roughly 10 weeks she slept for between 8-10 hours during the night. Since she turned 4 months old she is back to wakening during the night, but only once, and she still usually has a long stretch of sleep between 6-8 hours. So, I would say that it really does depend on the baby. Most of the bf babies at my bf group sleep well at night. At the moment I know that we are going through a huge growth spurt, plus there are so many developmental milestones at this stage. I believe that my dd is genuinely hungry during the night as she always takes a full feed. In my opinion the lack of sleep is well worth it. Plus, I quite enjoy the nighttime feeds. They are very peaceful and cuddly. Maybe I am just mad!

I have both formula fed and breast fed. My first daughter (ff) slept for a 6 hour stretch in the night from about 9 weeks, and properly slept through from maybe 3 months. My second breastfed daughter, currently 7 weeks old, goes anything from 1 - 4 hours between feeds in the night and I can't see her sleeping through any time soon.

I'm not bothered about that though because a) I want to keep my supply up, and b) she settles very quickly after a feed - we might both be awake for 10 - 15 minutes before falling asleep again. I think that's largely because we co-sleep. My first daughter, night feeds would take maybe 30 minutes and then another 30 minutes+ to settle in her cot.

EmmaBemma you make a good point. With bfing the feeds are short, there is no need to prepare anything and the oxytocin helps you return to sleep very quickly.

I know a couple of Mums who have swapped to formula because they thought the baby would sleep better only to discover that the baby doesn't, plus they have to make up the bottles and then lie awake for ages after the feed because they can't get back to sleep themselves.