Is it possible to do a breast fed dream feed?

[nappyaddict]

Someone I know was on about introducing a bottle a night for a dream feed but I was thinking if it is possible to do this by breastfeeding you wouldn't need to bother with the bottle.

I have warned her it's best not to introduce a bottle as often as once a day if they are going to be awake. I remember someone on here telling me from 4 months they gave a bottle every night at 10/11pm so the baby was awake but still sleepy and drowsy and he soon started rejecting the breast :(

It would probably be OK once you have started weaning and they are used to breastfeeding a little less anyway.

I dream-breastfed both mine with no trouble at all. It never occured to me use a bottle.

Trouble is, my youngest is now 19 years old, so I recall too little of the experience to give any up to date advice really.

Good luck.

I see no reason to introduce a bottle for a dream feed??? Why would it be different to breastfeeding? I breastfed dream-fed DS quite easily and it had the advantage of triggering oxytocin which got me to sleep, too.

I think because if you use a bottle you can leave baby in the cot where as if you breast feed you have to lift them out and risk waking them?

Hiya,
I only did it for a little while, but my experience of the breast-fed dream feed is that it is definately possible. My DD would immediately latch on and sook away as normal, whilst staying (almost) completely asleep! As she was very relaxed, no winding required and she was happy to go straight back into her cot afterwards.

I only really did it if I was quite late to bed myself, and was anticipating her waking about an hour or less afterwards. (in the hope of myself getting a few conseutive hours' sleep!)

I stopped doing it after a while in the hope that she might just sleep through. (She didn't, for a good while, but i felt better about letting her demand the feed on her own.)

"I remember someone on here telling me from 4 months they gave a bottle every night at 10/11pm so the baby was awake but still sleepy and drowsy and he soon started rejecting the breast"

I think one bottle a day is unlikely to have been what caused this. But yes it's possible to do a dreamfeed and breastfeed it :)

Yes it's possible to bresatfeed a sleeping baby, is that your question?

poke Nudge them a bit, rub your nipple from baby's nose to chin until the smell wakes them up, then they'll latch on. IME they are zonked out by it and won't wake up when you put them back down.

I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable bottlefeeding a baby from the side of a cot, I'm not sure why, something about choking and not being close enough

If you raise their head slightly then they shouldn't choke and you are right there over them giving them the bottle so you are watching them at all times.

Yes, it's perfectly possible do to a bf dreamfeed - I did with both of my DDs. Some people prefer a bottle though if they think their baby will sleep longer after a ff.

Many people offer 1 bottle a day with no problems, and bf very successfully the rest of the time.

I used to do a dreamfeed breastfeed and now do a dreamfeed bottlefeed - always lift him out of his cot though! I'm suprised anyone wouldn't.

It depends on the baby. With my three I never managed to do a bf dreamfeed, by that I mean that none of my babies would bf unless they were fully awake, and if I woke them up fully at say 10.30pm, that caused problems for re-settling so it generally just made a mess of things rather than helping. I was able to give an expressed bottle as a dream feed (i.e. they would take it while still pretty much asleep, although on my lap not in the cot, and then drop off again, but it was too much of a hassle to start expressing and giving a bottle all the time and in any event I didn't find it was a whole lot of help in extending their sleep. It would maybe push them for an extra hour against when they usually woke without the feed, so not really worth the effort. In those early days it's worth trying anything to see what helps to give you (and the baby) a bit more sleep, but looking back i can see that all 3 of mine settled into a better, more consistent sleep pattern when I left them to it and didn't start trying to wake them when they didn't want waking.

Sorry this has got a bit long, but one more point, I think most babies have one natural longer sleep in a 24 hr period. Some people are lucky in that the longer sleep tends to fall from say 11pm ish, whereas all of my 3 seemed to have their one long sleep from 7.30pm ish and if I woke them at 10.30pm to feed they seemed to revert immediately to their 2.5 - 3hrly daytime pattern whereas if I left them they slept much longer in that first night time sleep slot and would go through to the early hours before eventually making it all the way through the night

I breastfeed the dreamfeed. DD stirs enough to feed and then goes back down easily. Similar to organiccarrotcake it makes me sleep too :)
I didn't bother with a dreamfeed for months but am doing it now as it means I choose when she feeds, not DD at night, and it's helped with sleeping very well!

I do a breastfed dreamfeed at about 10:30pm, I have to say it's one of my favourite feeds of the day. She sleeps in a sleeping bag which makes it a lot easier as she stays warm and you don't have to faff with blankets. She gives the most wonderful sleepy sighs and little strokes with her hands

I did a morning 'dreamfeed' when I worked an early shift - I was leaving at 5.30 am so I used to go in and pick him out of his cot before I left so he would get a feed.

He put his thumb in when I picked him up so I just unplugged it and latched him on. :)

I co sleep so I do it all the time :)

I'm doing one now.

Picklesarnie!