Keeping up with BF demands at 5 months

[DisasterZone]

I'm interested to know where others of you with April/May babies are up to with demand feeding.

DS born 16.04.11 is maintaining 75th centile, up from 50th at birth. He's quite refluxy - always pukes after feeding and often long after, so I've had to feed just 1 side at a time and the other maybe 30mins or more later, unless I want to see it all back again. It doesn't bother him though so we gave up on Gaviscon etc.

This does mean that he's a very regular feeder. He feeds around every 2/3 hours in the day. From a 7pm bed we usually get him thru till 10:30pm. For a while recently he then fed well and hung on till a feed at 3am or so then 6:30am. Now he's teething - both bottom teeth cut through at 20 wks. He's not dreadfully unhappy but I think they are causing him to wake more and want to suck. Last night: 9:30pm, 11pm, 2:40am, 3:30 am (tried to not feed and settle and this turned into a crying marathon that lasted till 5.05am, woke again at 5:40, asleep again at 6:50am. I can't face this again tonight!

Do most of you do just 1 feed around 3am or more frequent? Should I be trying to get him to drop/extend the first waking if it's before 3am? Is this a waste of time and should I just weld him onto my boob?

He's also becoming a right pain to feed, sucking for a few seconds before pulling away to check on noises and whatever is going on. Milk spraying everywhere....

Save me from this, it's exhausting! Any perspectives welcomed...

Late march baby here. My DD has maintained her 50th centile so is a bit smaller than your DS. She's also a right pain to feed, distracted about everything. I used to be able to feed easily in town in any cafe. I'd never think there'd be a day I'd rather feed in a bf room! But if there are noises, lights, even the TV, she stops and milk spraying everywhere. Just then I tried to feed her in front of the TV and she just looks sideways the whole time at my face . Oh and sometimes for evening feeds if my DH is on the bed, she'll pull herself off and then smile at DH. It's cute but it's such a pain!

She feeds every 2/3 hours in the day as well, but a relatively good sleeper at night. There's a 50/50 chance she'll sleep from 10pm to somewhere 6/7am. Other times it's one feed somewhere between 3-5am. But, a lot of parents wouldn't tell you, when she sleeps through, it doesn't mean you do! When she's in our room, we got constantly woken up by her thumb sucking through the night. I'd get up and check her and she'd be sucking loudly in her sleep. Then she learned to sing throughout the night. (As in she just sings in her cot, not demanding feed or anything. And she'll go back to sleep once she's sung enough). The latest is screaming in her sleep. I think once last week it felt she screamed every 2 hours!

As for if you need to feed him everytime he wakes up. Only you can tell. Is he feeding hungrily when he wakes up through the night? Because for my DD, sometimes if I just put her on the boob at night, she just suckles for a few sips then turn to me and smile. It's really frustrating coz I'd rather her fall asleep on the boob, instead of me putting her back to the cot and listen to another episode of singing. Also as you say, you didn't feed him at 3:30am and it turned into an 1.5 hour crying episode. I assume it means he's genuinely hungry?

BTW, can your DS ever self settles? Has he been able to fall asleep if you put him in his cot awake?

DD2 is a late Feb baby. She went through an enormous growth spurt at around 5 months and for a couple of weeks it was really tough to keep up. Then she slowed down a bit more. Growth spurts are tough but they don't last.

The distractability is normal at this stage too, I try and get her to eat as much as possible during the day so she's not feeding every hour at night.

This too shall pass etc

I posted earlier about perhaps feeding my DS too much, but apprently not. He's 18 (or is it 19?) weeks. I BF except one FF a day.

Last 24 hours have been pretty epic (he's been amazing - and very smiley and giggley to boot) and it looks like this:

Bed at 7.30pm (bit later than usual)
Dreamfeed at 11pm (210ml of formula)
Woke up at 3:45am, DH shhh patted twice.
Woke up at 6:20am, feed
Woke up at 8:30am, feed

He's then been fed about every 3 hours all day. Went to bed at 7pm tonight. I am hopeful that he won't wake up at about 3am, but he prob will. Last week or so DH has managed to shhh pat him back to sleep at this wake up. Although he nearly always has a feed at about 5am. So last night was exception rather than norm.

He's SO distracted in day it's driving me bananas and making me less inclined to feed in public as everyone gets to see my nips!

OP - is your LO still in your room? We moved DS out a couple of weeks ago and I think it's helped. Also, do you have someone to help resettle? I am weak and I am sure that DS can sense this. So DH will always have a go at resettling him before I feed. He's MUCH stronger than me...I am a lazy wench!!!

Interesting to read all the similar tales. Thank you!

My DD is 6yrs now and I just can't remember the details - lost in the sleepless haze. I do know she didn't sleep through until 6 months, and even then it was stop start until regular dependable sleep later on.

I didn't try to settle him last night, just fed and as a result it was just feeds at 2:30am and 5:30am. These feeds are only 10 mins, and I feel like I got enough sleep last night as opposed to not enough the night before.

My only other point of reference is a friend whose son is 2 wks younger, has been part bottle fed since birth and put into a GF routine, she's now about to fully wean as she has to travel for work. I feel conflicted about it as part of me is envious that she has better sleep and is soon to be independent. However I have made the choice to BF and it's intense but also wonderful. My son is thriving on it clearly, he's not had any illness either.

I'll just let him keep finding his pattern for the next month or so as we move into solid foods. But I'm also not keen to be still doing demand feeding later on, I do think they can develop these habits for comfort. Which is OK - but maybe not for me this time!

Your baby sounds exactly like my DS2 was at that age OP. He is now 11 months. I started weaning very gradually at 5 months and by 6 months I was starting to see some longer stretches during the day. I fed him once in the night til about 12 weeks, then it was many night feeds until around 7 months. Your DS sounds very normal and yes, it was really hard work at night. My DS2 started asking for more night feeds again from 9 months and at almost 10 months we did some sleep training, which has worked a treat . I now bf 4, sometimes 5 times a day.

And not at all at night, I should add.