DD is 14 weeks and since about 9 weeks stopped waking for her late evening feed-we'd feed early evening, put her to bed and then she'd wake at about 3 or 4am usually, then back to sleep till 7ish. I was worried at the time that she was too little to go from 6 to 5 feeds a day so slightly upped the amount she got (she is FF) so that over the course of a day she'd still be getting roughly the right amount. Now, however, she's dropped another feed and pretty much goes from 7pm-ish to 6 or 7am. Obviously this is brilliant in many ways (did it for the first time on Christmas Eve-a full night's sleep was a great present!) but it means she's only taking 4 feeds a day when she's meant to be on 5 until she's 6 mo according to the HV. The way I see it I have 3 options:
A) let her get on with 4 feeds a day of the amount she's supposed to be having at this age (180ml per feed) as this is what she's 'asked' for. My problem with this is that she'll be short a full 180ml per day which can't be good for her.
B) give her more at each feed but let her have the 4 she asks for rather than the 5 she should be having-ie up it to 210ml per feed which means she has approx the right amount over 24 hours.
C) feed her on a schedule during the day to give her 5 feeds in the 12 hours she's awake. Problem here is that she's always liked her sleep and I'd have to feed her every 3 hours which would mean waking her from a nap at least a couple of times a day.
D) wake her up in the night to feed her. Problem as above-don't think it's a good idea to wake a sleeping baby generally?
I've opted for B over the last week, and it seems ok, but now I'm worried because in a couple of weeks she's supposed to be going to 210ml per feed 5 times a day anyway-so when she starts to seem hungrier should I up it again to 240ml as she's only getting 4 feeds? The carton doesn't even acknowledge it as a possibility so technically I don't even know how many scoops I should give, though logically I'd imagine it's 8.
Does this sound ok? Or should I give hungry baby formula instead-is the nutritional value of that greater than the normal stuff?
I know this must sound like a ridiculous thing to worry about but I'm so paranoid as it is about all the BF benefits she's missing out on and I don't want to over or under feed her because of this stupid formula! I know if she were BF I wouldn't know how much she was taking anyway so maybe my worries are totally redundant. She's been bang on the 50th percentile since birth and I'm worried that dropping these feeds means she won't get the nutrition she needs :(