Backwards baby - reverse cycling?

[getagoldtoof]

Hello - please help if you have any ideas?

I have ebf my son who is 5 months since birth. I am back at work so he has expressed milk while I'm out. He has two feeds in the 9 hours I'm out, of around 5-7 oz.

When I get home he doesn't feed until I put him to bed at 7. Then it goes on and on all night.... He will wake up, feed and then writhe around a bit. He wakes up at least 6 sometimes up to 10 times in the night. I don't bother to go back to sleep sometimes. I feel like the walking dead and am a wreck with no sleep!

Is this reverse cycling? Is it abnormal or just got to get through it?

I finish work in 2 months - perhaps I can keep going for that long, but is there anything DH (who looks after him in the day) can do so he eats more in the day? Sorry I'm rambling, I can barely see straight!

Will weaning help?

Any ideas? Thanks!

Have you tried a bottle of ebf at night? I wonder if he just prefers the bottle?

Hi, yes it does sound like he's reverse cycling. My dd2 did this. She wouldn't drink any milk at all when I was at work as she completely refused a bottle for the childminder. She would then feed loads at night (I stopped counting as it was demoralising).
Our only answer was co-sleeping. I got to the stage where I could pretty much feed her in my sleep. It didn't last forever. Weaning didn't really help for us (sorry, I know that isn't what you wanted to hear), but we were doing BLW so she didn't eat a massive amount until about 8 months. I think we got through the worst of it by about 7.5 months, then we were back down to 2 night feeds til 13 months when I finally night-weaned.

Jodidi - thank you so much. So helpful to know someone has been through it. I can't co-sleep although I'd love to, so will continue to power through. As long as I know it will calm down.

It's hard as my mum family tell me to be tougher on him, but he is actually eating, he is not always just after comfort and it's not easy to turn him away.

And I suppose being back at work, I will grab any time I get with him at all and appreciate it, even if it very nearly kills me and makes me shit at my job .