SCBU baby home in a 3-4 hour routine - how to sustain this?

[Cheeser]

Hi. My DS came home from SCBU 10 days ago, after spending around 35 days in NICU and SCBU after being born at 30 weeks. He's doing fine now and is exclusively breastfed and gaining weight.

The hospital helped establish a feeding routine, and he wakes for food every 3-4 hours. However yesterday evening and over night he seems to want feeding more frequently, about every 2.5 hours - do I feed him when he's hungry or encourage him to wait for the 3 hours to be up? (which would just involve ignoring his cries and I don't think I can do that ) I'm keen to keep him in this routine as I'm getting reasonable sleep (well, about 4-5 hours a night) but I don't want to deprive him of food if he needs it.

Do babies get into routines and then change them themselves?

Sorry for the stupid questions, I just don't know what to do for the best. He'll be 7 weeks old on Friday (and 37 weeks). Is this a growth spurt?

Wow, you must have had a really hard time. Great that you have your baby home now. Normal advice with bf babies is feed on demand. In a hospital they had to have a routine but your wee one is tiny and I'd have thought best to respond to him, which will also be good for your milk supply.

Feed him when he's hungry
It seem wrong to mess up routine but I think it's harder to ignore his hunger

Meant to say presumedly for quite a lot of the time he was tube fed so so they were putting exact amount and know how much he was being fed. Now he's just taking what he wants when he wants it was shall be better for his stomach and his needs

Thanks everyone. That makes sense, to just feed him when he's hungry. When I was pregnant I planned to exclusively breastfeed on demand and I'm glad I'm able to breastfeed him after the ups and downs of special care... equally now I'm quite liking the little bit of sleep I get and feel like I've skipped that stage of constant feeding etc as he's now almost 7 weeks so hoped the routine he was in would be ok.

Yes bronze he was tube fed EBM for some time and I suppose yes is now getting into the hang of feeding when he's hungry rather than sticking to their imposed routine (which I always thought was a bit harsh on his tiny tummy, being fed big amounts then nothing for hours).

But I thought as he was in that routine best to stick to it - although I can see actually it is best for him to feed him when he's hungry. It varies a lot, if he leaves it a bit longer between feeds he'll take more, and then so it will be longer until his next feed.

Why don't babies come with a manual!?

cheeser, there are sound reasons why sick, vulnerable or pre-term babies may be fed to a routine. It's a way of ensuring they get the nourishment they need and would not be able to 'ask' for.

None of these reasons apply to a healthy, term baby and the sign your baby has turned a corner is that he is reaching out to be fed more often; he has the strength and the desire to form a relationship with you, rather than just sleep and conserve resources.

It is cause for celebration, and to keep a healthy, thriving, robust little boy on the routine that was applicable when he was so tiny and needy would not be right - it just does not meet his normal needs.

This will probably mean less sleep for you in the short term, that's true, but you sound as if you have your priorities right :)

I don't know enough about prem babies to offer any advice, but just wanted to say how fantastic that you have managed to EBF your baby even though he was so early! That must have been so hard and I am in awe :-)

Thanks tiktok that's just what I needed to hear. I will listen to his cues and feed him when he wants it. Perfectly happy to miss a bit of sleep, it's what you sign up for when you have a baby isn't it. I just want him to grow bigger and stronger

Thanks shhh it was difficult for sure but I was determined. Had lots of support from the breastfeeding coordinator on the unit and got up through the night to express when I was at home and he was still in hospital. I'm just glad he seemed to take to it fairly easily (and young, he was sucking and swallowing well at 33 weeks) Thank you

Hi. My Ds was a 29 weeker, he came home EBF at 37 weeks. It took about 3 weeks to go from 3-4 hour routine to fed on demand. He was hungrier once he hit "term" and I would still say make sure you don't go too long without a feed in the first few weeks (chance may yet be a fine thing) as asking in my case wasn't gret until 42- 43 weeks ish. Enjoy that bit though as he will wake more soon enough.

Also whatever you do do not compare a premmie feding pattern to a baby who had been born at term. That's the way of madness, all the women I know who EBF a premmie fed more often than those with term babies. The babies didn't get the strenght for a while. Also don't compare with premmie babies on nutraprem. Again if you do it will drive you mad as the nutrapem babies tend to stick to a routine.

You'll presumably get a dietician follow up who will pick up any issues in due course. And stick with abidec and iron if you are told to.

Any enjoy it.

Thanks everyone. This is exactly the kind of info I was after and good to hear your experience. I have no idea what's normal for a prem baby, and what sorts of things to expect. I know every baby is different but I had no idea whether once he hit term he would sort of turn into a normal term baby in terms of feeding etc or what would happen. Do you know of any good breastfeeding resources that are knowledgable about prem babies? Not spoken to LLL or any others yet but worried they might just give advice based on a term baby

To be honest I found the breastfeeding resources available in my area useless with a prem baby. I did go to LLL once, and also to a group once. In the end after they had done being in awe that DS was a BF baby there was nothing much they could say and kept talking about term babies patterns. If I had gone along a bit later that would have been fine but to be frank it was probably too soon for me to be mixing with term babies where the mums were fretting about the possibility of a tongue tie snip when i was fretting about the possibility of an apnea attack! I am sure it depends on the individuals though and I just got unlikely that they did not have relevant experience.

I did find a very helpful woman who had also EBF a prem locally whose son was 2 years older and I phoned her a couple of times when it all got too much (usually when I had been making unfar comparisons of my 5lb baby with a termie or a nutraprem baby) I also found this site, and bliss much more use, but probably more MN for bf issues. I don't come back here much now, but used to a lot in the first few months.

Also the timing of growth spurts varied a bit from the norm. But now 2 years later all my DS development varies from the norm so maybe I should have known that things just weren't the same.

What's the follow up from the hospital like, is there a bliss or prem support group there? I had a good one with a great SLT who kept a bit of an eye on us. I was also told by a mum there that she always thought I just took to BF like a duck to water, when actually I thought regularly I'll just get through today and get the nutraprem in tomorrow. The fact she thought it was much harder with a prem baby made me understand that it probably is harder, if only because of all the other prem things which come up and the fact that it does take prems a bit longer to find their line.

Finally depite me thinking I'll just get through today regularly I will say I got through the first 6 months without topping up, but it was bloody hard on occasions however I was determined to make sure I did, after all the pressure I had felt in hospital to BF as much as I could. With the benefit of hindsight I think I perhaps should have given myself more of a break though. Once I started to wean DS it got easier and he gave up himself about this time last year.

This is a lovely thread
Op, I'm so glad for you that your ds is growing strong and healthy and that you've had such great advice on here
Sometimes I forget why mumsnet is so fab, when I've spent too much time on aibu usually,

This is a lovely thread
Op, I'm so glad for you that your ds is growing strong and healthy and that you've had such great advice on here
Sometimes I forget why mumsnet is so fab, when I've spent too much time on aibu usually,

OP...others have said it all really. I'm mama to a 27 week prem, now a strapping 6 year old and a 3 year old term baby. Very, very different feeding experiences though they were both EBF. Do look for support for yourself, as others have said BLISS and MN are both good forums. Or PM me if you like.

Yay Cheeser, so glad DS is home! Such fantastic news! And I'm so glad you are both getting on well with breastfeeding now.

DS vaguely stuck to his 3hr schedule when he came home in terms of his 'demand', but they varied a bit - some 2 hr intervals, some 4 (once longer, but I didn't let him do that again!).

He reached his due date last Thursday, and for the last week or so he's been on more 2 hr intervals than 3 (especially overnight ) and has done the occasional cluster feed session. Today he wanted every hour all morning! He will be 9 weeks tomorrow.

I'm not really adding anything here, as you've already had great advice above But I know nothing about what to expect from him either - I keep thinking should he be going longer now he's 2 months old... but then I remember he could still be in the womb right now, so maybe I shouldn't expect any more of him than a brand new newborn. Just follow his cues I guess!

So happy for you

I was also advised to set my alarm at night to feed if going to long between feeds otherwise they don't have the strength

Now that was going against everything I felt but made sense really

How fab you have him home, you must be thrilled, I know I was, it's a difficult time. My 26 week DD came home 5 weeks ago and she is settling herself to her own routine, she is feeding every 3hours but goes 5 overnight. I feed when she is hungry. The nurse said as long as she is gaining weight and is settled then not to worry. Listen to your son. Congratulations!!!

Thanks everyone.

I think he was wanting to feed more often yesterday as he had quite a lot of trapped wind. I can never seem to wind him effectively and he was really uncomfortable yesterday, he would take a little bit of milk and then cry/arch his back and after a while he'd take a bit more milk, but I think it was only making it worse. I made DP take him for a walk yesterday evening and he wasn't too bothered about feeding while he was out - then fed him after what happened to be 3 hours after the last feed. Which he took really well, fed for a long time and then slept for 3hours. So I think we reset things a bit. I've been really hot on looking out for his hunger cues today though and he does seem to have settled back into 3-hourly feeding times but I'm happy to feed him sooner or (a bit) later if he needs it.

He was weighed again this morning and has gone from 1.99kg to 2.2kg in a week so obviously it's working. Also my mum came over this morning and looked after him while I had a 2.5 hour sleep which has helped me mentally, I really don't think I'd been getting enough sleep as I'd not been sleeping in the day. No idea why

I asked the nurse this morning about the feeding and she recommended I speak to the specialist at the hospital again, I didn't even know I could still call them up for advice. Annoyingly the specialist only works on Tuesdays so I've missed her for this week - I will remember to call next week though. It's so difficult to know who to turn to for advice with a prem baby. THe health visitor had given me the NHS Direct number to call if there's a problem that's not A&E-worthy, and the nurse this morning (who was from SCBU) said to absolutely not call NHS direct, instead just to call SCBU direct and ask them for advice. I didn't know I was able to do this either...

Sounds like you're doing great cheeser

I had a 31 weeker and a 32 weeker. Both came home on four hourly feeds but started demanding more frequently once they reached roughly their due dates.

DD1 fed 1.5-2 hourly day and night (!!) and DD2 is nine weeks adjusted and feeds every 2-3 hours in the day but gives me good stretches at night.

I found there was no support out there regarding feeding weaning etc a prem so I just muddled through doing things when my DD wanted to and it seemed to work fine.

I hope you have a baby like my DD2 and you continue to get good chunks of sleep at night.

I kept calling scbu. They were always helpful