Bfeeding but confused about adding a bottle at 7pm or 11pm

[Fodders]

After a period of illness and poor weight gain, dd2 appears to be in relatively good health again but with a continued preference for feeding every 3 hours 24/7. She's been doing this for a month, her weight gain only returned to normal in the last fortnight.

Am having a little success with not feeding after 3AM. Am only happy to do this when I know she's had a full tummy earlier in the night. I'm knackered and my milk supply is genuinely lower in the evenings so am giving her a bottle. HV advised doing this before she goes to bed.

Has anyone had the same problem - is giving her a bottle at the 11pm feed going to be more successful - I have tried this once or twice but with limited success and I have only persisted with a bottle at her bedtime feed.

hopefull, fodders

How old is your baby?

Yes - difficult to say anything without knowing the age and the other details such as weight of your baby.

I don't understand the question either :) Why do you not want to feed after 3am?

The other thing I'd say is that if you are giving her a bottle at her bedtime, and then another bottle at 11, and then not breastfeeding until the next morning/breakfast time, this will definitely have an impact on your breastmilk....if there's been a history of poor supply/poor weight gain, this could be very risky for continued bf.

sorry - am making less sense than I realised - dd2 = 4M old, she's a little one, just under 5.5KG ie. 6th centile, and was so at birth.

Am trying not to feed her for some of the night, as she's waking a minimum of every 3 hours a night, sometimes it's every 2 hours, but when we get round to 7AM she doesn't want a morning feed till around 1030.

At least 1 of her nightime feeds only lasts a couple of minutes - we've probably got into a bit of a bad habit of sucking to sleep, but I was under instruction from the HV to keep feeding her until her weight gain returned to normal, which it has (200g in the last fortnight).

So now I'm not feeding her between 3 and 6 so that she'll be ready to start the day with a feed from 6AM onwards. The last two nights, she has managed to go back to sleep between 3 and 6, without my boob, and has taken a good feed at breakfast. This has inevitably involved me being awake to comfort her (without feeding). I don't think it's appropriate to controlled cry a 4M baby so I pat and shh and cuddle if that doesn't work and offer water from a bottle if she's really yelling.

It's got to the point where my lack of sleep is affecting everyone else - dh working really hard at home as well as the office and getting increasingly worn out, my parents helping me at least 1 day a week and I'm still shattered, dd1 getting a bit stressed and wetting herself 3 times a day as I was grumpy with her last week (ok this week though as I'm on my best behaviour with her), oh, and I bumped the car yesterday - might not sound bad but this really freaked me as I am good at parking and I do not bump into things.

The chaotic nights started at the beginning of February when we all had flu, and I kept on telling myself it'd be ok when we all got better - but we just don't get better. We've had one week in the last 9 when nobody in the house was ill. In the last 10 days we've had 3 days colic then blood in the nappy from dd2, another cold for dd2 and me + 1.5 days nausea and diaorrhea for me. I'm trying to do as little as possible round the house so I'm conserving my energy - but that's pretty hard when there's a 2.5 year old with me all the time.

Yup - realise 2 bottles in the evening will diminish supply - but am getting to the point of thinking that only bottles will help - even if dd2 keeps waking, at least someone other than me will be able to get up to feed her from time to time.

....sorry for the whinge - but I have to get this off my chest....

Personally I would probably introduce the bottle at the 11pm feed time. Hopefully to give you a few more hours sleep, also perhaps you could go to bed at 10 and your dh could do the last feed.

I mixed fed v sucessfully with DD2, one bottle a day from about 6 or 8 weeks (funnily enough it was a daytime one though!) Found it made no difference to my supply, but It did mean I wasn't so tired, which in turn helped everything :)

Fodders, I still don't get it.

Why don't you just feed her at 3 am and then you can both get back to sleep???

In addition, she'll be getting milk inside her, which is good.

I can't see that pattig and shushing is of any benefit - it keeps you awake and means she has one less feed than she otherwise would. Water when she is yelling? Why get to that stage? Just breastfeed her :)

If you are worried about her getting bad habits (huh?!) , then don't be! Plenty of babies her age and older feed to sleep, and she is little enough and young enough for this not to be an issue....especially when you have other concerns in your life.

Sorry if I am missing something here. I don't see the point of stopping her breastfeeding at 3 am - that's all!

Oh God, poor you Fodders. You must be totally exhausted

The way I read this is that you are trying to get her to drop the 3am feed in the hope that she will sleep through from 11 - is that right?

am trying to not feed her for some of the night so that she will be hungrier in the morning and to help her learn to go to sleep without a boob in her mouth .

I would be delighted if she went to sleep at 7-ish, fed at 11 and once more before 6AM and was bright eyed and bushy tailed for some part of the morning....in fact I'd be over the moon if we could get to that!

We'd got ourselves into such a pickle that she'd feed so much through the night that she would be asleep solidly between 7AM and 1000 - precisely the time of day when there's no possibility of me being asleep!

I've just bf, and will continue with that when she wakes this evening until 2200-ish when she'll get a bottle.

am keeping everything crossed in the meantime, k

ps. tiktok - been there, done that - I put a boob in dd1's mouth whenever she cried at night for a year. From the age of 4 months she woke at least once every couple of hours. At the age of 8 months when she was still completely reliant on me to get back to sleep she teethed all four bottom teeth in one week. During that week she did not sleep for longer than 40 minutes at a stretch. I''m sure you can see why I'm keen to try to manage sleep a bit better this time.

Fodders,my dd is 4m old too & is bfed. I've been in a similar situation with my ds. He fed 2hrly day & night & I was knackered too. So I can ttally see where you're coming from. However, I would agree with tiktok. My dd goes to bed at 7pm, I give her a dream feed at 10-11pm when I go to bed. She wakes up at 3-4am for a feed which only takes 10-15 mins. I personally wouldn't contemplate giving her water or pat-shush her to sleep. I think at 4m she needs this feed & it isn't a "habit" as such. Feeding her is quick & ensures she sleeps till 7am. What I've noticed lately is that she isn't always hungry when she wakes at 7am. I think she's just refreshed from her sleep & just wants to play. After an hour, she wants her morning nap so I feed her then & she takes a decent feed. Are you able to do that or do you have a school/nursery run? Also, as tiktok says, replacing night time feeds with formula will affect your supply. These feeds are important. Also, it's natural to have less milk in the evenings.

oh, & another thing, will she fall asleep on her own during the day?

she can and does fall asleep alone during the day with a few minutes groaning and grumbling. Am sleeping in the spare room at the moment in the hope that she won't disturb everyone else in the house on the occasions I think she might be able to do this at night.

I'd love dd2 to be on the same pattern as your 4M karmamother - but she's waking every 2-3 hours i.e. 7, 9, 11, 1, 3 and 5.

Tiktok will know more about this than me but I think her weight may be a factor. I'm sure I read on here that when babies have enough fat on them they're more likely to sleep longer at night. It may be her low weight that's causing her to need frequent feeds. I was going to suggest hanging in there till she starts on solids but apparantly it doesn't make a baby sleep through if they weren't already. I know of some MNers who give a bottle at 11pm in the hope of getting more sleep at night but it might not work. But I wouldn't recommend replacing more than 1 evening feed if you want to keep your supply up. Also, there are threads about upping your supply by taking fenugreek/fennel tea.