Dropping a feed and sleeping through the night - FF baby

[user1494168328]

Hi all, my little one is 12 weeks old and we have been pretty lucky with his feeding and sleeping patterns so far. He has been exclusively FF as of 3 weeks ago. His pattern of feeding looks like this at the moment:

6am - wake and feed
9.30am - feed
12.30/1pm - feed
4.30pm - feed
7.30pm - feed and bed by 8
1/2am - night feed

My question is, will the night feed automatically drop when he is ready? I try to only give him half to 2/3 of a normal feed as he is sleepy and goes back down easily, then he has more during the day to make it up. Or will it just creep forward and then eventually merge with the 6am feed? And then that one will drop?

I realise that I am lucky to have him on the above routine at this age and very happy to continue for a while but I'm just curious about the next step and how to encourage it.

Any advice welcome!

Thanks

Have you ever tried him with a dreamfeed?

You're about to hit the 4 month sleep regression where he'll wake more and feed more. No point even thinking about it till you're out the other side of that.

I would also introduce a dream feed. When my DD was 12 weeks, she fed at 7.15am, 10.45am, 2.45pm, 6pm and 11pm. We were able to drop her night (3-4am) feeds at 9 weeks. She did wake up but we were able to settle her by shushing and patting. We took note of how much she fed during the day so we knew she was getting enough calories and did not need to be fed after 11pm.

Re: 4 month sleep regression - it may or it may not hit you depending on (1) whether your baby falls asleep and wakes up in the same place (Moses basket/cot) and (2) whether your baby has learnt (or has been taught) to self-settle. We had a materntiy nurse helping us and she pretty much "guaranteed" we would not have any 4 month sleep regression problems. However, she did say that self-settling does not help with 8 month sleep regression and teething so our challenges are not over and we should be prepared.

Coming back to your question, I would introduce a dream feed at 11pm and try and settle your LO by cuddling/shushing/patting if he wakes up between 11pm and 6am. It may not work immediately but it may be worth trying.

Thanks so much for your responses. if the goal though is to eventually sleep through from bedtime (7.30/8pm) to the next morning, then there are options for 2 night feeds right, the dream feed at 10/11pm and the night feed at 1/2/3am? So at the moment we don't do the dream feed and instead feed at 1/2/3am whereas if we did the dream feed at 10/11pm we might drop the other feed...? Is it easier to drop the dream feed eventually than the later night feed? X

Yes, basically dream feeding allowed us to drop the middle of the night feed sooner rather than later. We eventually moved the dream feed to 10.30pm so now we are getting a decent stretch of sleep (10.30pm -11pm to 6-7am).

There is a chance your LO may be able to merge the 1/2/3am feed with the 6am feed and start sleeping 7pm to 6am but I personally think going for the dream feed is generally a safer strategy. Also, it is probably less likely the baby will start waking up early due to hunger. Our DD can patiently wait playing under the mobile while we get ready and prepare her bottle. She feeds at around 7.15am and finishes her morning milk to the last drop but she never cries for it.