Growth Spurt or ready for food....

[Juicylucytoo]

My nearly 19 week old is back to waking 2 hourly or every 1 and a half hours during the night to feed. During the day he still goes 3 hours. This has been going on since Friday night (5 nights).

He is still exclusively breastfed.

I am guessing this is a growth spurt and he's feeding so often to up my production. Some friends have suggested weaning.

He will be 19 weeks old on Monday. I am thinking of getting him weighted on Monday then making a decision about giving him food and / or introducing formula. 4 and a half months seems early to wean...or should I sit it out? Will it pass / improve from alone??

He had moved from 9th centile to between 25th and 50th the last time I had him weighed (about 3 weeks ago) and he's very bonny, so not worried that he's not getting enough food.

Bit Very knackered, but don't want to wean too early or use formula before I have to.

Meant to add - PLEASE HELP!!

stick with teh BF as long as you can

if you add anything, don;t add food , add more milk

he is obviously thriving marvellously on milk, and it is a common age for a growth spurt, so hang on in there whilst your supply catches up with his demands

a good milk feed is more filling and nutritious than a spoon or two of puree or baby rice

it will pass !

Growth spurt, carry on as you are, he will settle in a few more days .

ds now 2.6 - our health visitors recommended starting to introduce other foods at 17wks - don't get me wrong, bm primary and most important food - rest just tastes to start with and some baby rice mixed with bm - very runny. I don't think ds would have gone much longer on just bm - large baby and very hungry by this stage. Good luck whatever you decide.

My ds1 had a big growth spurt around this time. I didn't put him on solids but did give some very small formula feeds each day as the growth spurt lasted 8 days and I was exhausted. He settled back down until 25 weeks and then went straight on to mashed up and finger food. All dps family start to wean at 16 weeks - and just the constant puking during and after each solid feed from a baby whose stomach is rejecting the food that its tummy is not ready for, is all the confirmation we need that we were right to keep our two on milk for 6 months.
Stick with it you have done brilliantly so far.

not sure what the answer is, but just to let you know I'm going through EXACTLY the same thing. DS 18 weeks, frequent waking, v hungry, moved from 9th to the 25th centile last week.. some pressure to start weaning.. not sure what to do!

I am surprised that hv's till say to give other foods, even tastes at 17 weeks, when for a few years now the who has advised milk only for first six months as babies tummies can't digest anything other than milk for that time.

Growth spurt.

Feed more milk - its more calorific.

6 months is recommended weaning age

search archives here for compelling reasons why this is a goood idea

this whole tastes things is not necessary, there is no window of opportunity you miss

your baby does not need tastes , tehy don't know anything other than milk exists

if your baby is moving up the centiles, tehn surely that gives credence to the fact that milk is enough

btw, my paediatrician, HV and GP have all now said to start weaning now/soon. I'm still not convinced

Unfortunately, I think it's the case that MNers know more about up to date recommendations etc than your average HCP, naturopath.

Thanks for all the advise. He went 2 and half hours between most feeds last night (although I may be jinxing it by writing it here), so I'm hoping the worst is over and we can move towards 4 hourly feeds

advice

Mine did this too but it passed. Hang on in there. I am always saying this but at 6 months when I did start weaning, my DS went through another growth spurt and started waking up every 2 hours again - even though he was having food as well as milk.

DD kept this up for about 2 weeks while she tried to learn to roll both ways. Have you seen the info on Kellymom? I found it very reasuring to know that growth spurts can be for mental development and learning new skills, as well as pure physical growth. For us it also coincided with DD getting more interested in the world around here during the day so not feeding so much then and trying to make it up during the night.

It DID pass, we DID survive - after a couple of weeks she went back to feeding every 4 or so hours. We "managed" not to start weaning till just after 6 months (and so far that's made absolutely no difference to her BFs or sleep patterns in 2.5 weeks). That said, I was really struggling after about a week and talked to the BF councillor (also a HV) - she pointed out that there's more to being a good mum than exclusive breastfeeding and suggested 3 things to try:

1. go back to the new born days of "be nice to mummy". Make sure you eat well and get as much rest as you can (I started napping with DD for an hour or so in the afternoons).
2. give a bottle of formula in the evenings to get a break.
3. start weaning.

Hang in there - sounds like you're on the home straight and you're doing a fantastic job

If you're unsure about weaning then I would say trust your instincts and wait. My DDs have both been madly hungry at four months, the first one was not satisfied by more milk and ended up being weaned but DD2 has now settled down after two weeks of crazy feeding. I know it's exhausting but hang in there. Easy to say, I know...I got angry with my phone last week because it said "fully charged" and I was so tired I thought "well bully for you"... Good Luck

Thanks. Home straight not looking so close today. Last night was a bit of a disaster. Started at 2 hourly and moved to hourly, then fully awake at 5. Very knackered today, but determined not to give up yet.