if i BF at 11.30ish will this mean we can lose the 4am feed?

[monkeybird]

My son is 12 weeks and Bf, roughly like this:

6am small feed
8am
11am
2pm
6pm cluster feeds up (and fusses!) until about 8pm
sleeps until
4am feed

I have no idea how much he weighs since I don't bother going to the clinic but as he's a little chubster who was on the 98th centile at birth, never lost any weight and poos/wees for England, I'm quite happy he's feeding well.

I'd like to try and see if we can drop the 4am feed somehow, but worried if I feed him between 11-12 he'll either wake up and scream the place down or that it will set him back on a 3 hour cycle and then will wake at 2am and 5am

Or do I just leave him to decide?!

You could try a dream feed before you go to bed but some people find lo is too tired to feed much and still wakes about the same time for the next feed. On the other hand lots of people find it works well. Once your Milk supply is well established you can try giving EBM at this time as you can give a bottle without waking them as much. HTH

Gosh I wish my 16 week old was this good!!! She still gets up twice per night!! With DS1 and 2 I never tried 11pm feeds as it meant I couldn't go out for the evening without expressing which I never got the hang of.
DS 1 kept up his 4am feed until 9 months when i had to control cry him out of it and DS2 slept through on his own accord at 5 months (not on solids). I guess you just have to try and see if it works for you. But your 12 week olds sounds like he is doing so well!!

I know - I shouldn't complain but also have an 8 yr old and a toddler so any extra sleep is very welcome in this house! With the other two I kept feeding in the night as they wished but hoping to shift things a bit this time in the whole family's interests (like DH and I sleeping in the same bed or even room sometime soon!)

I dream feed and thoroughly recommend it
ds is 7 mths na dhas been sleeping 10.30/11-7 sporadically since 5 mths and 5/7 nights recently...
But he is on 2-3 good solids meals a day too

Only read original post. Try a dreamfeed (via bottle with EBM is fab) around 10-11. DH gives my LO it via bottle, he stays asleep most nights, so getting the teat of the bottle in is far easier than me trying to get a boob into his mouth. he guzzles, then goes back to sleep.

You may find despite this, that your LO continues to wake at 4 out of habit and not hunger (I am finding this with 1am waking for the feed that we have just dropped) - and am trying the wake to sleep texhnique from the baby whisperer....2nd night tonight, fingers crossed it works.

Trial and error is the way forward, although I think to have your LO sleeping those hours is fab at the 12 week mark!

It worked for both of mine, I used to wake them up and bath and feed them at 11pm and they both slept through 'till around 6am.

Thanks all. those of you who give a bottle of EBM, do you then start expressing late at night as well to keep the supply going? Or in the morning?

DS now has another cold after having a week of snuffle-free feeding (while the 3 yr old was really poorly instead. No rest for the wicked...) so didn't feed well this morning. Since I was pretty full, I took the chance to express (120 mls! Amazing! No wonder he's such a chubster). Of course he immediately woke up and wanted a feed but fortunately I seemed to have enough milk.

But under normal circumstances, when is the best time to express for most?

V v of all that continuous sleep! Wish ds3 could take a leaf... Dream feeds worked with the first two so persevering here, not least because then he would be up 3 times in the night rather than the current 2.

Anyway. Expressing times...being a Gina girl her expressing pattern seems to work. Off the top of my head (book is upstairs by ds3s bed (hmmm...maybe he'll learn by osmosis that he should be doing better in the night ), expressing just after each feed during the day means that you maintain enough supply for each feed and a little over for expressing rather than doing it as well as one of the other day time feeds. Will fetch book later if you like.

I have same problem as hannahsaunt. How old is your LO Hannah? Mine is 18 weeks.

Anyway, we are still on 11pm-12.00 and then a 4am.

Monkeybird - I express 11pm - ish for dream feed. Tonight I am late (am doing it now) and then I express again in the morning as because he feeds so much between 4am and 5.30am/6am he has no breakfast to speak of.

So express at 11pm. BF at 4am (for big munchies) then express around 8am just to empty them and prevent getting too full (have suffered from mastitis a few weeks back so am now paranoid)