Bf and sleeping through

[sausagecake]

Is it normal for a bf baby not to go through the night. My dd is just short of 9 months. I am worried she is not getting enough milk from me. To be honest I am not sure if she is waking because she is hungry or some other reason. She has gone through approx half a dozen nights since birth but not recently, now waking 3-7 times a night. Can anyone help. Considering trying formula to see if that works! (hmm)

Well, I think it is perfectly normal not to go through the night at this age. It could be teething? My ds went onto formula at night at six months and still didn't sleep through, in fact his sleeping got worse. If you are feeding on demand I would think she is getting enough milk.

It is so tiring though, you have my sympathy.

Hi SC,

Sympathies from me and many others on MN who've been through this. Do a search on here for tips but may appear in Behaviour topic too. I think there is a 'sleep is for the weak' thread for letting off steam too. Have a look.

Basically all babies are different and whether bfed of ffed some will sleep through early on and others will be well over 1 year before they do.

IMO it would be a shame to introduce formula now - I'm sure that combined with food she is getting enough milk from you but it may be worth upping the times you feed in the day. How many day feeds is she having now? Are you still at home with her all day?

You are right about the fact that sometimes they wake up and are not hungry - they do need to learn to sleep through at some point. Some people do controlled crying (CC) (I am not a fan) and others recommend the 'no cry baby method' (it's a book called something like that which someone else will know better!). I just decided how often I was willing to feed (say once a night) and got DP to get up and settle the baby at other times. Now DD2 is 21 months we just leave her to grumble and she usually goes back to sleep.

HTH.

Thank you. If I had a pound for every time a friend or family told me that formula would change all of this...!! I am currently working from home so she feeds approx every 2-3 hours during the day and I usually get her to eat food at least twice a day with fruit and veg and the occasional biscotti in between. Two front teeth did appear at xmas also.

Some people swear by shovelling in a bowl of porridge for supper. I did baby led weaning tho so never tried it myself.

On the formula front your baby can have cow's milk to drink in a cup during the day and this can increase as they near a year old.
As long as BM remains the main drink it's fine. No need to buy formula at this stage.

Funny you should mention that. I did try a little pit of weetabix last night with a little cows milk but she wanted non of it. What do you mean by baby let weaning? Thanks

have a look at babyledweaning.com which is written by a MNer. Lots of info under the 'weaning' topic too. it's basically no spoons and purees - baby just eats what you have. much easier.

HI, DS is 10 months and we had similar issues at 9 months - it was just before he started crawling, he started eating loads at night.

Still doesn't sleep through, but occasionally i'll get 5-6 hours out of him. It's easiest if you co sleep. I never went down the formula route, although it has crossed my brain a million times to try it !

We BLW as well,so we're not eating as much food as a pureed baby would either, which may or may not make a difference...

My ds is 8mo and he has been waking more and more through the night since he was about 4 or 5 months old. Although he is breastfed I did start giving him some baby cereal (mixed with formula) before bed this week and so far it has seemed to help him sleep through (2 nights approx 7/8pm - 6/7am? with no waking or dreamfeed inbetween) and last night 8pm-11.30pm and then through to 5.30 so still a huge improvement on what it was. Only been 3 nights though so a bit early to draw conclusions.. and tonight he fell asleep before his cereal so we´ll see what happens..

I´m not sure if giving them food before bed is frowned upon but for me was favourable to cc which was the other option.

oh and re. babyledweaning, I do a mix of this and spoonfeeding, there´s no reason why you can´t do blw and also give porridge or cereal

I tried giving formula as well as bf when my baby did this, and it made no difference. he got better when two teeth appeared, he went in his own room, and I decided to feed him at ten pm then again at 5 am, and in between if he awoke we just took turns soothing him and putting him back down, until he learned he wouldn't get any feeds. It was quick and a month later he didn't even need the ten pm feed. He now goes 6 to 6, every night. Good luck !