is milk supply lower at night?

[peggotty]

my 8 day old ds has just started to feed better during the day i.e every 2-3 hours and settled/sleeping in between but as soon as it gets to 9 or 10 pm-ish he starts to want to feed almost constantly til early hours of morning when he then settles back into more of a pattern. is this because milk supply drops at night or is this normal behaviour for the early days?

no it is not lower, and your supply is not fully established yet. feeding at night , there is more prolactin in your system IIRC, so more feeding at night helps get your supply well established. your baby does not know day and night exist yet !

here is a lin kto Hunkermunker's breastfeeding site, howbreastfeedingworks.com/tag/breastfeeding/

and

www.kellymom.com another excellent site

peggotty

Your milk supply is higher at night as the level of prolactin, the hormone that supports lactation, is higher. In addition, many babies 'cluster feed' at certain times. Get as much rest as you can, take it a day at a time and he should settle down. Remember he hasn't read the books that say babies should feed at 10, 2 and 6!

peggotty - hang in there, it does get easier, it took me a full four months to get my milk supply properly sorted as I was very sick after I had my daughter, but for most people it's easily a few weeks of uncertainty and worry while things settle.

You do have enough milk, you are doing wonderfully and it will get easier as your body gets used to nursing and your confidence increases.

Normal cluster feeding. I was told that in the evenings you produce smaller amounts of fattier, richer milk so the baby feeds more frequently to tank up on it then have a longer sleep afterwards. Ds cluster fed for 4-6 weeks IIRC and it helped knowing it was normal and nothing to do with not having enough milk.