Is tiktok or other BF guru about?

[IsItMeOr]

Sorry, I know you don't know me, but I have seen from lurking on other threads that you are very expert on all matters BFing.

DS is 6.5 months and has never slept through. Although he only wakes twice for a feed most nights (although 2-5 other wakings for cuddles), the time this happens varies greatly, and, while he's never been a quick feeder, he seems to be getting so slow, that I think something might be wrong with our technique. I hoped you could advise!

He had got down to about 20 mins per night feed about two months ago, but that all seemed to go to pot when he had a succession of teething/colds/nights away from home, and now he is taking more like 45 minutes for each of his feeds, and almost an hour at bedtime. He was getting really distracted in his daytime feeds, and they were very quick baby wrestles, but I have started doing them in a darkened room when he wakes up from his naps in the hope that this will enable him to feed more in the day. But he's taking at least 30mins to do these now.

Is this normal? And is there anything else that I can try to encourage him to be more efficient in his feeding? DH and I are increasingly desperate for him to sleep through, but we seem to be going in the wrong direction at the mo. DH has read about an idea that you gradually reduce the amount of time that you allow them to feed at night-time to get them to drop a feed, but I'm not sure that sounds like a good idea.

Sorry for the ramble, but grateful for any advice you can offer. Thanks!

Hello, I'm not a guru but I have breastfed two children successfully.

Okay, there's a lot of stuff going on at six - seven months, your son is getting active - I'm guessing he's started rolling over recently hasn't he? He's probably got two teeth or so as well.

He'll be getting a lot more, at night it seems to hurt them more. Give him Neurofen for children when it gets bad, it's anti-inflammatory and reduces the gum pain as well.

At this point he's also going through a growth spurt - your milk supply has to catch up. He may well having a lazy old time feeding all the way through the day, some kids do that. You can't really judge from the first few months when they are totally shell shocked from the birth and finding their feet.

As for the sleeping - go get a copy of the 'no cry sleep guide' and try any of the methods in there. I would suggest you keep a record of when he is waking, if it is regularly at the same time, then you want to time shift him by rocking him for five minutes and gradually shift the time at which you feed him till you get to a point where the wake ups merge together into one, or hopefully he just stops waking up expecting milk.

What does your DH do when he wakes up? Does he try comforting him. If your DS can smell you he's not going to be easy to settle. Let your DH have a go.

Thanks whomovedmychocolate. I'm sure you're right. He doesn't have any teeth yet, but he has recently mastered rolling and sitting, and we started BLW about 2-3 weeks ago. He definitely has been upping the milk feeds for a couple of days as well, which made me think growth spurt.

My DH is a star, as he does pretty much all the settling in the night other than the feeds. He's also started a scarily thorough record of night wakings - no obvious patterns yet tbh, but maybe one will emerge.

I suspect DS is just a bit sensitive to change, but that's not that unusual for babies, is it?

One of last night's feeds was only 25 mins, but then the second was longer again, and DS didn't go back to sleep for ages, so he was awake from 4-5.30am. Mostly he was just chatting to himself, but enough for me and DH to both be awake with him. We leave him to it until he makes unhappy noises - what do you do with a cooing baby in the middle of the night?!

I don't think he's actually got any pain in the night at the mo, although it is sometimes tempting to give him a bit of the magic calpol juice.

Sigh. I guess it's just another phase and this too will pass.

I'm wary of sleep books as we bought a few when DS was really struggling with sleep from 6-13 weeks, and they tended to make me feel even worse and cry! But I've seen a few people recommend the no cry sleep one, so perhaps it's worth a go...

Thanks again. By the way, I seem to recall a thread where you were thinking of name-changing because Paul McKenna had put you off chocolate entirely. Do you still have that problem, or did you manage to get over it?

Teeth are in place and pushing through even if you can't see them. If he has just got rolling he may well be waking himself up, being confused and yelling because of that. Wait a few seconds before running to him, he may well quiet on his own.

My youngest (14 months) has never slept through so I do feel your pain. He thinks 4:30 is the ideal time to get up and play and we've had to put him in a bed (he was standing on the cot bars and leaping superman stylee off the top

The no-cry sleep guide is non-judgy and really positive. I tend to hate those ones too - it's just packed with a list of 'you could try this' couple of page methods. Or you can just wait a few months and see what happens.

I am still thin and can eat chocolate now without barfing, but I seem to have a handle on it now so it isn't an issue btw.