Does she need the 3am feed?

[TOK]

My dd is 5 months. She is great during the day and has naps no problem, nighttime is where I am having problems.

SHe goes down between 7 and half 7. We will give her a dream feed at 11. She will then wake at around 3/4am and have a small feed (maybe 3oz). She then sleeps until 6/7. But the thing is, she will then go without another feed until 9/9.30!! How can I get her to go that stretch in the night? Does she really need that 3/4am feed because she is never exactly screaming to be fed. Is she waking out of habit? Sorry, million questions.

I have posted this in the sleep thread as well. We have tried dropping the dream feed but she'll wake up half an hour later looking for it.

My daughter is just over four months old and she will have her last feed anywhere between 7.30 and 9pm and that's it until she wakes in the morning at 8am. She does wake in the night sometimes but I just comfort her, stroke her head etc and sometimes I will give her a dummy. How many oz is she on during the day? Perhaps you just need to up that a bit.

If she isn't screaming for the bottle then she probably doesn't want or need it, she may have just unsettled or need a nappy change, but I would try not to give her the feed if she doesn't really need it.

She will only have max of 5 oz per feed and feed about 4 times between 7 and 7. SO she could have anything between 15-20oz throughout the day, then 5 oz at 11. Should I try feeding her more often during the day then, even if she isn't showing signs of hunger?

you can't really feed a baby who is not hungry, she won't take the bottle, or she'll take tiny amounts or take too much and bring it back up

at 5 months it is entirely reaosnable she needs and is hungry for her 3am feed

7pm seems early for a last feed and bed for a young baby..

thing is, if she is hungry, no amount of patting or soothing will help , if she needs the milk

if she is awake and not crying , but a bit grizzle, you could try not feeding immediatly, and gradually pusning back the feed a few minutes at a time, but tbh, with a baby this young, i would feed responsively/on demand

you are only really doing one night feed which is great going !

she's not taking a huge amount in the day either, so definitely feed at night

does she ever drain her bottle?

To be honest, if you can bear to wait, I would stick it out for a few more weeks. You'll be starting solids in a month, and that will change the feeding pattern. Once she's on a decent amount of solids (usually by about 7 months) then she may drop the feed of her own accord, and if she doesn't it might be easier to water down the feed and increase solids instead.

What is your gut feel? That she needs that feed? If she sleeps well and goes to sleep by herself and doesn't wake up any other time, I would suspect that it's more a food thing than a sleep thing.

Lulu she never drains her bottle. And you are right, other mums have to put up with several wakes in the night. The broken night's sleep get on top of me sometimes, probably more so lately because DH hasn't been able to help out with the night feeds for the last 2 weeks. Maybe if she had more during the day she wouldn't wake in the night but she gets to a max of 5oz and will not take any more. She must just have a small tummy.

lukewarm (love the name by the way!), my gut feeling is that she does need it. I tried doing the dream feed at 10.30 last night. She had 4oz, the woke again at 2.30 for another 4oz. She slept through til 7 then and fed at 7.30. I can cope with that just fine and as you say, hopefully once solids are established she might drop it.

Thanks for you support. Sometimes you just need a bit of perspective from a stranger!
xxx

It used to be 'anothercoldcupoftea', but DD2 is 10 months now, so getting slightly better!

The broken nights are a killer indeed, just one waking did me in, don't know how people cope with more than that. Don't be apologetic for just having one wake up!

DD2 sounds very similar to your DD. She was a great sleeper for the first couple of months, then just got hungrier and hungrier (I think), and we were back to late feed + night feed by about 4 months or so, and for some reason it seemed so much harder than dealing with a newborn doing that. Felt like the living dead for months (especially running round after a toddler as well). But it did all gradually get better after she started solids (although did do a bit of inadvertent sleep training as well!). She's doing 7pm-5/6am now, which is too early for me, but I'll take an early start over night wakings!

She also had a similar pattern of feeds - wouldn't take much at each feed (breastfeeding, but would only take one side and very short feeds mostly), although we did squeeze in something like 5 or 6 feeds during the day. She's now eating more solids than her 2 year old sister. She is one hungry baby, so I'm pretty sure she needed the night feed back in those months when she was waking for it.

They are how they are unfortunately (and fortunately!), and although I would have loved DD2 to love her sleep as much as DD1, she just doesn't. In fact DD1 at 2.9 sleeps more in total than DD2 at 10 months even now! Good luck - if it does get too hard, then there's no harm in trying to stretch the night feed, or water down the feed or whatever - but it might make your total time awake in the night worse rather than better!

TOK, i was not belittiling that you are finding one night waking hard, broken sleep is ehausting full stop, i suppose iwas saying taht the other way to look ati is, your 5 month old only needs one nigh feed

if she does not drain her bottle and tkes milk until she is satisfied, then you should keep on doing hwat you are doing, little and often suits her and as long as she is happy, thriving, weeing/pooing ets, just keep on trucking!