How to increase gap between feeds?

[gingerkirsty]

DD is 16 wks old and from what I understand 'should' be feeding roughly every 4 hours.

About a month ago she was on a 3 hr cycle waking once (3am ish) for a night feed (I was dream feeding her at about 10.30). However this went up the spout when she got a cold. She was so blocked up she really struggled to feed, so I had to feed her every hour or so to get enough milk into her. I have yet to get her back on to a 3 hour cycle and she is still waking 2 or 3 times through the night too

I have started giving her formula for her dream feed to try to get her to sleep through longer which worked for the first night (Friday I think it was) but not since.

I was vaguely following the baby whisperer EASY routine before (pre cold!), but now she seems to need to sleep more than once in a 4 hour period so I can't see how to follow this.

I am also trying to train her to go to sleep in her cot (rather than me rocking her to sleep) using PUPD and a little bit of CC. This is using 'The Baby Sleep System'. However when I posted on their forum asking a question about early waking, their first response was 'get her on a 4 hour routine' - BUT HOW?!?!?!

I am now feeling stressed and confused, have made reasonable progress getting her to put herself to sleep but I now feel like I'm doing everything wrong! Sorry, not normally like this but the forum response has really thrown me!

Any advice would be gratefully received

Get a sling and let her sleep in that so you can go out and about

Oh and at 'should be feeding every 4 hours'

I find 2 hours quite a helpful time for between naps - bit more if a long nap preceded, bit less if short nap. mine wakes up at a different time each morning so couldn't expect him to nap at set times. Same for feeds.

also you may find you can distract her into going longer between feeds but if not don't sweat it - maybe give her ebf in a bottle so you can get out and about a bit more. this helped me as ds went off feeding with an audience. he never managed 4 hours i don't think but did, some time after 16 weeks, change to feeding faster and less frequently. It does help when feeds are a bit further apart but don't beat yourself up about it because your baby will do what she does and what people are saying here I think is be happy to be led by her because you will enjoy her so much more. I was determined pre baby to have a fixed routine but then discovered that babies just aren't made like that. Well some clearly are, but most aren't. You haven't somehow failed if you don't get the 4 hour sleep through the night clockwork baby. IMVHO opinion it just means you have a normal baby and an enjoyable more flexible non clock-obsessed life.

I find it helpful having a pattern to the day so that i know roughly where I am, for sure, but a proper routine if your baby is not that way inclined? just too stressful.

Finally, imagine you did get her to fit into the routine after a hard bout of tears and stressing - what will you do when she next gets a cold? and the one after that? CAn you really be bothered to do baby obedience school over and over again? She will be doing nights and naps on time soon enough. 16 weeks is teensy tiny and just about to get so deliciously gorgeously cute and interactive and interested in the world etc. The next couple of months, for my money, are so special it would be such a pity it they went by in a fog of self doubt and stress for you.

Finaliisssimo - everything is just a phase!

sorry for going bit off piste - end of a longgggggggg day

Are you feeding both sides if you're breastfeeding? That helped my DD go from 2 hourly feeding to about 2 1/2 to 3 hourly at a similar age. She was having about 8 feeds a day by then in total.

No time as dashing out, but 'should be feeding every 4 hours'..... Dear or dear.

Where's this come from, gingerkirsty?

Anyone advocating this for a baby of 16 weeks (or, in fact, for any human being of any age!!) knows nothing about babies, nothing about feeding, and nothing about breastfeeding.

PUPD and CC are (in my opinion) unkind tactics for a young baby - and what is the point of something that a) does not work and b) results in the mother feeling 'stressed and confused'?

Off to google 'The Baby Sleep System' which sounds like a load of rubbish to me - hope they are not litigious