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Should I wake the twin who is sleeping longer...?

30 replies

jumblejam · 02/05/2012 08:45

Hello all,
I have gorgeous 16 week old ID boy twins. They are fab...but Mummy is knackered!! I was hoping someone who has been there might be able to offer some advice, please.
They were 5 weeks early and have been guzzling milk madly in an effort to catch up.
They have dropped the 'dreamfeed' and pushed it to 12/1/2am. I've tried to reintroduce it and encourage them to drop the middle of the night one but they're not having it - they wake up and want more milk at around 2.
One of our boys tends to go from 7:30 to midnight ish (which is great) and the other tends to go from 7:30 to 2am (which is even greater). Then there's generally a 3am wake up from one of them. Maybe a 5am thrown in. Then there's the early morning waking when they don't want any more food but are ready to get up.They're gaining weight and feeding well, but I'm completely shattered with all the getting up and going back to sleep. Or trying to!
We have a really good routine during the day with feeds and naps but at night it completely goes to pot and I'm at a loss as to what to try next. So what I wanted to ask is this. Should I wake our boy who is managing longer. OR will this ruin it for him as he's trying to go longer? What did you do? Can you offer any advice? Can anyone lend me some sleep?!!
Thanks everyone x

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
FormSquare · 06/05/2012 14:24

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Cerubina · 06/05/2012 15:24

What a helpful contribution! Thanks for that. Yes, let's hope you definitely don't get one who keeps you up all night, or chews your nipple to a frazzle or anything. Hmm

FormSquare · 06/05/2012 16:15

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beyoglu · 09/05/2012 12:58

Can I ask, how do you wake the sleeping twin? I feed the one who wakes first then feed the other but the second one always keeos her eyes shut throughout and as a result I think the feeds are longer and less successful.Talking to them/ changing nappy doesn't wake them. They Re onky 2 and a bit weeks old though so maybe I should just carry on as I am (lucky fir me they usually feed every 3h on demand)

jumblejam · 11/05/2012 06:37

Don't know what happened there with the deleted posts. Presumably somone being nasty - I don't know how they find the time!!
We reintroduced the dreamfeed last week....and they slept both slept through for the first time this morning. Grin
beyoglu I FF our twins every 3 hours on demand too. I'm not entirely convinced how much milk they take is linked to how long they sleep as sometimes they take very little and sleep for a few hours, and other times they take a lot and wake up again. I know that for the dreamfeed the suggestion is to just put the bottle to the baby's lips and let her drink, but I could never get ours to do this. For the (reintroduced) night feed, I now put the lights on low, change nappy with full bottom clean. A gentle blow slightly past their faces used to wake them too. Very gentle mind!
If I could recommend one thing, beyoglu, it's Jo Tantum's book 'Baby Secrets'. She has a really good website too. I only came across it a few weeks back and I really really wish someone had recommended it to me in the early days as it is absolutely brilliant. If I'd followed her advice I'm pretty sure my two would have been sleeping through weeks ago instead of only just making steps towards it now. x

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