What's your 5 month old's routine- time to start weaning?

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Hi

I have a 5 month old DS who seems to have suddenly changed his routine - or dropped having one entirely - I've listed previous and current below. Just wondered what other people's lovelies were up to at this stage, particularly re number of feeds, starting weaning and sleeping etc.

Any comments welcome...

Until recently, routine was;

-7AM wake up feed
-9AM nap - 30 mins
-10AM feed
-11.30/12ish nap sometimes
-1pm feed
nap in afternoon sometime - between 30 mins and 1 1/2 hrs between these 2 feeds - no specific time
-4pm feed
-7pm feed and bed
-10pm dream feed
-1 x Feed in night anywhere between 3AM and 5.30AM - ? hungry sometimes but only thing that seemed to work to get him back to sleep

Routine now;
Taking little at feeds (I am BF 90% of time, FF at 10pm and occasional in day). He tends to get distracted and pulls off constantly.
At dream feed often now not taking hardly any formula - 2-3 oz, previously 7oz.
9AM nap still happening but others varied if at all.
More difficult to get to sleep in day.
Waking later - between 7-8AM after approx 5AM feed, doesn't seem hungry, but feed anyway. Have tried 4 hour feed gaps but he can't last this long.

He's chewing his hands, and does sometimes watch me eating. When I feed him every 3 hours he does still seem satisfied by milk. He can sit up in Bumbo but gets wobbly after a little while - wondered whether change in routine could signify need for weaning to start? Any other ideas why things may have changed?

Ds2 is 5 1/2 months and we go something like this.

6.30am wake up, BF in bed,
8am Chuck a slice of his brothers toast in his general direction
9am quick bf then nap for 45mins ish
11am BF
12noon, chuck some bits of cucumber, carrot, pepper whatever in his general direction followed by banana. (can you see where this is going
12.30/1pm nap, usually until about 3pm
3pm BF
5pm he usually has a 20minute or so nap but on the days he doesn't he sits with me and the toddler at the dinner table and yes you guessed it, has some food thrown in his general direction.
5.30-6.15 BF with 10minutes to wash change etc
He's usually asleep by 6.30pm and wakes up around 10pm for a BF and again at 2/3am. The 2/3 am feed is getting shorter though.

We started giving ds2 food less than a week ago.

We just put bits of whatever we're having on his tray and he gums his way through most of it.

Have you tried seeing if you can keep him awake past 9am until lunchtime to see if he'll sleep better then?

Also, I would probably keep offering the dream feed until you start him on solids, then if he's only drinking 2/3 oz's he might cut it out completely very easily.

I would put some soft food in front of him, if he picks it up, chews and swallows then he's probably ready, if he pushes it back out with his Tongue I would wait a while.

Chewing their hands is developmental and I'm sure he watches you do lots of things like driving and using a kettle, doesn't mean he's ready to do them. 4hrs is a flipping long time to go without food/drink (which is what milk is). I don't go 4hrs without something, no way will a 5 month old be happy with it.

It's normal for their sleep to go up the swanny at this age, it's developmental and the distracted feeding is normal too.

If he can sit up reliably, has no tongue thrust reflex, can pick up, bite, chew and swallow then I'd see no problem with putting the odd bit of food in front of him and leaving him to it. Well not leaving him, but you know letting him try.

But his behaviour is normal for a 5 month old, changing, possibly teething, growing child.

Even if you started solids, milk is still the main part of the diet and offered first so I'd stick with milk to demand and it's up to you whether you want to offer some food to him. He'd take on a negligible amount at first.

5 month olds are funny, fickle, non-sleeping, fussy things. Lovely though. They like to change the rules though.

My 4.5mo has no routine [sobs]. He BF's 2-3 hourly, still, night and day, his naps are rubbish. His older sister reached a point of actively trying to snatch food off our plates around 5mo, but we held out til 6 months as was the advice then. When DS gets to that stage, we'll start letting him have food, and do the baby-led weaning approach again. At the moment he reaches for whatever's nearby, be it cutlery or food, DD reached a point of clearly preferring to reach for the food, if that helps.

Thanks

aPixieMomma - like your chucking food approach . You can tell you've already done it before and am more relaxed about it. It is easy to get hung up on prescribed routines etc in books, rather than being literally baby led.

It seems your DS is having 6-7 feeds in 24 hours which is where we were at until a few days ago. Me and DH have been ill though, so don't know if DS has been a bit under the weather that may have caused the change.

Someone was saying to me that a baby should have a 4 hour routine by now, but I agree 4 hours without food or drink seems a very long time.

Might try some food over the weekend...

My DS is now just over 5 months:

7:30am Wakes up and plays for half hour
8:00am Porridge or weetabix
9:30am Nap for 30-45 mins
10:00am Milk feed (7oz)
12:00pm Lunch (mushed veg)
1:30pm Milk feed 7oz and nap for bet 1.5 - 2 hours
4:30pm Milk feed 7oz
5:30pm Dinner (mushed veg followed by a yogurt)
7:00pm Milk feed 8oz hungry baby milk.

Sometimes he feeds in the night, but its completely random what time! If he sleeps right through then he has a milk feed as soon as he wakes. Routine varies a bit day to day if we are out and about and we play or he watches me potter in between the things above.

I try and stick to a roughly 2 hour spaced routine. But we've been weaning since 17 weeks so this is now getting to be pretty established! Til he decides he doesn't liek it anymore and it all goes out the window!

HTH.

Sometimes he does feed more.

For example, because he has a long afternoon nap, he might wake up half way through for a quick feed before going back to sleep, and in the evenings he might have a quick feed in between times too.

But with running around after the toddler (only 17months between them) I never really had any time to implement a routine for ds2.

Dp works away 12 days out of 14 so I found it easier to co-sleep with him at the beginning, then i'd put him down in his cot at nap times and the first Stretch of evening sleep. We still co-sleep once he wakes up for his first night feed.

We have had periods where he has been hit and miss like the time he ended up in hospital with bronchiolitous (sp?) so he's normal pattern went out of the window, but the above routine is what he got himself into with me just feeding him when he wanted and letting him sleep when he wanted.

Babies change all the time though and I'm sort of waiting for this routine to turn on it's head for something completely different lol.

I'm sure your ds will work something out for himself and good luck with the food this weekend. It's all rather fun. Lol.