How old were your babies when they started sleeping through?

[yummymummy1920]

I'm really struggling with my DS who is now 7 weeks, he wakes at least 3 times in the night for a feed. He is bottle fed but has been having 6/7 oz so it's taking a long time to feed him.
Its really starting to interrupt his sleep as he wont settle straight after a bottle.
I keep being told and reading about women who's babies sleep right through from being 4 weeks.
Can anyone give me some advice on how to get him to settle/ reduce feeds before I turn into a total and utter zombie?

Still waiting, 2.5 years later.

DS was 2 years old

They were both about 4 months

4 years 10 months

In fact, a colleague has got engaged, married & had a baby & the baby started sleeping through the night since I had DD & DD still isn't sleeping.

DC3 started sleeping through at 13 months, the other two were both even older.

DS1 - about 10 months
DS2 - age 3
DS3 (who very nearly didn't exist after our DS2 experience) - 11 weeks

Routines etc help a bit (we got a sleep consultant to assist with DS2 in the end) but fundamentally I think they're all built differently - some like to sleep, some don't.

When people say 'my LO slept through from X months old, we did a bedtime routine, bath, book etc' it drives me a bit nuts.

"...and then popped them into the cot, drowsy but awake..."

Mine still isn't sleeping through at 2. But, BUT, I do think it got easier to deal with over time. At 7 weeks you're still knackered from pregnancy/birth and you still haven't worked out the best ways of dealing with night wakings and sleep deprivation. So it does get easier, OP, even if your baby doesn't end up sleeping through for a while yet.

DC1 - 2.5 years old

DC2 - 6 weeks old

I don't think most 7 week olds are anything near approaching sleeping through, though.

And to be perfectly honest, there was nothing I did or didn't do that affected their sleep. It was definitely temperament. DC1 was very alert, took ages to drift off, was woken by the slightest noise and didn't go back to sleep for ages after a feed. DC2 had big feeds and then slept like a log from very early on.

Ds1 bottle fed-10weeks-8lb13
Ds2 breastfed-6months-7lb15
Dd1 breastfed-4weeks-9lb
Dc4 bottle fed-6weeks-9lb
Dd2 breastfed-9 days-9lb12

sorry not much help, to be honest I think it's in their genes, my lot obviously like their sleep, I also think birthweight has a bearing on it to.

As a PP said, peoples definitions of "sleeping through" can be different from person to person.

I had one mom telling bragging to me that her 9 week old baby slept through but in reality this "sleeping through" consisted of going to bed at 7pm, having a feed at 11pm, having another feed at 5am and then going back to sleep until 8am. I smiled pleasantly as she told me all but in my head I was confused as that didn't fit my definition of a baby who "slept through"

DS (BF) woke up at least 3 times a night for feeds until he was about 5 months, then it reduced to about two wake-ups a night but then when he hit about 7 months his sleep went CRAZY!!! At 9 months I decided to sleep train him and he then went from 8pm-6am which I do class as sleeping through. However, that lasted about 9 months and then it all started going wrong again.

DS is now 2yrs and 4m and still wakes up at least once during the night (about 3am usually) and sometimes twice

When people say 'my LO slept through from X months old, we did a bedtime routine, bath, book etc' it drives me a bit nuts. Surely everyone does this? It is not a masterplan.

I can only agree. Absolutely chuff all I have done has made a difference to ds's sleep.

I think a massive percentage of it is just how they are - you can help, assist with routines and sleep train but it only helps to a point. We've been doing a nice bedtime routine since very early but Ds is still a weapons grade sleep refuser.

From my own anecdotal (and thus possibly entirely wrong) observations though, bottle fed babies sleep better. Whether that's down to being fuller for longer or the not having the psychological crutch of mum=boob=sleep I don't know.

Just when you think you have mastered a routine. Sleep regression hits!

Just go with it

Errrr 2 years 5 months and still waiting for that to happen... Sorry!

When people say 'my LO slept through from X months old, we did a bedtime routine, bath, book etc' it drives me a bit nuts. Surely everyone does this? It is not a master plan.

This. Like those of us with non-sleepers aren't doing this. Personally I just chucked my DD into bed with a can of Red Bull after she'd watched a few horror films.

DD was breastfed. Started sleeping through reasonably regularly around 13 months. At 2.5 she still wakes once or twice a night at least half the time. I don't feed her - haven't since she started regularly sleeping through - but she often needs a brief cuddle. And occasionally it's a less than brief cuddle!

Really, three times a night at seven weeks is not bad.

Thanks for your comments I feel slightly more relieved to hear that it's perfectly normal.
For those of you that asked his feeds are 10, 2 and 7.
Unfortunately DP can't do night feeds as he starts work at 4 most mornings, he does take over when he gets home in the afternoon.
He is a very unsettled sleeper though with no help from constipation so I'm not getting much sleep in between feeds.
I try to sleep during the day while he naps but don't get much more than half an hour at a time.

Ds was around 16 months.
Dd is just starting to have a few nights of 12 hour stretches at nearly 18 months (please God, please!!!)

Sleeping through to me is a completely uninterrupted night - whether that's 8 or 12 hours - but staying asleep from the moment they go down to waking up the next morning.

I always thought that little babies need to wake up through the night as their bellies are so little and need to feed regularly. So it confuses me when people say their ten day old/8 week old/ whatever is sleeping through. It's like they're defying biology/ evolution or something

Twins here and neither slept through until well past 2. I got seriously screwed in the sleep department . They are lovely now though and sleep from 7.30pm until 6.30am. Both formula fed.
One of them took about an hour to drink 4ozs until i swapped her to a variflow teat. Then it only took 10mins. Could you try switching teats?

Dd1 was 9 weeks
Dd2 was 2 1/2

3 months. No master plan we were just really frigging lucky. But now she's 2 and we've taken away her dummy and she's refusing to go to sleep for about 3 hours every night so I think that's karma

2 years 2 months here and still not sleeping through although it's not awful now. Sorry to repeat what others have Said but your baby is very young, you can expect to have to suck it up for a while yet.

Wow, 7 weeks would have been a miracle!

ds1- slept through at 18mo, woke up 2-3x per night til then
ds2- just 13mo now, wakes 2x per night.

My grandson was 9 weeks. I remember waking up at 3am and insisting my teenage dd (his mum) fed him as I was worried something was wrong with him. Then I found out some babies do sleep through at this age and I stopped worrying. He was sleeping from 6pm - 6am with a feed at 10pm (ff). I think he gave up the 10pm feed 2 or 3 weeks later. He's slept through ever since with the very occasional lapse - once every 2 or 3 months for a couple of nights. Now at 12months he sleeps from 8pm to 7 am. Dgs has always been a very chilked baby (unlike his mother) and I wonder if this makes a difference?

Three and four months respectively. They were ff and I never ever co-slept. Putting them in their own room and ignoring whinging and whimpering seemed to hasten the process.

DS was 3 in July and still doesn't sleep through!