Breast feeding baby and sleep

[xandsch]

With a breast fed baby does it ever get to the position like it does with a formula fed baby, where they will go to sleep at 8pm ish and sleep through, giving parents time downstairs without baby? I think it doesn't happen, DH hoping it will- baby is four months today.

Yes of course it does happen, but when will vary from baby to baby. My DS1 slept through most nights from around 6-7 months, DS2 is 14 months and still wakes pretty much every night. Both breastfed, but I also know mums whose formula fed babies didn’t sleep through till they were 2. Luck of the draw either way IME! Most babies don’t sleep through at 4 months though (only a few lucky ones do).

We are just approaching 5 months and still waking a few times in the night. When i go to baby group all i hear about is how much all the other babies are sleeping. We don't even nap in the day any more unless we have a car ride! 😫

Mine sleep through consistently from 7 months, ebf. She’s nearly 3 now and has barely ever woken in the night.

Sleeping through happened at 7-8 months but she was in bed asleep at 7:30 pm from 5 months, with 1-2 night wakes.

One of mine was FF, one was EBF.
Both started sleeping through 7pm - 7am ish from about 8 months. There has been very little difference in their sleep patterns, to be honest. The only difference was how much easier BF was at night, compared to getting up to make bottles!

I do think formula fed newborns sometimes sleep better than breastfed, because when they are tiny they only really wake because they are hungry, and formula does seem to fill them up a bit more. But beyond 4 months, once they start waking because they are teething / learning to roll over / learning to talk / have separation anxiety / have nightmares etc etc, rather than just to feed, and then I don't honestly think it makes any difference how you feed them!

My DS is 12 weeks and sleeps from 7pm- 6am with one feed at 2. He is breastfed.

My DD was breastfed to 6 weeks and then formula fed because we had various feeding issues. She didn't start going down at 7pm until she was about 5 months old and she didn't sleep through until she was 12 months!

I really think all babies are different, I don't think we have done anything much differently with DS! Your baby will get there in time. All I can recommend is, if she is currently going down at say 10pm, start doing the bedtime routine eg bath, sleeping bag (or whatever), feed, darkened room at 9.30. You can then see if you can gradually bring that routine earlier e.g. try it at 9. This is what we did for DD if I remember rightly.

Yes my DD is Bf and goes to bed around 6.30/7. She has one night feed but DH and I have an evening together.

She’s 3.5 months. DS was the same from about 2 months. DD took about a month longer to get to that stage

It entirely depends on the baby.

One of my twins by 10 months was waking once in the night. At 12 months didn’t wake until 5am.

The other twin woke every three hours until we stopped breastfeeding at 18 months.

My milk was exactly the same and they otherwise ate the same during the day once they went onto solids.

One advantage of twins is that it’s easier to see that babies aren’t identikits. They aren’t born as blank slates. Differences in physiology and character have an impact.

If they don’t sleep, it’s not necessarily anything you are doing or not doing.

(I realise that’s not terribly helpful! )

Hi Op

My baby is 12 months now and is still breastfed I think we got into that position about 6 months old, after that we were able to put her down to sleep with the monitor on and then go downstairs until she was ready for her 10pm feed. It does seem to be a lot harder to settle bf babies from my experience in comparison to my friends who's babies are bottle fed my dd is still waking up a lot between being put down and us going to bed. If you can get her to take a borrow or expressed milk now I would really recommend it as my dd has never taken a bottle and I've only ever been able to get her to sleep xxx

There's a difference between a few hours downstairs undisturbed and sleeping through though.

DD slept through at 18mo, DS is 12mo and I'm sure we're a long way off yet.

BUT both of them were able to be put to sleep 'at bedtime' and left for a few hours once they were 6mo+.

My DS is breatged and has been going to bed at 7pm since he was 8 weeks old. I got sick of the witching (4) hour and thought he might be overtired so judt tried putting him to bed earlier, and it worked! He woke at 10pm to feed for a few weeks but soon dropped that one and woke to feed at 1am and 4am. Not sleeping through the night, but sleeping through the evening at least.

He's going through the regression now so it's a bit all over the place. However have you tried putting him to bed earlier? He might surprise you.

My baby is almost 7 months & is BF. She's sleeps 7pm-7am most days, but does wake up 1-2 times to go on the breast. She's not even hungry just wants the comfort & comes off within minutes. 1-2 times in 12 hours really isn't a lot! & it beats getting up & making a bottle when I'm half asleep you will get there...!

At six months I did controlled crying just for settling At 7pm bedtime. (I still fed after 11pm wakings till 1 year bf) as I found having no evening really tough. It made a world of difference. It took two hard bedtimes of about 30-45 mins of crying (going in regularly) but the third was maybe 15 minutes and after that I could put them in their cots wide awake at 7pm and they'd settle with no crying. It's not a good idea before six months due to increased stress on developing brain but it is fine to do after six months

My DD is nearly 6 months and is starting to sleep most nights 9.30-5/6am...breast fed but I have had to add a formula bottle at 7pm before putting her back on the breast to nod off to sleep...I couldn’t handle any more broken sleep and wanted to fill her up.

Totally depends on the baby. My 1st was only breastfed for five weeks and didn’t sleep through until he was 2.5 years.
My second was exclusively bf and slept through from 6 weeks but took a while to settle (had to rub her face/sing/bf to sleep and sneak away). Third is 9 months and still wakes once or twice during the night. She goes down easily though so we have time to ourselves in the evening. I don’t think method of feeding makes much of a difference here anyway.