Feeling baffled? 3-4 hours between feeds for baby

[Hel1985]

Feeling a little bit clueless with feeds. I hear some babies go between 3-4 hours between feeds during the day.
My little girl seems to only manage 1 1/2hr-2 hours sometimes even shorter. I can offer her a bottle any time of the day and she will always take it. I'm worried I may be over feeding her and I should be prolonging her feeds and maybe be trying some thing else, but after all attempts to get her settled again, a feed is the only one that settles her. Then she just falls asleep on the bottle and doesn't take much of the feed. Even a dummy she will spit out.
Also if
How do people go 3-4 hours between feeds???

How old is she?

How much milk is she getting at each feed?

How old is she? In the early days we had this problem and were advised to up the teat size (as it was too much effort for her to suck from a size 0),and to do everything we could to keep her awake long enough to have a proper feed, which was torture! After a few days she had more energy and her feeding regulated a bit better, to every 3 hours.

Mine was 4 hours on the button, but that was the routine she was in in the NICU.
How many ounces does she have per feed?
The guide on the side of the tub tells you (roughly) how many ounces she should be having in a day.

My little boy is 11 days old today and we have had a right palava with his feeds. One thing a midwife noticed was that he seemed to be confusing tummy pain (wind) with hunger, maybe this is why your little girl is asking for food but then not taking it? Try giving her a really really gentle tummy massage, literally 2 fingers in little circles, this seems to settle my son when he is indicating hunger but has not long since eaten. Xxx

In the early days my baby was always 3 hours on the dot, if ever her Oz needed upping she would demand a feed after 1 hour 45mins. I would just up 1oz and she would go back to 3 hour feeds :)

She's 4 weeks and takes about 3oz xxx

She's also jumped a line in weight on her chart xx

My DS was usually every 2 hours for the first three months - he was an absolute milk monster. I felt like I never stopped making bottles, washing bottles, sterilising bottles. We gave him a dummy in the evening or else he would have fed constantly from 6-10pm in the early days. He settled down at around 3-4 months to a three hour routine.

Ds was almost hourly for the first month then 2hours till 4 months 3hours till 6months and has only been 4hours for a week. He’s jumped loads of centiles to the 50th, they aren’t worried as his height has too but are querying restricted growth for number 2 Incase he wasn’t getting enough on the inside.
He was a milk monster with his reflux in the beginning, the pain makes them want to suck or drink to get rid of it. Any other signs? I was soaked in puke and he wouldn’t lay flat if he went down awake.

I'm probably a bit clueless here as never managed to get DD to take a bottle, but I know combination feeders tend to use paced feeding when using a bottle. I think it is a way of mimicking the feeding on demand routine most BFers follow. If your baby likes to feed little and often, something like that may work for you?

Feed on demand, ignore what anyone else is doing.

One line on the centile chart is not a big worry

In the early weeks frequent feeding is normal. Mine didn't get to 4 hourly until 4 months ish

Sounds perfectly normal. My eldest only went 3-4 hours between feeds to start because she had no sucking reflex and just didn't want to eat. We had to force feed her every 3 hours just to get her to gain any weight by 4 weeks (she just barely weighed her birth weight). My youngest ate every 1.5-2 hours until he was about 3-4 months, maybe sometimes longer stretches at night before then. Very normal. There are people who withhold feeds to fit a 'routine' with very young babies, which is cruel and dangerous and has been correlated with failure to thrive. Just keep doing what you're doing.

My dd settled into a 3 hourly feeding schedule from about 2 weeks, then 4hourly at about 8 weeks

How often do you go three or four hours without eating or drinking?

Our NCT teacher had us mark on a chart our daily routine, i'e get up =, glass of water, breakfast =coffee, go to work = bottle of water, mid morning snack, lunch, mid afternoon snack, all the while drinking water or whatever. it was a useful excerise in understanding why some (most) babes don't go four hours between feeds

i never go three or four hours without a drink and my stomach is huge

I would forget about clock watching and schedules, and just respond to your baby's cues, which it sounds like you have been doing. Sometimes she might want milk because she's hungry, sometimes thirsty, sometimes just for comfort. Sometimes she may drink a lot, other times less. All of these are ok. She's tiny. Just give her what she needs.

My babies were breastfed, but DS slept about 3 hours between feeds during the night (usually). During the day I just fed him whenever he seemed to want it - crying, rooting, sleepy, etc. DD was a different beast and wanted to be attached to me constantly day and night, but rarely seemed to actually take much at a time.

By the time they were 6 months or so there was some kind of routine to the feeds, but it wasn't rigid.

Babies suck for comfort. Newborn babies have a teeeeeeny stomach - it's about the size of a marble when they are born. It's natural and healthy for them to want to feed little and often.