What's going on with my prem's sleep

[hildathebuilder]

My DS is 22 weeks old but 11 corrected as he was very prem. For a 29 weeker he's very healthy, terrible reflux but that's about it.

He's exclusively breast fed (which has been a huge struggle given he couldn't even suck when he was born).

I have tried to go with the flow as much as possible but crave routine. As part of going with the flow he would typically feed 3 hourly ish with DH feeding at 11.00pm to midnight and then I'd do the next feed at 3 ish. Last week that became 11.00 pm ish and 4 - 4.30 am ish ... great I thought the gaps are getting longer maybe one day I will sleep again. The last 3 days DS has come back to waking, 3.30 am, 3.00 am and 2.30 am. I fed him back to sleep which I usually do but this morning DS didn't actually seem interested in feeding, he was just unsettled.

I never know what developmental stage DS is at (he smiled at 2 weeks corrected, rolled in bith directions at 7 and 8 weeks corrected respectively, head control is dodgy though) and not sure if this is just one of those things, 4 month sleep regression or something else.

Any ideas out there. Any tips on how to get him to sleep longer again? I will keep going with the flow if I have to but 4 ish is soo much easier to cope with than 2.30 ish. (I do co sleep some of the time, but sleep badly when I do and almost always end up feeling stiff/awful the next day so try to avoid it where possible).

Hi hun- we must stop meeting like this! Try not to worry, it's always one step forward and two steps back with night time sleep until they are reliably through the night. Only last week I thought I had it cracked with my 9 week old, only for her to go back to her old ways this week! It'll happen eventually.

For me though, I can't stress the importance of consistency enough! If he's not waking on a night for food, try to settle him with a cuddle or a little drink of water or a dummy if he's allowed one - in the dark, no talking, just close physical proximity. Then back in his cot and you go back to bed! He probably won;t settle on this alone, but he will after a number of attempts (if you go along with this, brace yourself - it may be many attempts at first!). He'll get the message eventually, and will only start waking when he needs a feed. Try it for 3 or 4 nights and see how he gets on. However you decide to do it, keep it consistent.

A few weeks ago DD2 started waking at 12am, only 2 hours after a feed, so she wasn't hungry. It took 3 nights and I was shattered, but we broke the habit and got her back till 3am.

Good luck hun, it's crap being tired.

thanks, last night he went back to 4.20, and was hungry, fed 15 mins then back to sleep until 6.45... i'm telling myself this is new normal and previous days were a blip. if i'm wrong i'll try to settle without food and keep my fingers crossed. I'm glad i didn't know DS was going to be so hard to care for before he was born..