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Original poster

sleep-night waking

2 replies

lucy1978 · 31/08/2005 13:58

my five month old son wakes every 2-3 hours every night and will only be settled by a bottle. he does not get put to bed on a bottle but bounced to sleep in his chair until i see him getting sleepy then put him to bed. he has started on solids and eats well during the day so i am sure he only wants the bottle at night to soothe himself back to sleep as he falls back to sleep straight away! any suggestions on how i can break this habit? lucy1978

OP posts:
Kathryn1967 · 01/09/2005 07:29

I'm not at that stage yet (DS only 10 weeks), but in the various books I have read, one recommendation for this problem is to progressively dilute the night-bottle until it's eventually water, by which time it won't be worth his while waking up for it. No idea if it works but a lot of books recommend it...

busywizzy · 03/09/2005 17:21

Lucy, my DS is also 5 months old and I too am trying to get him to settle in the night without a bottle (luckily he usually only wakes once somewhere between 3-4am). The reason I believe he is not hungry and only waking from habit is that in the past three weeks he has slept from 7.30pm until 6.30-7.00am about 5 times so I know he can do it.

I have been doing the diluted feed thing where I have taken his feed down from 7oz to 4oz and then only put 3 scoops of formula in 4oz of water. The last time I fed him this (three nights ago), he drank it and then chatted in his cot for an hour before going back to sleep. I therefore decided that he doesn't need feeding anymore and is only waking out of habit so now I'm trying to soothe him without a feed. He was also refusing most of his morning feed.

I've had two fairly long nights !! but I've been giving him a cuddle when he wakes up to calm him, then putting him back in his cot with his bedtime music on. I then sit by the side of the cot doing 'ssshh'. He also has a Kaloo bear which he drapes over his face and I make sure he has this. If he starts crying, I pick him up and cuddle him until he is calm and then pput him back in his cot again. I think this is the Baby Whisperer pick up put down thing.

The first night this whole saga took over an hour and last night it took a bit longer but once asleep, he slept through until 7.30am yesterday and 7.45am today.

I'm going to perservere as I know he will eventually 'get it' that it isn't worth waking up.

Sorry for the long post, just got into my stride

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