That nagging doubt ... what if he is hungry?

[sheeplikessleep]

DS2 is 8 months old this Sunday.

He's always been a rubbish sleeper and always been awake between 2 and 6 times a night.

I've always fed him to sleep, but in last few weeks, I've been putting him down in his cot drowsy and awake. He's been getting himself to sleep with back patting / rubbing from me.

He then always wakes about midnight (when I feed) and normally then 2 and 4am and up for the day anytime from 5.30am. He also sometimes wakes 10pmish, when DH tries and normally successfully settles him back to sleep.

He BFs a lot (partly because I use it to get him off to sleep for his naps) and normally every 2-3 hours during the day.

He is being BLW and is definitely taking food now, as his poos are much more solid.

I'm not sure what to do now. Whether to get DH to try settling him at midnight or whether for me to feed him then and then ask DH to try to settle him 2/4am? He isn't hungry, unsurprisingly when he wakes in the morning and isn't a fan of breakfast!

DH thinks we need to settle him more without feeding, but I just have this nagging doubt ... what if he is hungry? Is there any way of telling? He's consistently following just under 50th centile line.

Thanks for reading ... any advice or thoughts very much appreciated.

hi there

I don't think it's hunger - it's habit. He should be taking all his calories in the day time at this age, especially if he is on the 50th centile.

The difficulty is that he has got used to feeding to sleep as well as nursing frequently through the day. This is also a habit that he keeps because it's so nice!

What you do depends on whether you want the night feeding to stop and for him to sleep better overnight. If that is the case, I would personally do the following:

1. Stop his feeding to nap association in the day. You may have to rock/pat him initially but at least it will break the habit. Consider the EASY routine from the baby whisperer where feeding always follows a nap rather than the other way round

1. Stop nursing him every 2-3 hrs as frequent day time nursing can lead to frequent night time feeding IMO as their stomachs do not get used to taking in large volumes in one go

1. Have a goal for the frequency of night feeds and gradually space it out. Start with 3 hrly for a few days, then 3.5 hrly etc.

1. Try to get your husband to settle him as much as possible in the night

1. Be reassured that with BLW, they will take in as much as they need and never starve themselves. However, if they are being nursed round the clock this will impinge on their appetite.

Hope this is useful, good luck x

thanks so much for posting amijee. i would of course love the night feeding to stop, i'm shattered and feel like i'm not being the mum to ds1 i would like to be because i'm so tired. i'm just not prepared to do controlled crying, yet anyway.

trying to get him to do naps without feeding beforehand feels like an impossible task, as he just wakes and starts giggling at me / playing around.

i am going to try spacing out his daytime feeds a bit.

the goal of spacing out night feeds is what we are going to start tomorrow night (friday night, where dh can help out!). i think we'll try settling without feeding at midnight, as that is when he is quite sleepy. from 4am, he seems quite awake and in less of a deep sleep. so i think we'll keep extending it, maybe 2, then 4 etc, before feeding him. Over course of next few days / weeks.

love your idea of getting dh more involved at night! i'm more of a wuss with 'giving in', whereas dh stays much calmer.

to be honest, he feeds quite a lot with blw - his intake with solids is good. he is very active though, crawling, kneeling, climbing etc, doesn't stay still, so i think he is burning calories.

thanks for posting - tis useful and reassuring we are on the same lines.

Mmm I don't see what it matters what centile he is on makes a difference?

You should ask DH to keep trying to resettle at night but bear in mind he might want feeding for reasons other than hunger - teething/illness/developmental leaps.

I found that DS nights became much better at 9 months as he suddenly increased his solids intake. It also took time to balance the timings between meals and milk feeds in the day. If he has an off day with his solids he does wake up at night though.

I still feed DS to sleep at 13 months. Sometimes he wakes at night and resettles himself - try and leave him for a few mins and he might surprise you! Obviously not if he's yelling his head off.