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Sleep

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Original poster

What exactly does "sleeping through" mean?

45 replies

kiwicath · 19/02/2004 19:45

Hi ya. It's not of any great importance really but I'm wondering what exactly the term "sleeping through" means. I've always thought it was from bedtime at night (7pm ish) to wake up time (7am ish) however I'm being told by numerous proud mums that their baby "slept through" from the day they came out of the hospital. I find it hard to believe that their littlins slept for 12 hours solid without a squeak at that early age so I'm figuring it means different things to different people. General concensus please.

OP posts:

M2T · 20/02/2004 10:24

My ds was a terrible sleeper until he was a year old. For the 1st 6mths he was fed at 10pm, then 1am, then 3am and I would be up to start my day at 5.30am. NIGHTMARE!
However, when one of my friends had a baby she couldn't wait to boast to me how her 6wk old was "sleeping through" from 8pm until 6am. She really rubbed it in!
Then I found out what she meant! Her baby would go to sleep in his crib at 8pm, would wake at 11pm for a feed.... then again at 3am....then would get up at 6am. I failed to see much difference in her baby's sleeping pattern and my ds's, but she STILL to this day tells people her ds was sleeping through at 6wks old. Very odd......
I think sleeping through the night means about 8hrs and most babies can't manage that until 3 or 4 mths (I think?)....IMHO. Hope this one sleeps better than ds!

Gooby · 20/02/2004 11:29

For me, the definition of sleeping through has changed.

When I first came back from hospital with my little one, and hadn't a clue about anything, I seriously thought sleeping through meant that they slept between feeds at night time, rather than being awake and alert or crying or wanting to play at night. So I probably said to people that my ds 'slept through'.

He's now 9 months and it was only when the novelty of night feeds wore off that I realised that sleeping through meant something else entirely! So don't be too hard on those ignorant souls with new babies who say they're sleeping through, they're just like I was then... clueless!!

Mine still isn't sleeping through the night (and I now use the medical definition, which one book I have says is 5 hours).

Northerner · 20/02/2004 11:44

Well to me 'sleeping through' is unbroken sleep from bedtime at 7.30pm ish to wake up time at 7am ish.

bossykate · 20/02/2004 12:22

actually, i don't remember using this phrase in real life, iirc, i just used to tell people how much ds slept, e.g. "he's sleeping 10.30pm to 7.00am" or whatever. no wonder it takes some children much longer than others to "sleep through" the definitions are so different.

elliott · 20/02/2004 20:36

kiwicath, your ds has a sleeping pattern very like my ds2. He's been settling for the evening at around 7, I have been waking him at around 11 and he has generally woken once for a feed between 3 and 5am. A friend suggested I try dropping the 11pm feed, as apparently it can actually cause some babies to wake if they are woken from sleep to feed - so I tried it and he slept from 8pm to nearly 6am...don't know yet whether this was a one off, but maybe worth trying with your ds? (ps ds2 is just over 11 weeks, fully breastfed and probably weighs about 13lbs)

shari1972 · 20/02/2004 20:44

Well you're all gonna hate me, my 13 week old has been sleeping through from 8pm til 9am with not a whimper or a feed has been doing it for over a month now, though if you look at another sleep thread I do deserve this as my 2 year old STILL doesn't sleep through and is a nightmare-so therefore I am not a smug as i could be

LadyCodworth · 20/02/2004 20:45

12 hours. ds3 still hasnt got he jist

he is almost one

Clayhead · 20/02/2004 21:01

shari1972, I don't hate you, I'm just very, very jealous...

fairydust · 22/02/2004 16:35

dd goes 7 - 11 quick change then 11 till 8/9 in the morning and that does me fine

roisin · 22/02/2004 18:50

The good news is ... I can't remember! My dss are 4 and 6, and at times both were pretty lousy sleepers ... But I honestly can't remember the gory details now ... Hurray! It's so nice to have put a stage behind me.

(Except that ds2 was vomiting every 20 minutes until about 3 am this morning )

marsup · 22/02/2004 21:07

My grandmother (who is German, it's a long story)rang up to quote her 1930s German encyclopedia at me and it says babies should be fed every 4 hours during the day and left entirely without food or adult contact for 8 hours every night, FROM BIRTH!!! Does this explain the Hitler Youth movement?

suzywong · 22/02/2004 21:20

Shudder!

Beccarollover · 22/02/2004 21:22

DS does 7-7/8 WAHEY he is almost 6 months and has been doing this for a while

DD does 12 hours too normally 8-8

id classify sleeping through as full 12 hours or thereabouts

bunnyrabbit · 22/02/2004 23:44

Becca,
You're such a show off!!

Rhubarb · 23/02/2004 13:37

Help! I'm having problems with ds - 11 weeks old, been following GF. Everything was going smoothly apart from his afternoon nap. He would sleep fine for 1hr then wake up crying, go back to sleep for 10mins, wake up crying, go back to sleep for 10mins and so on. I have tried going in to him just to reassure him, but that didn't work. Now I am leaving him to settle himself, but that isn't working either.

Now we are having problems at night too. He had been sleeping until 4.30/5am and getting later so we thought we were on the verge of getting him to sleep through! Then 3 days ago he awoke at 4am. 2 days ago he awoke at 3am and last night he awoke at 2am! We didn't feed him last night and he did eventually go back to sleep (after about 30mins or so) and reawoke at 5.30am. But why is he waking up earlier? We haven't changed his routine in any way. His nappy is fine, he doesn't appear to have too much wind and since he has gone until 5.30am without a feed, I am disinclined to start feeding him now at 2 or 3am.

Any ideas?

suedonim · 23/02/2004 17:10

Is he having a growth spurt, do you think? Istr that 11 weeks being one of those feeding milestones and I had a feedathon then. Maybe trying to slot in some extra feeds during day would help?

Rhubarb · 24/02/2004 10:28

Thanks Suedonim, he actually slept until 5am last night so dh thinks it was the cold nights - we put an extra blanket on him last night. I'll try giving him bigger feeds too, he probably is growing, he certainly feels it anyway, my arm aches when I feed him now as he's so heavy!

suedonim · 24/02/2004 15:31

Glad he's going in the right direction, Rhubarb. It is a bit nippy, isn't it? I'm sitting here with a pashmina round me, even though the CH is on and it's bright sunshine outdoors!

Thomcat · 24/02/2004 15:43

Just joined this and haven't read all posts so excused me!!

I said Lottie went through the night day 8 because she breastfed at 12 midnight then we'd all go to bed and she'd wake up when we did about 8 hours later for another feed.

Now she goes to bed at about 8 ish and wakes about 7.30 - 8ish and has about 2 hours nap during the day, usually wakes from that sleep about 3.30 -4ish

samwifewithkid · 29/02/2004 21:07

My daughter "slept through" from 6 months, I class that as a whole nights from 7-7 without waking for a feed.

Rubarb - sounds like your baby could be coming up to weaning time soon, my daughter started doing this at the same time and drove me mad, I had to start weaning her at 13 weeks (only with baby rice and breastmilk until she was 16 weeks)

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