Baby waking hourly

[LouisaJF]

My 18 week old baby has taken to waking almost hourly and it's killing me.

He was doing really well and only waking once, but in the last few weeks it has all changed. He has been breast fed but we are now weaning him onto formula as he is a big boy and I'm struggling to fill him. Last night he had a 6oz bottle and slept for nearly 3 hours. He then breast fed and woke up every hour. Is it just a case of introducing a bottle in the night now to keep him going longer?

It sounds like the 4 month regression. Do you feed to sleep?

At 4 months old their sleep changes and they will often wake up after each sleep cycle. If they have the ability to fall asleep themselves, they might just shuffle around & go back to sleep.

If not, they might want the same assistance getting back to sleep - being rocked or fed.

The formula is probably helping break the association rather than filling them up at this age although there is a week long growth spurt at this age.

Look at encouraging self soothing through shh-pat. Google should tell you how to do it.

This too shall pass, hopefully quickly!

He does feed to sleep at night, although during the day he tends to need rocking.

Try and alter the bedtime routine to move milk earlier on in the equation, preferably in the lounge. I do pjs, milk downstairs then up for teeth (prob n/a) and books. It removes the association