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Sleep

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Original poster

Do you wake your 3-4month baby for the 10/11pm feed?

25 replies

omama · 09/03/2015 21:42

Or do you:
give them a dreamfeed?
wait for them to wake up themselves? (And if so do they wake around 10/11pm or much later?)

Just interested as keep reading posts saying their dc is sleeping through from 11pm-7am. My dd is 15 weeks & she dropped her 11pm feed weeks ago & is doing her long stretch from 6/7pm - 1/2am. Then she wakes again at around 5am so I am still getting up twice in the night to feed her most nights (she's ff).

I'm tired & would love for her to do the long stretch overnight instead of in the evening (so I can actually get a decent night's sleep) so am debating whether to try waking her.

OP posts:

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UncommonSense · 09/03/2015 21:48

Really? Baby is sleeping from 6 til 5 with only one feed and you are complaining?

That's eleven hours! Get a grip and go to bed earlier yourself.

Hobby2014 · 09/03/2015 21:54

Well that post was helpful .

OP I'd try a dream feed when you go to bed for a few nights and just see what happens. It might make baby move the 1am feed to a bit later and then may wake up later than 5am.

Ihavealwaysbeenastorm · 09/03/2015 21:57

Wow that's so unhelpful uncommon are you always do rude?

OP broken sleep is hard when it's followed by a very early morning, and I know it's not always possible to have an early night when you're getting caught up with washing bottles , cleaning, laundry and having a small amount of 'me' time.
My ds responded well to a dreamfeed at 11pm do give that a try, what have you got to lose?

Ihavealwaysbeenastorm · 09/03/2015 21:58

*so rude

Original poster

omama · 09/03/2015 22:06

Thats really not a constructive or helpful post in any way UncommonSense.

Baby is not sleeping 11 hours. As per my OP I am up twice in the night for feeds at 1/2am then again at 5am. By the time I have resettled her after the 5am feed her brother gets up for the day so I dont get back to sleep. That information is not relevant to my post. I am not complaining about how long she sleeps for. Technically she is 'sleeping through' as she does a stretch of 5-6 hours. Just she does it in the evening not overnight. If there is a way to shift that long stretch of sleep it'd be nice. Tis all.

OP posts:

GraceGrape · 09/03/2015 22:06

My DD1 (who was ff by 3 months) used to have a dreamfeed at 11pm. I literally used to get her out of the cot, put the bottle in her mouth and she would drink it all without waking up. In fact, as she had reflux, this actually seemed to be the easiest feed! She would then sleep till 5am originally, which gradually extended to 7am by about 4 months. The dreamfeed used to be one of my favourite feeds.

I tried giving DD2 a dreamfeed (fully bf) but it didn't make any difference to her waking pattern, so I just used to go to bed earlier and then feed her when she woke naturally - which was every couple of hours, grrr. I co-slept with her though, so I actually found it more restful than when I had to get up in the night and bottle-feed DD1. It is tiring to have broken sleep every night. I would try the dreamfeed if I were you for a few days, if it doesn't make any difference you can just go back to feeding her when she wakes.

Muchtoomuchtodo · 09/03/2015 22:10

I did, and it worked for ds1 but. It so well for ds2

It's got to be worth a try op. If it doesn't work then is there any way that you can get to bed earlier?

TreadSoftlyOnMyDreams · 09/03/2015 22:14

I used to do a dream feed as late as possible so 11-11.30. I got a longer stretch that way. Usually had a sofa snooze before heading up.
The 5am feed is a killer. Soo hard to get back to sleep

By 6/7 months I had started to bring it earlier and dropped it entirely by 8-9 months

Original poster

omama · 09/03/2015 22:16

Thankyou for your helpful replies hobby and Ihavealways.

I've been a little reluctant to try a dreamfeed as we tried it with ds when he was a baby (coincidentally for the same reason) & he would only take a couple of oz & then still woke up twice! We ended up just waiting it out which took til he was 6/7 months. It was easier last time though as I could lay in to catch up - dont have that luxury this time! So maybe we will have to give it a try.

DD is quite sicky though so would def need winding before laying her back down - how do you do that without waking them?!

OP posts:

GraceGrape · 09/03/2015 22:18

As I mentioned, my DD had reflux and was very sicky. I actually found that the slow drinking rhythm helped with this and she was never sick after her dreamfeed. I did used to hold her upright for 10/15 minutes after she'd finished though.

Original poster

omama · 09/03/2015 22:22

And thankyou Grace, Much and Tread. Thanks for the df tips

Re earlier bedtime - I am already going pretty early most nights. But as mentioned upthread there are always some chores to do & I have studying to do too. Very little 'me' or 'us' time is occurring in our house at the moment.

OP posts:

Muchtoomuchtodo · 09/03/2015 22:59

It's a tough time.

Just keep in mind that it will get better.

Original poster

omama · 10/03/2015 00:51

Thanks Much - I have that to keep me going

OP posts:

Cooper11111 · 10/03/2015 02:29

Hi OP, my dd 11 weeks (5 corrected) does EXACTLY the same- as you can see by time of my post that in doing the 2am. I'll be up half an hour and hopefully she will sleep til between 5-6. I'm also a little anxious about that second feed- luckily my OH does it. My plan is to just go with it and hope she can gradually push that second stretch a little longer to nearer 7am. I did try dream feed and it made no diff and actually she was p'd off and I was more tired. It seems the amount of milk she has doesn't affect how long she sleeps for- e.g yest she had 2oz at 2pm and woke at 5.30, she has just downed 5 but think she will still wake.

Not much help, but just wanted to share experience. Please ignore that unhelpful post! There are a lot of very tired people on here and she is prob envious as she is up 10 times a night! Your baby is doing well but doesn't mean you shouldn't want her to do better, in fact I get a little furious when some responses on here suggest that we should all be happy co sleeping and still breast feeding our babies forever . Each to their own x

Original poster

omama · 10/03/2015 06:49

Hi Cooper thankyou for taking the time to post. I'm quite surprised by how many of those who've responded do dreamfeeds - I thought there'd be more doing like you and I.

My dd is quite a few weeks older than yours (15 weeks, 12 adjusted) so yours is doing really well! . Last night dd fed at 6.45pm, 12.30am & then again at 5.45am. DH did the second one but as usual I havent got back to sleep as ds is now awake!!

DD takes approx 4-5oz per feed every 4 hours in the daytime. and the night feeds will often be 5-6oz. I'm now finding she isnt hungry in the morning & its often 10/11am before I can get a feed into her so she sometimes only has 3 feeds in the daytime - this doesn't seem enough to me (though I am comparing to ds who guzzled tons)?

If I try to top her up at say 8/9am she sometimes flatly refuses, other times will take 2-3oz. This then pushes her next feeds to 12pm & 4pm (ish) which causes a problem at bedtime as she's not hungry enough to take a full feed & then needs to wake at night for it again. I feel like if I could get her to take 4 decent feeds of say 5-6oz in the day she would probably only need to wake once for a feed. She had actually started doing this (waking once at 3/4am) about 4/5 weeks ago when she was feeding 3 hourly but she won't eat that often anymore.

OP posts:

Original poster

omama · 10/03/2015 06:50

Oh & I am definitely going to have a talk with dh about trying out a dreamfeed!

OP posts:

firsttimemumma2014 · 10/03/2015 07:57

My DS is 4 1/2 months and was waking the same time as yours after a 7pm bedtime - 1am and 5am (ish). We introduced a dream feed at around 10.30pm. I call it a dream feed although it isn't really as he fully wakes up every time. Initially it made no difference and we had the same wake up times, I was ready to scrap it. But we decided to plod on and that if he woke before 3am we wouldn't feed him, only shhhh/pat. It took a while to settle down, probably a couple of weeks, but he now wakes at 3.30am for a feed and then is up at 7am. Means I am only up once in the night which is much more doable than 1am and 5am. Good luck if you decided to try!

Cooper11111 · 10/03/2015 08:39

Morning Omama, mine was the same re feeding. Totally uninterested in morning bottle. Just hoping it will pass. She did 8pm (we went our for dinner) until 2am and then slept until 6. So a really good night. She is now back in her cot and I will wake her at 9.30 to feed her. I give her last two feeds of the day quite close together- seems to really tank her up. She is doing well, but I'm still not putting her down awake at bedtime. But it doesn't seem to cause a problem as she must be settling herself in the night otherwise she wouldn't sleep such long spells. Try cutting down on the oz in the night so she takes her morning feed well?? X

LauraDec · 10/03/2015 11:01

We have a similar sleep pattern and we tried a dream feed but LO was so asleep he started choking on the milk and woke up totally really angry. It then took 2 hours to get him back down. We then decided never to so it again.

This is making me think twice though.

Heatherbell1978 · 11/03/2015 10:45

Hi, DS1 is 6.5 mths and we've just stopped the 10.30pm feed and he's now sleeping through (horrah!) AT 3 months we started a dream feed but in reality he only properly 'dream fed' a handful of times. More often than not he'd wake and be grumpy. Then he'd sleep until around 4am, feed, and then to 7am. Then the 4 month sleep regression hit.....oh Dear Lord....and it was hourly wakes after the dream feed so we changed strategy a bit and fed him when he woke but in reality that could be any time between 10pm and 12am which was getting annoying and also I didn't want him to associate waking with always eating. About a month ago I weaned him off the 4am feed by gradually reducing the milk, then one day he just refused it so from that point, no more milk at 4am. Then about 2 weeks ago we started properly waking him at 10.30pm, lights on, nappy changed and then feed. He was a bit grumpy but nothing awful. 2 weeks of that and he started refusing the milk. Now he sleeps 7pm to 6.15am.....:-)
Not sure if that answers your question but tbh your babies pattern at this stage sounds very normal and like mine was at that stage. It will change so whatever you decide to do now might not work in a few weeks time!

Buglife · 11/03/2015 12:40

My DS had a similar pattern to yours at that age, long sleep from 7- until 1-2am, then wake again at 4-5am. Sadly the dream feed would quite often do nothing and he'd wake around 2 for a feed anyway. I never mamaged to tweak his long period of sleep, a few times he had some upset at 10pm and then slept 10-5 and I was amazed, but that was a cruel trick from him as now after we've been weaning a month his sleep has gone to shit and he drinks most his milk overnight, so we are now on 7pm, 10pm, 2am and 5am.

Buglife · 11/03/2015 12:41

At nearly 7 months that is

Katekoom · 11/03/2015 13:40

My lo wales twice in the night usually and i tried a dream feed but she always woke just that little bit and out was like her brain told her that was wake up one, so she woke the second time and wouldn't go back to sleep easily - i creep into bed! Contemplating an early night tonight as she gets her big chunk of sleep in the evening too and its killing me!!

widdle · 11/03/2015 15:05

Hi OP - I tried for about 2 weeks to do a dream feed with my DS but he still woke up at 1am. Mind you, he still doesn't sleep through now and he's nearly 2! In fact he had much more of a regular pattern as a baby than as a toddler (Maybe I broke him )

I would give it a try but it wasn't a miracle for us. Good luck!

Gennz · 12/03/2015 00:22

Omama my DS is 16 weeks, largely BF but gets a bedtime formula bottle at 7pm.

Routine is:

7pm formula bottle - 250ml - some nights he drains it, sometimes drinks about 200ml
10.30/11pm dreamfeed (breastfeed)

This gets him through to anywhere from 3am - 6.30am. Usually between 3 - 4am, but this morning it was 5am. Anytime between 5am - 6.30am I treat it as a night feed, straight back to bed and get him up again to feed by 7.30am.

If he goes through til 6.30am (almost unheard of!) I start the day. If it's between 3 -4am (usually) we start the day at 6.45 - 7.15am.

I had dropped the dreamfeed at 9 weeks as it didn't seem to be making a difference but re-introduced it at 12 and it made all the difference, suddenly he started sleeping longer.

Of course we still have bad nights, but the nights where he only wakes once at 3.30ish, feeds and goes back down til 7ish are becoming more frequent... SO much more managable then 2 wake-up/feeds!! I actually feel almost human again.

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