Dreamfeed - does this actually work for anyone?

[camgirl]

I have been giving my 12 week old DS a 10.30pm dreamfeed for the last week after putting him to bed at 7pm. The problem is he is still waking at 2am, the same time as he would without the feed.

My question is - are there some babies whom this just doesn't work for? Should I give it more time and see if it settles down? I have tried soothing him at 2 without feeding, but it doesn't seem to work (he does go to sleep on his own at other times.)

Please help .. getting desperate for some sleep.

If it was me and he seemed to need a feed at 2am I'd just carry on giving it. Keep lights off, or down, no noise and just feed and then put him straight back down. Eventually he will stop waking for it (ime anyway).

Are you formula or breastfeeding? If formula, could your partner (if you have one) do one feed and you do the other so that you each get a bit more sleep? This is what dh and I used to do. I would go to bed early and he would do the 10.30ish feed and then I would do the 2-3am one. Worked really well for us.

It worked for us and we did the same us Gobbledigook.... lights dim... no talking..
you will soon find that the 2 am feed goes to 3am then 4am then before you know it he will be sleeping 7pm till 7am...
I think he's doing great at the moment.. In theory you only have to get up once in the night! and this is also the time when they tend to have a bit of a growth spurt and need more milk...

good luck

Thanks for the encouragement! I will carry on then and agree it might be a growth spurt as he does seem genuinely hungry. We are bfing so DH can't help with this one!

Dreamfeeding worked for me with both of my DC's. I would put them to bed at 7pm and then last job of the night whenever I went to bed was to do a feed. Lights off, just picked them up, fed them and put them back down. In the early days this guareenteed me about 4 hours sleep, before I did this I would go to bed and it seemed like 10 mins later they would wake up. Recommended it to a friend but it didn't work for her and her DD!

My ds used to still wake up not knowing he'd had a dream feed so I didn't bother giving it to him.

Didnt really work for me either, BUT i dont agree that they will eventually stop waking by themselves, well mine didnt!! I hoped this would happen but 8 month ds still wakes up and i need to feed once at night-have tried and tried to settle without feeding but then he is wide awake for 2 hours and then i end up feeding him just to sleep-so better to do it in the first place! Now i dont know if its out of habit or because he's hungry-doesnt eat much solids you see.

i think a 12-week old will still need feeding at night for a while..