does co sleeping really help?

[charliegal]

My 4 month old boy recently started waking about every 2 hours, sometimes less through the night. I feed him and he back to sleep, no problem. Someone (on here, I think) recommended co sleeping as being easier for these kind of night feeds, so I tried it.
Wow, practically every time I open my eyes, there he is lunging at me, mouth going like a guppy's. I tried to follow advice from some attachment guru or other 'ignore the clock, 'tis irrelevant if you are meeting your child's needs'.Ignoring the clock, I just felt something was not going to plan. Last night after 3 feeds I squinted and it was only midnight- he must have been feeding every hour!
I love having him in bed with us, but has anyone found co sleeping dramatically increases the amount of night waking and feeding?

I know I read a study which found exactly what you're saying, co-sleeping does increase night-time contact. This could be seen as good or bad thing.

You know he's probably happier in with you. Do you feel like you're getting more rest?

My lo started waking every 1 to 2 hours for feeds even though we were not co-sleeping. I believe he was going through a huge growth spurt and that this is often mistaken for the reason to start weaning. I find that co-sleeping means I get more sleep as I don't have to physically get up to get him but unfortunately he is now stuck in the rut of waking every 1-2 hours.

i find is dd is stirring and i pat her back, she goes off sometimes. if she gets more het up instead, i feed her. i can't be arsed with fighting with her for more than 30 secs when i just rather have some sleep. she is now 24 months so play it by ear. you will learn more about each other as time goes on.

We have wound up co-sleeping rather by accident than by design. Ds2 is 4 months and I do wonder if it has increased his night wakings. I also find it uncomfortable as he likes to turn sideways and kick me in the back. I would really like for him to sleep in his little co-sleeper crib. He falls asleep in it just fine but then won't go back in when he wakes for that middle of the night feed.

Oh, and yes, he has started wanting to snack during the night even more

i loved my lo coming into bed. i got sooooooo much more sleep that way too.

I co-slept with ds for around 5 mths and it reached crisis point when he was waking and feeding every 2 hrs and still wouldn't go back to sleep. At that point neither of us was getting the quality sleep we needed. I believe he was 'asking' me to give him his own space and routine. It took some hard nights and perserverance, but he's in his own cot and room now. And we wake up every morning happy to see eachother. For us, co-sleeping was fantastic for those first few months where babies need their nightfeeds sp ti's easier anyway.

I second what Lori said. We had exactly the same problem and didn't co sleep at the time. Co sleeping since seems to be the only way I'm not awake for hours in the night because if I have to get up then I'm fully awake rather than rolling over in a bleary daze

quite common to increase night feeds anyway at this age due to be being nosy and not settleing to decent feeds during the day.

There is also a belter of a growth spurt about this age. my dds lasted 3 weeks before her feeds dropped back down to every 4 ish hours.

Grit your teeth and do whatever means everyone sleeps!

ds2 has been in bed with me since he came home, in the begining it was great he fed i slept, gave up the night feed at 10 months but still is in with me and has just turned 1. starts in his cot and then senses that i am in room and howls and is asleep seconds after his head touches my pillow! i dont mind but dh does and so does grandma when he is staying with her!

I've been mainly sharing our double bed with ds3, who is now 5 1/2 months. He's always been hungry at night and tbh I've been holding out until I wean him at 6 months and assuming that he'll sleep through then. But last night, completely out of the blue he slept from 11.45 til 8.15, which counts as sleeping through in my book.

We're currently doing a battle of wills with our DD about this. She suddenly went from sleeping happily six hours overnight to waking hourly wanting food.

We've (for the last three nights) been trying to break the habit of nursing to sleep and what we've found is providing she has had a decent feed, she will go four hours so far - so we put her down at 7, dreamfeed at 10 and she'll wake at 2am. We are now extending it by 15 minutes every three days (so, so far we only get to 2:15 before she wakes). But you need to teach him to go to sleep without food, we do pick up/put down and it's working so far (and on average takes about five minutes - down from 20 - that's three night's progress). It's easier if the non-milky parents does the PU/PD though.

We bring her into our bed after 4am if she wakes up and she feeds and goes back to sleep (so do we). But co-sleeping also often means you sleep less well, babies are wriggly, noisy little so and so's. I tend to get my DH on one side and her on the other both of them farting, snoring and kicking me. If I could fit in the cotbed I would!

Good luck!

It didn't actually increase it in our case because he'd started doing that anyway, but it certainly followed that kind of pattern. But after a few weeks I learned to sleep through it (or at worst more-or-less sleep through it) and I suspect DS was never 100% awake either, so overall it made for more sleep as well as more feeds.

DS (6 months) is in bed with us for the past two weeks as he too was waking every two hours. Since he is in bed with us he is slowly sleeping better (I do think there is a growth spurt at this time as well, and he is too nosy to feed prop during the day) and even getting himself to sleep now in the evening instead of me bf him.
I noticed that when my breast is "exposed" he will feed more than when I cover it up with either the duvet or button up pj top again.

We all get more sleep now despite being in a double bed (oh I wish we had a kingsize).

Dd slept much, much better in with us - defn less feeding/more cuddling - but we didn't start co-sleeping til 5/6mths...

charliegal, very good question

I resorted to co-sleeping (and what seemed like more or less continuous breastfeeding some nights!) out of sheer desperation because I just couldn't stay awake to sit up in a chair and breastfeed. Co-sleeping seemed the lesser of two evils.

But I would not say that I am one of life's natural co-sleepers - I never slept that well myself, and my right hip got very achey with lying on it to feed and that has taken a long time - years actually - to mend.

Thanks for all your responses- good to know I am not alone.
Jomaja- I definitely agree about the exposed breast, I put my pajama top on last night and it did form some kind of barrier!
My partner is getting a good night's sleep, huh.
I do feel even with the increased feeds, which may have happened anyway, co sleeping is the best option at the moment. I too, cannot be arsed getting out of bed 4/5 times a night and my head was lolling forward when I was sitting to feed him.
The second night was better as I was less tense about having him in with us. We only have a double bed too and it's not the ideal co sleeping set up you read about.
He is a really big boy too, maybe that's another reason why he needs so much food.
I do wake up to him biffing me (!) and am slightly worried about the weaning from bed scenarion later down the line...oh well...
it's lovely to seeing him smiling and laughing first thing.

charliegirl we always started dd1 off in her bed at the start of the night as she slept longer she stayed in it longer so the weaning her out of our bed was a non issue really.

glad it is working out for you.