5 month old - how to get good naps but not miss feeds?

[sunnyfields25]

Hi

5-month-old DS has just got over a cold and I'm keen to get his daytime sleep back on track. But I'm struggling to see how I can let him have decent length naps without leaving big gaps between feeds.

For example, if I feed, then he's awake for 2 hours before nodding off, I would have to wake him after an hour so as not to go more than 3 hours before the next feed.

It's not that I'm dead set on feeding every 3 hours, but I'm aware his body needs a certain number of calories and and if he doesn't get enough during the day he'll need to make up for it at night.

I feel like I'm missing something obvious here!

Thanks

I used to stress about this and in the end I just left DD to nap for as long as she wanted and fed her immediately upon waking. She didn't increase her night wakings if she'd fed less frequently in the daytime. That was a big worry of mine. Is baby's weight ok? If so, definitely don't wake him up.

Every day was different. I remember one day she went 4.5 hours without a feed and I was freaking out. She just wouldn't take the boob. She did everntually and had a nice long feed so it was fine. Just go with the flow!

DS2 is 7 months and I have never ever woken him to feed him. I never woke his older brother either. Bar health problems, that you would be aware of, a baby will wake up if it’s hungry. I’d just let him sleep.

What is your usual nap schedule?

When I started getting long naps at 5 months my 2 hourly feeder would often have two feeds in the awake time - one up in waking and another just before nap time. As weaning then started at 6 months, this became one milk feed and one solids meal in every awake time.

Thanks MrsBriteSide and mistermagpie, seems the consensus is leaving him to sleep. I do prefer the idea of that as I hate waking him when he's having a good sleep. I just start freaking out when he's been asleep 2.5 hours and it's been 4 hours since his last feed. It's at that point that I cave in and wake him.

Got him weighed yesterday and his weight has dropped below the curve he'd been following - he had been 25th centile since early on, but has dropped to 15th centile. HV wasn't concerned through, expecially since he's just had a couple of weeks of feeding badly while he was poorly (he's feeding well again now).

FATEdestiny - we don't have a rigid nap schedule unfortunately... Wake-up time each morning is different, which means the times of naps vary each day. But in general DS falls asleep 1.5 - 2 hours after last waking up, has 4 naps a day, the first one long (2.5 hours) and the other three shorter (30-45 mins). It's a shame he doesn't have two good length naps rather than one monster nap and lots of little ones! Interesting point about feeding him twice in one awake period, I'll have to try that. I had been wondering how to fit both food and milk in once we start weaning, but that would solve it!