8 week old sleeping

[AH917]

My soon to be 8 week old (7 weeks 5 days) has always woken up between 3 and 4 for a feed after having his last feed at around 10:30-11:00. He’s only taking 2oz (usually takes 6oz every other feed) when he’s waking between 3/4 and generally goes straight back down once’s he’s been winded until 7am. I’m wondering how I can’t start to phase out this feed as I don’t think he completely needs it and it would be amazing to get a full nights sleep(!!!).

How often was your 8 week old waking and is it possible to phase out this feed or do I need to just wait for him to be ready? Very tired FTM -,-

TBH if he's 8 weeks and only waking once to feed in the night, you're not doing all that badly. That's not meant to sound unsympathetic, night waking is hard! It doesn't last forever though.

Instead of trying to get him to drop the feed, is there something you can do to make you wake up a little less? Lower lighting, keeping warm, having everything as close and convenient as possible...

I know! It could definitely be worse but I feel like I’m running of fumes sometimes as he doesn’t Nap well in the day so I rarely have time to catch up on any sleep.

I always feed him with the lights off during this feed but I’m still very much wide awake... too afraid of falling asleep with him on me or in the bed etc.

Dd is like this and 15wks old. Just recently she has been taking sometimes only 1 or 2 oz at this free tmand won't even wind she is so sleepy.

Dm told me to give a few sips of water and put straight back down. I haven't tried it yet. Dd is not a big sleeper through the day either. She's not a massive eater either tbh. I've decided this evening to persevere with the night bottles cos if I drop it I think her weight will drop and she's only a 9th centile baby anyway.

Up once during the night at eight weeks is pretty amazing to be honest. Please don’t try phasing our night feeds. Your baby is far too young and babies that age aren’t supposed to sleep though the night to protect from SIDS.

Also replacing a 15 week olds milk with water is horribly out dated advice.

Without wishing to sound harsh, parenting doesn’t end when it gets dark. Little babies need feeding at night. It’s not realistic or fair on your child to expect a full nights sleep when you have small babies. My twins are eight months and still up multiple times a night. Parenting is tough sometimes.

Babies still need milk in the night. Do not replace a feed with water, terrible advice.

You’re doing really well at 8 weeks! Dd was up every 45mins to an hour at this age. And even if baby starts sleeping through the night it doesn’t mean it will last forever. Lots of things disrupt their sleep and it’s so normal.

The other thing is that at about eight weeks you hit the 'wall of exhaustion' where the novelty wears off, the visits slow down, your body's initial Adrenalin and hormone rush is over and it's just very tiring.

Good news tho, your body adapts and tho you'll stay tired, it'll just become the new normal as if you'd moved to a hot country and got used to the heat or something.

There are also sleep regressions coming. No one told me about those.

Get out and about in the day, eat healthily, take whatever help you can

Echoing what others have said. This is on the very good end of normal. You're getting eight hours of sleep from him overnight by the sound of things! At this stage some people are still getting up every hour.

At 8 weeks, my son was up 4 times a night minimum!

You are very very lucky.

Can your partner do some nights to give you a full night's sleep?

I agree with PP this is excellent. My DS started doing 10.30pm - 4am around 9 weeks and I couldn't believe how great it was after him waking every two hours before that.

That's practically sleeping through the night! Don't phase out night feeds,he's only 8 weeks he needs feeding at night. It's hard but that's a really good stretch of sleep.

Oh my goodness you need to drastically reassess your expectations. It is not for you to judge whether he 'needs' the feed or not. Whether he's waking for food or comfort he's a newborn baby and it's your job (and your partners) to provide it for him. Yes it's bloody exhausting but it comes with the territory of parenthood. Neither of mine slept through until they were older than 15 months. Night waking is normal.

I agree, you need to adjust your expectations.

My expectation was never that a baby needs to sleep through the night immediately, so no, I don’t think they need to be reassessed. I never said night waking wasn’t normal, I was merely asking what the waking / sleeping time of other 8 week old babies are as being a first time mum there isn’t anything to compare this to.

Yes it is my job as a parent to provide him with comfort and food as and when required, which I do thank you, but it’s also my job to help regulate his sleeping and routines. Forums such as this are available to allow parents to ask such questions and gain insight into the experiences of other parents and babies.

And that's what you've been given- the insight that you're very lucky to be only woken once and have such a long stretch over night.

Wonderful. Thanks EspressoPatronum for clearing that up.

but it’s also my job to help regulate his sleeping and routines not at 8 weeks,it's not. It's your job to feed him when he wakes up.

Your baby wakes once at night and you feel like you’re running on fumes?! I’d feel like fucking superwoman if I only had to get up once and my daughter is 14 months old. Whether you think so or not, your expectations are clearly unreasonable if you’re asking how to phase out a feed for an 8 week old baby because you don’t think that they really need it. At 8 weeks old a very large proportion of babies are waking up at least every couple of hours. Count yourself lucky and go to sleep when baby does.

Lol OP I wouldn’t complain about your one wake up at any baby groups or you’ll find it difficult to make any pals 🙈

Thanks Nixen. I’ll be sure to keep that in mind.

Wow there are some harsh replies in this thread. Waking up at night is very hard, surely we can be more supportive of each other?

Going against the grain here but I phased this feed it around the same age (slightly younger actually). Because she was only taking 1-2oz overnight it seemed a fairly logical conclusion that she didn’t really need it. I never gave water, I think that’s outdated advice. I just stopped jumping out of bed when she started to stir and waited to see if she’d go back to sleep which most of the time she did. If it escalated to actual crying, I’d attempt to resettle with a cuddle first. We had earlier wake ups for a couple of weeks (6am-ish rather than 7am) but then she started sleeping longer again. Im throughly of the opinion that all babies are different, there’s no ‘normal’ and just because some are up multiple times a night doesn’t mean that others aren’t ready to sleep through at the same age. I definitely agree not to complain at baby groups though - you are lucky to have such a good sleeper!!

I'm afraid it's a phase that you can't change......we were feeding every 90 mins at 8 weeks so I'd have swapped with you in a heartbeat.

Posts like this will always get tense comments I'm afraid x

Tbf DD has always been good and only ever got up 2 times in the night even from newborn. I appreciate how lucky I am however talking to others at baby group lots of there's have slept through the majority of the time from around 12 weeks. Lots of them have bed times.

My dd goes every 4 hours naturally. Her last bottle is usually between 9-10.00pm sometimes she will wake at 2 - 2.30 sometimes closer to 3.30am. She will then sleep till 6 at which point she wakes up pumping then comes into. Our bed for another hour and a half before she properly wakes up.

My dm is in her 50s so I appreciate that the water advice is crap but she did have 5 children and were all still alive and well so it must have worked once upon a time. I would prefer to give milk though and so that's what I will be sticking with.

I completely agree. I guess there will always be keyboard warriors in any case and Its a wonder why there are so many people suffering in silence and not asking for advice when needed. Just because someone appears to have it ‘easier’, whatever that means in parenting, it does not warrant a response to make someone else’s question seem inadequate.

OP my 10 week old DD is very much like your LO and from about 6 weeks she has been going down around 9.30pm and waking around 3am and settling down again until 6.30am.
I tried feeding her but she refused as it's just reassurance she needs. I've resorted to giving her a dummy which I was reluctant to do but she settles down straight away.
Not all babies need night feeds. My 2 eldest DS's constantly needed night feeds but DS3 was very much like DD.
Every baby and their needs are different and my DD is certainly thriving without a night feed.