Sleep and Dream Feeds HELP!!

[cakesandcookies89]

Hi everyone!
I am new here so forgive me if this has already been a subject of discussion and is rather lengthy.

My LO has just turned 6 months old. We did quite well with sleep 8.30-4.30 for about a month then we he went through the regression late. My partners family is quite pushy and kept telling us we needed a routine, we shouldn't have given in but we did so we sought the advice of a sleep trainer as we couldn't listen to their nagging anymore!

LO now has a feeding and nap schedule and his bedtime is earlier around 7.15 and he drops off around 7.30. The sleep trainer insisted on a dream feed which I had never done before. The 5 days she gave advice felt like the longest of my life as I barely slept. I knew it would be a rough process. Having to go in and out of his room every 10 minutes. (He has only been in his room less than 6 days I should add with blackout blinds!)

The trainer insisted the dream feed would make a difference and if I drop it everything will go out the window but it seemed to make things worse. So we dropped it and he slept 7.30-5.30 then went back off for an hour until 6.45 but last night we also dropped it and he woke an hour earlier 7.30-4.30 I still feel this is good going, he had a short feed at 5 and went back to sleep for 2 hours. I always make sure to feed him by 7.30am to get back on track. My question is (sorry for the waffle) is the dream feed the answer or is it better to feed once in the night? I don't want him waking earlier and earlier that's all! As I didn't need to feed him the first night but she said it will be about his lack of calories. She made me feel so guilty when I said it wasn't working after a week. He woke after a dream feed at 4, 3, 3.30 etc and would not go back to sleep. It seemed to muck up his sleep clock. As much as I would like not to get up at 4.30 it allows me some sleep if I go to bed early. There is also a query of a digestive problem with LO and he has been referred to a specialist gastro, the dreamfeed seemed to make his tummy more uncomfortable despite winding. The sleep trainer said this wasn't possible.

Any gentle advice/similar situations would be much appreciated. We have also been advised to hold off on solids until we speak to gastro early next week. Thank you everyone! :D

Anyone?? Sorry for the length post!

Do what works for you. If he’s better without the dream feed, drop the dream feed. Babies are all different - don’t do something you know isn’t working to appease the sleep consultant! x

Thank you for replying to me! She basically told me it wouldn't work without.. but it doesn't work with. She said all 6 month olds should be able to sleep 12 hours! Clearly doing something wrong! X

My first never got on with a dream feed, like you say it seemed to much up his sleep clock. We tried a few times. In the end I used to let him sleep as long as he wanted, fed him (usually around 2/3am) and then got him up at the same time each day. I went cold turkey on the 2/3am feed when he was on three decent sized meals a day and was having massive bottle at bedtime. I think he was about 10months. It took a few nights but when he realised he was only getting a cup of water he slept through pretty reliably.

Tell your sleep trainer to FUCK OFF

Dreamfeed didn't really work for me either. I would prefer to feed in the night when my baby wakes and sleep later in the morning, than dreamfeed and wake really early, so that's what I do (im breastfeeding so can go back to sleep while he feeds). I would forget the sleep consultant and go with what works for you!

The relationship between a sleep consultant and client should be a collaboration, not a dictatorship!

How does baby go to sleep at bedtime? What happens from the point baby is fully wide-awake, until being fast asleep.

Do you have a way to settle baby back to sleep during a night wake up, that does not involve feeding? Have you tried settling baby without feeding?

At 6 months old, the aim wants to be no feeds for the 10-12h of baby's night sleep.

At that age nine still fed every 2h, so i dont have any advice at all.
Just do whats easiest for you. Mine both had a very good routine by age 1 without me enforcing anything, even though the fed every 2 hours up to the age of ~8months, then it got less.
And i have friends who tried very hard to enforce a routine and ended up having issues until toddler age. It really depends on the child. Sometimes it all works out on its own, and sometimes it just doesnt, no matter what you try.

Thank you everyone for your advice.