How to get 9 month old to eat more in day

[4amWitchingHour]

Hello wise mumsnetters, I need help. I generally think that sleep is developmental, and that a baby will sleep through in its own time, however... I'm starting to think there is more I can do.

My DS is 9 months old, ebf since birth, and waking 4 times a night for milk - around 9pm, around 11:30pm, around 2 and around 4:30am. I try settling without feeding, but at these intervals it just doesn't work. We've recently reverted to co-sleeping as he was waking every hour to two hours in his cot, but I could resettle him without milk for some of those wake ups, so it's not the case that he will only sleep with milk, he's definitely needing the feeds (and he feeds properly at these times, it's not just a lazy suck to go back to sleep).

I'd like to try and up his calorie intake in the daytime so he's not topping up at night, but my question is - how? He's on 3 lots of solids a day, typical meals are:

Breakfast - porridge and apple
Lunch - chicken, pasta, tomatoes, cucumber and grapes
Tea - banana and coconut yoghurt (he's dairy and soy free atm)

I don't really know how many milk feeds he has, and I think this is my problem - he's constantly on the go (crawling and cruising), and is such a snacker on milk, because there's more interesting stuff to be getting on with. The only times he reliably feeds well are first thing in the morning, straight after lunch and bedtime.

So how do I up the daytime calories? More solids? Stricter milk feed times? Milk in a cup? He drinks well from an open cup with help, so I'm thinking this might be my next port of call.

I'm ok to continue with some night feeds, but I'm tired, he's tired, so I'd like to get it down from 4! What do you reckon?

I’d try giving him a more substantial meal at teatime. Yogurt isn’t very filling so he’s probably waking due to hunger. My DD would wake a lot more in the night if she didn’t have a good dinner! Typically my DD eats things like spag bol, cottage pie, pasta, roast dinners etc. Could try something like that adapted to his allergies?

I was also thinking yoghurt isn’t much for dinner. DS (10mths) has a proper meal for both lunch and dinner. Does he have carbs at all? This could help fill him up more.

Could you take him somewhere quiet and less interesting for his daytime feeds? Maybe the bedroom with the curtains closed? DS is bottle fed so probably different but we just do 4 set times per day.

Less milk is the only way to get them to eat more solids . They only have a certain amount of space in their stomachs .

Yes I would add a proper meal in the evening in my view . Proteins particularly to fill him up overnight and you could start to add snacks mid morning and mid afternoon also. After he has tea at 4/5 ish then you can do a feed before bed.

Scrambled egg and toast, beans on toast, or cottage pie/potatoes etc and all good things to continue to expose his taste buds.

I night weaned at 7.5m best thing I ever did.
Offered water and dummy instead and within 3 nights he was down from 8-10 wakings a night to 2-3.

Then he naturally wanted more food in the day. He was eating 3 meals plus 2 snacks though, he took to food like an absolute dream.

I’d do a bigger meal at teatime definitely - we do thinks like homemade fish cakes with veggies, lentil cottage pie, veggie chilli and rice, vegetable frittata with new potatoes. Tonight she had creamy leek pasta from the What Mummy Makes books - they’re good actually and she generally gives non dairy alternatives for most recipes. I sometimes give a pudding of yoghurt and fruit, or homemade rice pudding (I’ve done one with coconut milk before) or chia pudding etc. Not always but it’s a way to up calories.

You could sneak a few more calories into the other meals eg adding nut butter to the porridge, some hard boiled egg alongside the other bits at lunch - and maybe some more filling veg rather than just tomato and cucumber?

No idea if this will make a difference to breastfeeding at night though sorry, I wasn’t able to and my little one stopped having a bottle in the night a while ago. Worth a try though maybe?

Night wean. I did that with DC1 when he was 10 months old and he immediately had more milk and solids in the day. DC2 is 8 months old and still has 1 night feed (2 on a bad night), it was more but I managed to cut it down. Both ebf.

Thanks all this is super helpful - I've been keeping tea light as I'd read something about protein digestion being more likely to disturb sleep, so not to have a protein-y dinner until 10 or 12 months, but seeing as he's up loads in the night anyway... I'll try that first, then look at night weaning if there's not much change

@4amWitchingHour

Thanks all this is super helpful - I've been keeping tea light as I'd read something about protein digestion being more likely to disturb sleep, so not to have a protein-y dinner until 10 or 12 months, but seeing as he's up loads in the night anyway... I'll try that first, then look at night weaning if there's not much change

I read that but I’ve also seen it disputed! It’s never made any difference here.

Sleepy foods apparently contains tryptophan- poultry, egg, banana, oats etc - and for those to work they need to be combined with a carbohydrate as well. I don’t know how much evidence they actually have but that’s the theory.

You also obviously want to leave enough space between eating and bedtime so that there’s time to digest.

@FTEngineerM can I ask how he was after a few nights of stopping night feeds? My DS is 6.5 months and the last 3 nights hasn't had a feed, but he's still waking a handful of times but I can settle him with just a dummy, he doesn't seem to want a feed. I'm just wondering how I can get these wake ups to well, him not waking at all 😅😆

I'd carry on with the three good milk feeds (breakfast, after lunch and before bed).

Give him a bigger, more protein rich dinner.

Try and avoid the 9pm feed if possible, try and resettle with dummy/water.

Then do a really good dream feed at 11pm and hope that gets him until at least 4:30am.

@Laur89 after a few nights he stopped waking as often and he didn’t sleep through until we switched to hydrolysed formula for cmpa.

I think the last 2/3 wake ups a night were related to him being uncomfortable 😟. It really was quite quick.

Does your dc cry or anything when he wakes up?