How to avoid 5am wake up with twins.

[knittedwithme]

Hoping for a bit of help here 😊

We have twins who are nearly 7 months old (5.5 months corrected age). Generally speaking I have managed to get them into the same feeding and sleep routine.

Our day currently looks like this

5.15am wake up
5.30am feed
7am nap
8am wake and feed
10am nap
11am wake feed
12pm nap
1pm wake
2pm feed

2.30pm nap
3pm wake
4pm feed
4.30pm nap
5pm wake
5.30pm downtime,bath, ready for bed etc
6pm feed
6.30pm sleep
11pm dream feed

For context feed is 7oz formula milk each, some feeds they finish others they leave a little behind. We have slowly started to introduce purées into their diet (HV advice as both suffered badly with reflux)

Their day time naps never last beyond an hour, and usually are around 35-40 minutes long before one wakes up. They are generally never awake longer than 1.5-2 hours without a nap.

I'd love to make the naps longer and reduce how many there are in the day but I'm not sure how to do this. Would doing this help to try and start the day a little later?

Any advice appreciated.

I've twins as well (they're two).

Your twins are sleeping nearly 11 hours at night, which is good. Could you try putting them to bed a bit later, and hope they then wake up later.

I found the Little Ones sleep solution to be excellent. I didn't know what routine I should be aiming for at each age-stage, so it really helped. You need to pay (I've no connection to it).

www.littleones.co

Also they're having 7 feeds a day - are they all 7oz? That sounds like a lot.

Can they eat food apart from purées? Or do you have to wait until they're 6 months corrected to wean them?

Hey another twin parent 👋🏻 tell me it gets a little easier 😉?! I'm sure at 2 it's not feeling it though!

We offer 7oz at every feed. Some feeds they finish others they leave some behind but there's no predicting how hungry they are as there doesn't appear to be a pattern to it. It can be a little maddening as formula is costing us a fortune.

We have only just started the weaning (past week). I've been a bit nervous about doing anything beyond purée as I'm not sure if they're ready and have based everything else off of their corrected age...

Thanks re the little ones recommendation, I'll look it up!

Re weaning I was told to wean on corrected age, actually did it a bit earlier on advice of the paeds because of reflux. They still couldn't sit up properly so I fed them purées propped up in their chairs.

They're sleeping a huge chunk overnight which is great, but it looks like a lot of naps. I'd try to push bedtime back to half seven. Have you got black out blinds / curtains?

At that age mine were having a dream feed around 11, would wake at 3ish for a feed and then sleep to around 7.

Bottles were 7 / 11 /3

Thanks @nearlyspringyay yes ours aren't sitting up completely properly and one twin occasionally tongue thrusts (i think due to tiredness) so purée feels much safer at the moment. We have noticed a difference with reflux though which is good. Do you recall how and when you noticed less milk needed due to adding in the purée?

No we don't have black out blinds. I have been thinking to invest.

Putting back the bedtime might be the trick!

@knittedwithme it's a while ago now, I think I only gagged about adding formula to the purée for a week or so.

I started them on single fruit purée - tinned pears and then on to vegetable and then some weird and wonderful mixes of stuff. Once they could sit properly I added in vegetable sticks alongside the puree. We carried on on a mix of purée and solid food.

Definitely think about black out blinds!