Self settling at start of vs during sleep - whats the difference?

[Pinkballoons5]

DC2 is 4.5months. Unlike DC1 she can fall asleep by herself for naps and in the evening (which is quite the novelty for me as DC1 required intense rocking!!)

Anyway, while she will happily be put down awake and settle herself to sleep at the start of the night, she wakes up every 1-2hours crying and im unable to get her back to sleep without BF her.

Why can she self settle at the start of the sleep but not during??

She uses a dummy at the start of the night but refuses it during these wakes.

She is combi fed - 2 bottles of formula per day and BF the rest of the time.

Shes pretty settled during the day, seems happy enough apart from the odd tummy/gas pains, but I would LOVE a bit more sleep at night. I've only been getting an hour at a time for the last 5 weeks and its starting to take its toll!!

Any ideas!? Advice would be most welcome!

She's only 4.5 months, she is probably waking for a feed because she is hungry. Its normal for babies, especially BF babies to wake during the night. They only have small amounts and need this regularly.

It might be the dummy waking her up if she can't yet get it back in herself.

Have you tried doing a dream feed? Feeding her without waking her up at about 10/11pm to hopefully keep her going until 3ish.

@Kam610 should she really need feeding every 2 hours at night when she only needs it every 3 hours during the day? I would expect to feed her once or twice of course, but most of the wakes she doesnt seem that hungry, feeds for 2 or 3 mins then falls asleep on the boob.

@alyceflowers she refuses the dummy during night wakes frustratingly! I tried dream feeding a few weeks ago but it didn't make a difference unfortunately. I could give it another whirl i suppose.. nothing to lose!

I'm just so tired and desperate to find something that would allow me maybe a 3hr chunk of sleep during the night. It feels like everyone else i know with babies of a similar age are waking up much less frequently... but perhaps that isnt the case!

I would try getting rid of the dummy entirely if it's not helping in the night. It will take a week of tough bedtimes but if she can fall asleep without it at bedtime that should help.

I'd also make the dream feed a bottle feed (swap one of the day time bottles maybe) so at least you can go to bed early and your partner can do the last feed. Again, you probably need to do it consistently for a week before you can expect to see a difference in sleep.

My 9 month old still wakes every 2-3 hours for a feed. Sometimes more, it's very normal. Sleep isn't linear. And the first year it's all over the place!

The difference is this: self-soothing is a bit of a myth. Babies don’t have the cognitive development to be able to regulate their emotions, so if she’s upset she’s gonna need your help. If she isn’t upset she can fall asleep. So when she goes down at bedtime she’s calm and content, but when she wakes in the middle of the night she’s either hungry or lonely or too hot/cold, maybe her tummy hurts a little, or she’s teething, whatever it is she can’t deal with it on her own and needs support. If she wakes in the middle of the night and is still calm and content and nothing is making her upset, then she can conceivably get herself back to sleep.