7 month old STILL waking every 2 hours - help!

[Nellie1027]

Looking for some feeding/sleep advice!

I have a 7 month old little girl who is EBF. I feed her to sleep and I’m happy to continue to do this however I think it’s affecting her ability to stay asleep at night and I’m finding the lack of sleep quite hard now! Currently she feeds to sleep and has a 2-3 hour stretch and from there on will wake every 90 mins to 2 hours. She won’t be settled unless I feed her, both my husband and I have tried rocking, shushing, bum pats, hand on chest but she just screams until I feed her. I’ve had lots of people tell me ‘she’ll sleep better when she’s on solids’ or ’give her formula to fill her up’ but I know neither of these are going to help! She feeds well in the day and I know she’s using me as comfort to get herself back to sleep as when she feeds at night it’s very lazy and not productive in any way.

So my question is, if she’s using me as comfort is there something else I can encourage her to do instead of feeding at night? She has a dummy which gives her some comfort but it's never enough for her.

I love breastfeeding so much and I really want to continue until she’s 1 but I’m starting to resent it at night because I’m so tired! This has been going on since she was around 3 months old so I’m feeling a bit delirious now!

Any ideas?!

Following because I'm in the same boat!

You need to do some gentle sleep training at bedtime to help her learn to fall asleep by herself.

Can you leave her with your partner and sleep in a separate room? She will have to settle without you.

Decide when you want to do a night feed and go in at that time only.

@Boomboxinmyattic I know you're right, I just feel so reluctant as she goes to bed like an angel and we've never had a problem like others I know. It's the wake up that are the problem. But I know I've taught her to use me to fall asleep.

@imisscashmere

I have considered this but he does shifts so sometimes he's on nights, others he works until 11pm/12am/2am so it wouldn't be consistent. Have considered telling him to take a week off but I fear this will be a longer process than that

The good news is, sleep training is incredibly successful once you've made your mind up to do it. Don't start it until you've made a firm plan with your other half, as you both need to be on the same page. Good luck!

This takes me right back! If you feed to sleep, you’ve set up a sleep association (I did this too, of course I did - it’s easy and natural but has consequences). They wake and instead of rolling over and going back to sleep as we as adults do, because we’ve learned how, they need that same sleep association to get back.

Basically, night weaning was the only thing that worked for both my babies and I did that by getting my DH to take a week off work and doing nights three nights in a row.

You sleep in another room and absolutely cannot get up during the night. (Bliss!) He does all settling and can offer water. Baby does know dad’s smell and knows he doesn’t provide milk.

7 months feels slightly young for it, I’d do it around 8 months. Both mine started sleeping through the night around 4-8 weeks after, doing longer and longer stints sleeping.

An alternative would be shhhh pat type styles to settle baby to sleep but there will be a lot more long term crying I’d say. And feeding through the night isn’t necessary anymore and it is an absolute killer!

I'm the same OP except mine is now 9 months 😔 don't know what to do at all, I can't get her to sleep any other way except feeding but she wakes constantly.

7 months is a really hard age! I remember crying about the thought of going back to work when my son was that age. I carried on feeding to sleep until I stopped breast feeding at 13 months. His sleep got better with age.

Follow second star to the right and little nest sleep on Instagram if you don’t want to sleep train. They offer lots of practical advice.

If he has a few days in a row, it might be enough to at least get her sleeping slightly longer stretches for you. Or - even just a bit of a break for you with some longer stretches of sleep in the spare room!

I do agree with a pp that 7 months is young for total night weaning. I’ve just done it with my DD who was almost 12 months. It’s hard, I feel for you. Hang in there!

Thanks all, you've given me some things to think about. I'm going to start with the day and stop feeding to sleep then. I only normally do it once/twice a day but if I can stop then it'll be easier at night and then I'll speak to my husband about seeing what we can do about night.

I don't necessarily want to night wean, I just want to feed much less than I am. She did go through 2-3 nights where she went to bed at 7:30 and woke at 11:30, 2:30 and 5:30 for feeds and I was totally okay with feeding back to sleep then.

But pretty much since she was 3 months it's been sleep at 7:30, awake at 10:30, 12:30, 2.30, 4:30 and up at 6:30 and some nights more than that and I think my body is going to fall apart with exhaustion!

I would just say, if you’re feeling like this at 7 months, imagine how you’ll feel in 5 months time when nothing has changed. That was my experience (DH couldn’t take a week off until baby 2 was just turned 1). 4-8 wakes every single night. It was unbelievably bad.

What better use of a week’s holiday than the chance to properly sleep again? It only took 3 days for us but allows more time if needed. However, you also need to hold the line and not feed during the night again afterwards - be ready to offer water, pat, cuddle, whatever. Those don’t create the same sleep associations.

(I’m not saying definitely follow my suggestion, but also saying if you want something to change, waiting for them to age out will usually take around a year more - 18m seems to be a time when fed to sleep babies start improving on their own though now guarantees - I also know 2-3yo fed to sleep babies who still wake 2+ times a night.)

Sleep training is entirely optional, but be prepared to wait a long time (years) for things to improve of their own accord.

Definitely - it's a matter of years, not months. I couldn't live like that, but lots of mums do.

Thanks all, I have been waiting for things to get better on their own and I think I could manage if I knew it would be 9-12 months, but I can't manage this and going back to work at 13 months so I think we will try and gently look at getting her used to some other sleep associations and see where we get.

Appreciate all your replies! ❤️

Fingers crossed for you! 😊🤞

Solidarity, OP. DS1 woke every 45 minutes from 4 months to about a year. It destroyed us. Treat yourself kindly. I wish I had any tips, but other than accepting any help offered and tag teaming with DH if possible I don’t.

Hi Nellie,
I've just had a few thoughts since I posted on this thread. We night weaned (apart from a dream feed at 11) our now 4yo at 6 months because her sleep was terrible and something had to change. However, we moved house when she was just 2 and the night feeding started again as we were desperate, her sleep fell apart completely. She weaned at nearly 3 so we had another year of night feeding but it wasn't every two hours. Only now at nearly 4 is she sleeping through again!

Our 7mo has been a much better sleeper so we've been much more lax with her and having come back from 4 weeks away with constant chopping and changing she's worse now than as a newborn. My husband has started putting her to sleep and she naps in the day without feeding but she STILL wants to be on my breast from 11-7. I don't mind too much about the feeding except the position I have to sleep in is wrecking my back.

I'm not sure what the answer is with her as with our older one breaking the feed to sleep cycle worked a treat but we've already done that with this one.

Agree though,make a plan and stick to it when you're ready.