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Help....sleeping through

4 replies

Cyclista · 27/05/2010 06:42

My DS is now 6 months old and as such we've decided to try and knock his night feed off. He was going to sleep at 7pm, having a dream feed at 11pm, waking for 3 fl oz between 3 and 4am and then sleeping till about 6.30 ish.

My HV and a couple of friends advised us to give him water at night instead of milk, both friends vowing that their babies slept through the night after a few difficult nights as their babies got used to it.

We're now on night 4 and it's getting worse. He's waking now at 2.30 and then pretty much every hour after that, before being wide awake at 5.30. He doesn't seem hungry, to be honest. He has a few sips of water and goes back to sleep, but just keeps waking up. He doesn't scream and cry but chunters enough to keep us awake and let us know he's not particularly happy.

Any bright ideas? I'd forgotten how hard multi-wakings are. But I'm worried about going back to milk feeds as if we don't tackle that, we could be feeding him in the night for months yet!

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
OhExpletive · 27/05/2010 06:51

TBH I'd just go back to feeding him. But then I'm a path of least resistance fan anyway. but you can always try again in a month or so if that's what you want and things might be totally different. Or he might pack it in of his own accord in the meantime.

Either way i don't ever think having a baby waking more can be a good thing

bippyhippy · 28/05/2010 21:12

If the milk was helping him go back to sleep so you could sleep until 6:30, then I'd carry on with that. You might find this useful - weaning off night feeds

More about pushing the feed along than replacing with water.

I have two little ones and honestly, they both occasionally needed feeding in the night after 6 months and I just did it. Anything to go back to sleep! lol!

bacon · 29/05/2010 09:17

I wouldnt, as you said he's not hungrey and I read problems of toddlers waking for milk which is harder to break. Water is a great idea.

Is he in a nice cool room in sleeping bag? dummy?

Have you tried ignoring him. The more you get up the more he gets used to it.

I assume hes in your room so poss to more him out so he can have a winge without you waking up.

My son does this occassionally, I just ignore the chattering and within a few mins we goes back to sleep.

ches · 31/05/2010 02:41

Six months is about the biggest growth spurt babies have. They NEED loads and loads more milk at this age and nearly all of them have to take it in at night! Giving a hungry baby water is very dangerous. They will drink the water to fill their tummy, it'll pass out of their tummy very quickly and they'll wake again. If you keep giving water, they can become over-hydrated ("water intoxication") which can be fatal. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_intoxication

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