please help me with my 4mo!

[smileymama]

this is my 3rd child, and 3rd child using BW. he's a toughy... touchy baby who was 5 weeks premature and may have some developmental delays in the future but we have not seen anything yet. he's nearly 4.5 months old and on a fabulous 4 hour easy during the day where he falls asleep exactly 1 hour after the beginning of his feeding. 

a couple of nights ago, he went 8 hours straight without a night feeding. since then, he's been up 5-6 times a night and tonight has woken every hour since bedtime and we are on our 4th wake-up thus far. he falls right back to sleep when i hold him for a couple of minutes. he is swaddled but does enjoy sucking on his hands... he's almost discovered a full-fledged sucking on his thumb.

should i not swaddle one hand? do i need to implement pu/pd with him? he will not take a paci and so i have found it nearly impossible to successfully get him down during naps/bedtime without holding him... especially because like i said i have 2 others running around (a 2 year old and a 4 year old).

what am i doing wrong? what do i need to implement? i am exhausted!
any wisdom would be so incredibly wonderful.
xoxo,
smileymama

[smileymama]

ok, so i just reviewed how much he should be sleeping each day and i think he may be sleeping too much. here's his easy routine:

E 7am bf
A 7:30
S 8am-10:30/11 (2.5-3hrs)
E 11am bf
A 11:30am
S 12pm-2:30/3 (2.5-3hrs)
E 3pm bf
A 3:30
S 4pm-6/6:30 (2-2.5 hours)
E 7pm bf
no df as he seems to not go any longer than 3-4 hours after that
numerous NW but i only bf him every 3.5-4 hours at night

so, should i just try to increase his A time slowly over this next week? i was going to delay switching him from a 3 hour EASY to a 4 hour EASY until he hit his 4 month adjusted age but he started extending his eating times. should i go back to every 3 hours in hopes that he will go longer at night??? he really hasn't stayed up much longer than 1 hour after i begin his feedings unless i misread his cues and then he became overtired.

help, please!! i feel like there are a bunch of different options as to what i should do.... your thoughts??
xoxo,
smileymama

[deb]

Not sure how much help I'll be but I did find that once I had another kid in the house to consider, DD#2 spent more time napping in the Baby Bjorn and sling than she did in her own bed. Her sleep schedule was never the same from one day to the next for probably the first two years, but we hadda do what we hadda do, KWIM?

Looking at your schedule, you may want to try tanking him up before bedtime while changing that last nap to a catnap. In other words, something more like:

S 4pm-4:45 or 5PM
E 5PM
Short A time, maybe enough for a bath
E7PM bed.

That way his last 3 feeds would be 2 hours apart, so you'd be stuffing him full of calories toward the end of the day.

Just one thought.