6mo won't settle to feed unless tired

[J0lene]

Hi

My 6mo ds has been fully breastfed from the start.  He has also been on EASY since the early days.

At the moment he isn't settling well to feed.  After he wakes, I will put him on to feed and he wil drink very little, if at all.  He then stops and pulls his face away - not upset, but  just not wanting the breast at all and he gets annoyed if I keep trying.  This is frustrating as I know he's not had enough.  So I try again half an hour or an hour later and I get the same result.  Then it gets to his bedtime, and of course he is hungry and wants to feed then - so frustrating, as of course trying to avoid feeding him to sleep. But he's hungry so needs the drink.  I feed him then and he drinks happily.  I try not to feed to sleep so he gets upset when I pull him off, but as his tummy is full I am then able to settle to sleep. 

And so it goes on...  Of course after the nap it's even worse as he's had a drink beforehand and isn't that hungry so the cycle continues.  But the thing is this even happens first thing in the morning when he's not had a drink for 5 or 6 hours, so it's not just that he's full from having the drink before the nap.

This is so frustrating!  I feel like I'm forever getting my boobs in and out and trying to feed him, but not getting anywhere.  When he was 5 or 6 weeks old we had a similar patch but then he had thrush so I think that's why he wouldn't settle to feed and it stopped when the thrush went away.  And he doesn't appear to have thrush now.

He seems to only settle to drink well when he's tired - he also drinks well in the night (sigh!).  He wakes to feed in the night - usually once, sometimes twice.

Of course, as he's 6 months we're also starting solids - which he loves.  But this makes it even more concerning for me when he won't drink when he wakes, as i don't want him fulling up on solids at this age when milk is so important.  I can't remember, but think the unsettled feeding started before we started solids.

Any advice on solving my wee issue?  I would like him to get all the milk he needs without my boobs being in and out being refused all day and without feeding to sleep...

Thanks

[*Ali*]

What time is the NF? Do you DF? What if you didn't offer the BF until an hour after he wakes up so around the middle of A time I imagine?

[J0lene]

Thanks so much for replying.

The night feed varies a lot.  Most often I would say it is 1am ish, so a good 6 hours before up time.  I did introduce a dream feed for the first couple of weeks after we did the 3-2 transition.  However I found that I was staying up for the dream feed only to find he would still wake to feed, so I've stopped dream feeding so I can go to bed as soon as possible and just feed him when he wakes.  Sometimes he'll wake at about  10.30pm as well anyway and feed, then again in the wee hours of the morning.

Not offering the BF until 8am is a good idea.  I'm so exhausted right now (having a 6mo and almost 2yo seems to have suddenly caught up with me and I'm the walking dead at the moment), I can't remember if I've tried that already.  I will do it tomorrow.

Routine is:

E 0700 BF (this is up time, but will try this feed at 0800 as suggested)
E 0800 Solids
S 0900 (or 0930)
E 1100 BF
S 1300 (or 1330)
E 1500 BF
E 1700 Solids
E 1830 BF
S 1900

...and one, maybe two feeds when he wakes in the night.

[J0lene]

To add to the frustration in the past few days he's started filling his nappies a couple of minutes into every feed. He stops feeding to do it and then I usually can't get him back on whether I try right away or change him. So frustrating!

[*Ali*]

I think I would definitely try to push his naps to around 2.5hrs after he woke so he doesn't have such a long A time before BT. I found mine woke more when OT or UT and it was like they thought they may as well have a BF since they were awake and had noticed they were hungry.

[J0lene]

it was like they thought they may as well have a BF since they were awake and had noticed they were hungry

I would say this about any time he wakes more than once in the night.  I think he needs the one night feed (if I could make it a dreamfeed that would be ideal, but haven't been able to make that happen yet), but any additional ones it's like he thinks, "Well, I'm awake.  Mmmm, a feed would be lovely and a wee snuggle.  Thanks Mum."

Hmm, maybe I should try a more consistent 2.5ish hours A time.  That would mean a 9.30am nap and 2pm nap...  He's always been so tired in the mornings.  However, you're right, he's tired in his long evening A time as well. 

I'm finding it a real juggle balancing an ideal routine for baby with activities and pick-ups etc for my toddler.  But we're getting there.

Thanks for all your thoughts.  I now have a plan to try out tomorrow.  Fingers crossed...

[J0lene]

So...

We had a yucky kind of night...  It was going fine - he'd just woken once to feed as usual, until he woke to fill his nappy at about 4.30am.  I could hear he had woken, but he was happy so I left him.  By 6am he was grizzling so I went to him and noticed the nappy and changed it.  I put him back to bed without feeding which he was fine with.  ALthough he was wakeful he went back to bed with no fuss and I think drifted back to sleep.  I got him up at 7am and he was awake and happy, but of course started the day overtired...

I tried the BF at 8am.  It was the same - fed for a minute or two, then pulled away not interested and got annoyed if I tried to persist, so I stopped.  I fed him solids at 8.30am.  I aimed to have him down for 9.30am.  I didn't feed him at bedtime, though he was asking for it.  He settled fairly nicely with no feeding by 9.45am. 

He only slept for half an hour .  He woke asking for a drink.  I refused to give one - I'm just so sick of this crazy pattern and I want to get out of it.  I tried to settle him without it.  He was so tired, but wouldn't resettle.  At 11am I gave him his feed, thinking he'll be starving and take it nicely.  The thing is, he didn't - he did the same thing.  Drank for a minute then refused.  Frustrating!  Eventually I distracted him by giving him part of my bra to play with.  He then settled and had a decent feed.

It's like whether he feeds well is not related to his hunger at all.  It seems to have more to do with his state of mind...  He wants to feed when he's sleepy.  He'll also settle to feed when he's distracted playing with something else.  But if I just try to feed him awake and hungry and doing nothing else he feeds for literally a minute then flattly refuses.

BTW I also tried white noise and music and singing during the feed to try to settle him but it didn't help.

What next?  I guess I need to keep trying the distraction stuff.  Part of me wants to be stubborn and only offer him feeds at the designated times and surely he'll be hungry and take them if I'm not offering them at other times.  The  other part of me wants to work with him and not against him and feed him at bedtimes instead, which is what he likes - but I totally understand where that can lead...

I just hate the thought of trying to coerce him to feed.  It should be nice and he should love it and look forward to it - we both should .

He's a very tired boy now after the disrupted night and half hour morning nap.  Actually I'm a very tired girl too.  My toddler has been very patient today.

[J0lene]

On a side note... Do you think it's worth persevering with the dream feed at this point? Would it help me reduce or eliminate night feeds over time? I tried for about two weeks and still he still woke to feed every night, so he was just getting an extra feed...

[Fiver]

If you find he'll feed if he's got something else to concentrate on at the same time, I'd probably try going with that, at least for now.  So giving him something to hold or a necklace or something like that the keep him occupied in the right direction.  There are some really nice brightly coloured nursing necklaces available that are on strong enough cords that they don't break when pulled.

Mums often find that LOs get a better feed when they're sleepy, so it might be worth trying to get a feed in immediately after a nap.  I'd, personally, go with trying to follow LO, so if he's asking for milk, I'd give it, especially if he hadn't had a good feed that morning yet.

As for the DF, I think the general idea is that it can be phased out and that it sometimes causes disturbances in sleep after a certain age.

[*Ali*]

I was also thinking of the nursing necklace and feeding when he wakes but is still sleepy. I had success feeding in the still dark nursery immediately that he woke.

I don't think I would hold out on the feeds at this age if he was asking and hungry. Do you think he might take more BM if you cut back on the solids for a couple weeks? 

[J0lene]

Thanks both .

This morning I fed him at 7am when he first woke and was wearing a nursing necklace (had one from my first son).  He started off by pulling away as usual, but after distracting him with the necklace he started playing with it and fed happily .  And the same happened on the second side.  Finally a decent feed at 7am .

He was still a bit reluctant to go down for his nap without a wee drink, however this time I know he shouldn't be hungry so felt better about settling him without the drink.  He is having his nap now.

So this is good progress.  Funny boy needing entertainment while he eats!

Now... if only he'd stopping filling his nappies at every feed, including in the middle of the night (poor boy, mummy's never satisfied). 

Thanks so much for your help x

[*Ali*]

That's great. Distraction is common but most grow out of it to a certain extent I think.

[Fiver]

Good news!  Always nice to have something to try