Struggling to feed 4 m/o

[Mowgli81]

Hello. I've tried to establish EASY routine with my little girl over the past couple of months with varying success. I'm finding it particularly hard at the moment because she is difficult to feed during the day. When she wakes in the morning she is too excited and distracted to feed, meaning I spend the rest of the morning trying to get her to eat and the rest of the day trying to anticipate when she's hungry and catch up. Same story straight after a nap, too excited to see me. I sometimes have more success feeding her before a nap, but sometimes not - she'll either fall asleep or be too grumpy to make a good job of it.

How can I get her to fill up properly at regular intervals? Should I be stricter about spacing her feeds out? I offer roughly every 2 or 3 hours after a decent feed, but if she's only had a short feed I'll offer an hour later. She has three or four naps a day and is healthy and generally happy, but the erratic feeding is driving me mad.

[*Ali*]

Many babies take shorter feeds by this age as they are more efficient. Mine were down to 6 and 8 mins respectively and by 4.5mo they were both on 4hrly feeds. Maybe you are offering too often since some babies would be feeding 4hrly at this age and most others somewhere between 3-4hrly. Mine definitely wouldn't have been hungry after 1 or 2hrs.
How long is she awake between feeds? Typical A time at 4mo is 1hr45-2hrs. I'm guessing some naps are short of she is having 3-4?
Is she having NFs? How many and what time? Is her last feed close to morning wake up? If so that may be why she isn't super hungry in the morning. Do you try to feed her still in the dark bedroom before getting up?

If she isn't hungry on wake up I would just wait an hour and then offer in dim, calm surroundings. Many people also find giving LO something to hold helps distract them enough to stay interested. Something like a nursing necklace or blankie to hold.

[barbaraz78]

At four months we had similar issues and it was partly due to distraction (feeding in the dark helped a lot) and partly due to feeding too often. I was offering at 3-3.5 h and he wanted nothing of it, he was pulling out from breast crying and screaming. And he was waking a lot in the night to compensate for not enough good feeding sessions during the day. Only feeding after 4 h brought good feeds. And these feeds lasted between 5 and 10 mins in total, when one month before were around 20-30 mins, so he became really much more efficient.

[Mowgli81]

Hi Ali. She is usually awake about two hours between naps. Recently it's been tricky to get her to nap longer than 30-40 minutes at a time, although occasionally she surprises me with 1.5-2 hrs!

Yes, she wakes for one or two night feeds. She has her longest feed before bed at 7.30 when she's all relaxed from her bath, then I dream feed her at 10.30. She will then wake roughly between 2-3am for a short feed then straight to sleep, and then between 5-6am and we get up around 7. You may be right about her being full still from the 5am feed when I try her at 7am, but on EASY I want to feed her when she wakes...this is how we get off to a bad start!

Between 7-11 weeks old she used to sleep through from 7.30-5am. Probably because she was feeding more during the day. This is what frustrates me - I want her to get more of her calories during the day so she doesn't need it at night.

Today I did feed her exactly every hour, no offering in between, and she did feed for slightly longer, so this could be the key.

Barbara - your situation sounds very similar, thank you!

[*Ali*]

You fed her every hour? Or is that a typo?

It is not a problem to do AEAS rather than EAS. The main thing is that there is some A to separate the E and S. Would she settle at all after just a smaller feed at 5am do you think? Maybe just one side if you normally do two for example. Then she might hungrier on wake up at 7.

My two were the same. Slept really well and then started waking to feed at the 3-4mo point. It is very common. There are growth spurts at 3 and 4mo and also their sleep changes so they cycle between light and deep sleep more like adults rather than spending the majority of their time in deep sleep.

[Mowgli81]

Sorry, I meant to say I fed her every THREE hours, not every hour! I will try to stretch this out to four to see if that makes a difference. And ah, I would love to feed her from both sides but that almost never happens as she is either full or bored if it after a few minutes on one.

[*Ali*]

Mine only really took two sides in the daytime. I found if I fed from one side and changed the nappy then offered the second side they were more likely to take more from the second. At night we only did one side as they were normally asleep or at least done by the end of the first side.some mamas always do single sided feedings though so it could be all she needs.

Good luck with keeping the feeds spaced. Let is know how it goes 

[Mowgli81]

Just wanted to report that after a few days of strict 3 hour feeds she is staying on for much longer at each feed, and even gulped down both sides just now. And slept through last night, I wonder if it's related
Thanks for the advice. Will start stretching it out to four hours soon...

[*Ali*]

Great!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Nice update!