New - Needing Clarification

[gabysgrace]

Before reading about EASY, my baby (12 weeks) & I were basically onto the routine except when it came to the evenings. I was trying to keep her awake from 5pm until about 9pm hoping this would help her sleep longer. My mistake apparently!! I am doing well with the routine up until the cluster feedings, catnaps and dream feeding part. I would appreciate if someone could confirm or explain my misunderstanding of the following:

1-cluster feeding is just like regular feeding where you feed the regular amount (oz & time) but instead of being 3 hours apart it's 2?
2-dream feeding is when you feed your child even if they haven't woken up to be fed so they can make it through the night?
3-with the catnap of 45 minutes, you actually wake your baby??

I have been focusing on getting the routine down before working on having Gaby sleep in her crib and learning how to self-sooth. Currently I use the swing and stroller during the day for her naps. At night we are co-sleepers.

[Deb_in_oz]

well Tracy recommended dropping the cluster feed around 8 weeks so not sure if you want to institute that ... she rec. combining them at 8 weeks into the 5:30/6pm feed

Df is when you TRY to feed lo in their sleep between 10-11pm (not later as then you are into overnight sleep time..). you just gently lift them out of bed/cot and stimulate their sucking reflex (if bottle fed you can just touch the teat to her lips and tease a littleuntil she accepts it into her mouth) if the feeding starts to slow down you can try to gently pull back on the bottle/teat and sometimes they will start sucking again (my dh used to do this repeatedly until she finally did not start sucking aain and that was when he woudl end the DF).  sometimes they can go through a stage of waking before the Df and then it is your cal what to do - we always just fed if it was 9pm or later and she usually fell back to sleep no problem. others choose to resettle thei lo and then stick to regualr DF time. the DF will usually push out any night feeds to later times and in some kids will eliminate them. it really depends on the lo and how much they take and how they respond to the DF.... all trial and error

with the catnap the aim is to wake at 45 min. again as with everything it comes down to your knowledge of your lo. with dd2 she often did her best nap at the "catnap" slot so i woudl let her sleep 1-2 hrs in the later afetrnoon. as she got older and her earlier napping improved i knew she had enough sleep and i woudl wake her by 1hr... i tend to look at the total daytime sleep to avoid overtired at bedtime. also some babies can wake late from a catnap and still go down for bedtime ata reasonable hour. others need a longer awake time atthe end of the day. try limiting it and see how she holds up til bedtime etc. if you find she needs a little longer in the afternoon add 15 min until you find what her best "wakeup timme" is.

HTH

[gabysgrace]

Thanks for your original reply. I now have another question about dream feeding.

Gaby is now almost 16 weeks. I am still breastfeeding and we are still on the 3 hour routine (I realize we will have to start working at getting onto the 4 hour routine soon).

My question is: after the DF between 10 and 11 pm should she be able to make it to 7am before feeding again? I realize she may wake during the night but is the recommendation that I try to get her back to sleep rather than feed her? If I do feed her say around 5am, do I still wake her at 7am to start our daily routine?

Also, if I opt not to DF and feed her when she wake at 1am is there a disadvantage to this other than her waking me in the middle of the night? I am wondering if not DF is leading her to staying awake after her 1am feeding.

Thanks again for any advice/support out there!

[corrina01]

If I do feed her say around 5am, do I still wake her at 7am to start our daily routine?

Yes, is the answer to that.  When she gets a little bit older and her stomach grows she will drop the 5am feed.  Still wake her at the same time of 7am, because that is the way to get her inner clock to wake at a certain time, like an alarm clock.