5 month old increasing feedings

[FionaS]

DD is 5 months old. From 10 weeks to 16 weeks she slept 11 hours solidly (with no feeds) quite consistently. Her min was 9 hours and her max 12 hours. Then she hit a growth spurt at 4 months and fed 3 hourly at night for a week. She was starting to extend a little...max of 7 hours once a night but is now gradually feeding more. Her longest stretch is now 4 hours max. She won't resettle without milk (we've tried but after 1.5 hours of resettling only get 10mins sleep before she is crying again). However, she now won't feed when she gets up in the morning and most day feeds she just takes one side. I feed in a quiet dark room and try several times to get the second side in but she generally won't take it.

She won't take a bottle, even wth EBM. She isn't showing much interest in solids.

I am just so tired...does she really need to feed this much at night even though she could do 11 hours?? Anyone got any ideas for dealing with it?


EASY:

E 7.30 (often won't take it...try offering every 20mins or so but no go)
A
S 9-10.40

E 10.45
A
S 12.45 - 2.45

E 2.50
A
S 5.00 - 5.45

E 6 & 7.30
A
S 7.40ish

In reality she usually only has 1.5 hours up at the end of the day but this EASY gives you an overall idea of what she is doing.

[FionaS]

I am currently trying the programme suggested re: starting EASY at 4 months or older.  We have been on EASY since birth but our EASY has been much shorter than recommended for her age as she could never do the A times.  She is closer to the A times now.  So in essence, I am aiming for a 4 hour EASY but will feed anytime after 3 hours if she seems to need it.  I have started a 10pm feed and am not feeding her again until morning.  Instead, I'm staying with her while she cries.  Last night I fed her at 10 and she woke at 12.15am so I resettled (I figured there was no way I should feed after only 2 hours in the night?).  It took just over an hour but she went back to sleep.  She woke again at 4.  I would've prefered to feed but I felt it was wrong to make her cry sometimes and feed others so again I refused to feed.  It took more like 40mins and then she slept until 6.30.  Naturally she is very tired today so her first A time was only 1 hour 20mins but I felt I needed to let her sleep again sooner after all the time awake in the night.

This is soooo much harder than feeding as it means our whole house is awake for long periods.  However, since she did 11 hours for so many weeks and now seems to wake earlier and earlier every few nights meaning more and more night feeds I feel I have to do something.

Am I doing the right thing?  The wrong thing?  I just don't know..

[FionaS]

Sorry -that link you put up brings me back to this thread?

In answer to your questions...she wakes crying.  I never hear her fuss or talk.  It is either crying or silent.

Is she teething?  I don't know...she drools and chews everything but I can't see any lumps.  One of her eye teeth is poking through a little but as she has no teeth at all yet I don't think it will actually fully cut yet.

[FionaS]

So how would you handle the midnight waking (only 2 hours after the 10pm feed)?  If I followed her I'd be feeding at 10pm, 12am, 3am and 6.30am.  She did do 6.30pm to 5am for 6 weeks, then dropped back to 7pm to 3am then to 7pm to 1am and now to this.

[Love, laughter, & PJs]

Just some {{HUGS}}} to you!  I could have written this post.  My DS never went 11 hours but I had a nice stretch of a couple of months where he did 6-7h and now he refuses to go more than 3.5-4 without BFing.  Kudos to you for not feeding, I've been working on getting the courage up to do that for weeks and everytime I do there's a GS or teething or some other madness!  I'm working up to it again, let me know how it's going for you - I need some inspiration! 

[FionaS]

Yes Jay3.  We were not doing a DF at all (she started sleeping 11 hours solidly when we stopped doing it at 10 weeks..prior to that she woke every 2 or 3 hours).  I reintroduced it when the NW started again. I have found that she is waking between 12 and 12.30 whether she is DF or not so have concluded it is habit.  Interestingly, since the night it took an hour to resettle her...she has continued to wake at 12.30 but has resettled herself after 5 to 10 mins of mantra crying.  Last night she ate at 7, cried out at midnight but then resettled herself and slept until....5am! 

I feel we did the right thing in holding out on the mid night feed.  Here is hoping our progress continues!