11 month old NW, EW and demanding night feed

[newlon]

Hi, I have been following many of the forums on this site for a while and have found them to be very helpful but I'm stuck on what to do with our current issue and would really appreciate some help.

Our little boy is 11 months old and had been previously sleeping through the night until he recently had total upheaval with a growth spurt, teething, chicken pox and gastro all in the space of 2 weeks. He is now waking at least once a night and up to 2-3 times and waking at 5am ready to start the day. He usually screams for a bottle and if we give it to him then will drink 200ml and go back to sleep until 5am. If we don't give the bottle then he wakes every half hour to hour screaming non stop.

I know that he doesn't need the bottle at night but have no idea how to get him to give it up and to be honest have been so tired that I tend to give in just so I can get some sleep.

The EW are also new and he has been getting up ready for the day at 5am every morning. He has never slept late, usually waking at 6.30am but 5am is just too early.

He is a very independent little guy and goes to sleep really well on his own and has the same nightime routine everyday. He has a dummy but I don't believe it is a prop as he puts it back in himself and will sleep without it.

Im not sure if it is his feeding pattern that is the problem or his nap times and don't really know which one to tackle first.

Here is his usual routine

5am awake
6.30am Bottle 180ml
8am Breakfast (he wont take very much at all)
10am Nap 1.5 hours
12pm Lunch
2pm Bottle 30-120ml (he seems to be weaning off this himself and eats a lot better in the evening if he doesnt have it)
2.30pm Nap 45min-1hr (this has recently dropped from 1.5 hrs)
5.30pm Dinner
7pm Bottle and bed (he is only taking about 100ml of his bottle)
10pm Bottle 100-150ml

And then whatever time he wakes up he will often have 200ml bottle.

I have tried changing his dinner time and evening bottle time but no matter what combination I use I can't get him to drink a proper bottle before bed. I know that he can because he was on only 3 bottles a day before getting sick.

And the only other thing I can think to add is that he sleeps in our room at the moment (not something we promote but we are about to move internationally and so needed to be in a smaller place short term). Im not sure if our being in the room is adding to his waking.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you

[mmom]

I was going to suggest the 2-1 switch http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=163278.0, but it looks like you have already shortened 1 nap.  How long has it been like that?  Maybe you need to shorten it a bit?

For the NF, I would say you need to bit the bullet and do PU/PD, which is basically just PD for your LO.  http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=69177.0

Any chance he is teething and the bottle is soothing him?  Are there any other issues like reflux?

[newlon]

Thanks for your advice and the links. He has reduced one of the naps himself in the last couple of days but the night waking has been going on for a couple of weeks. I'm not sure how long he should be napping for?

He is a reflux baby but is on medication and pretty well controlled now. If the bottle soothes when teething is it best to offer it or hold off?

[mmom]

I would still wean that NF.

You could also try medicating at night and see if it helps your LO sleep through.  If the reflux is controlled and your LO is just teething, then meds could help.

As for the naps, at this age a lot of LOs shorten 1 of their naps and the goal is either a cat nap in the morning and then a longer nap in the afternoon or a long nap in the morning and a cat nap in the afternoon.  Since you are already doing a longer nap in the morning, you could try shortening the 2nd nap.  If a 45 minute nap isn't helping after a few days, I would try 30 minutes.  The goal is to keep pushing that 1st morning A to eventually move to 1 nap.