Getting back on track

[torie2507]

Hi, My DS has just turned 8 months.  He's exclusively breast fed and solids were introduced gradually at 6 months.  He's been poorly recently with a cold when he refused to eat any solids at all and started wanting to BF every 2 hours, I went along with this but now his cold is going away I would like to get back to feeding every 4 hours with a dream feed at 10pm.  I'm struggling to do so as by 3 hours he is screaming for milk but when I feed him he doesn't take a full feed.

Any suggestions how I go about stretching the time between feeds again?

[*Ali*]

Could you post your EASY so we can see how feeds currently fit around his A times and naps?

How is he at eating solids now? Do you give a drink (of water or such) with solid meals?

[torie2507]

Hi, thanks for replying so quickly.

Normally its

6am - wake & feed
7am - solids
9am - nap
10 to 10:30 - awake and feed
12:00 - solids
13:00 - nap
14:00 to 14:30 - awake & feed
17:00 - solids
18:00 - feed and bed
22:00 - dreamfeed

He is starting to eating his solids again, but he's never really been a big fan.  He loves his milk and he's a big boy but taking to solids very slowly.  He normally has 3 meals a day, sometimes refuses one of them.  He has between 1 and 2 tablespoons of puree per meal.

The past week and half has not resembled this as he's been poorly, when he refused all solids and was feeding all the time.  The past 3 days he's been waking between 2:30am and 3:30am and taking 1 - 2 hours to get back to sleep, even after feeding. 

Today so far has been:

3:30am - feed - put back into cot when he was chatting to himself, he was doing this until 5:30am when he started screaming so fed him again as couldn't resettle.  He went back to sleep until 6:10am.  I gave him solids at 7am.  I just gave him a breast feed at 8:30 but again he only had one side for about 5 mins.  He's now asleep.  I couldn't hold off feeding him any longer due to his nap. (We've had issues with accidental parenting and props so I try to avoid feeding to sleep)

[torie2507]

With regards to drinks with solids, he doesn't have water at the minute as he refuses to take any kind of bottle.  We're currently working towards him using a tommee tippee cup but at the minute he just plays with it and chews the spout

[Shdef]

Breastmilk is digested really quickly, so after three hours it could be genuine hunger and thirst. If you feel you have to stretch to four hours again (some babies never get there, some adults don't either) I would do it VERY gradually by adding five or so minutes

[*Ali*]

If he isn't having a drink with his solids and isn't taking much of those then it is understandable he can't go 4hrs between feeds, especially with such long A times now. Most babies who manage 4hrly feeds around 4-6mo are sleeping for the last 1.5-2hrs. Once awake times extend and they are awake for more than about 2.5hrs it is common to need more than one sitting in that time. Most will be on solids by 6mo and so can have the second sitting as solid food. For many such as my DS2 they don't take much solid food and need that next feed before the first nap. What I used to do around 8mo though is then not offer a milk feed on wake up and he would have solids when he woke up (lunch) and then next milk feed shortly after that. Then we did his second nap and dinner on wake up with a BT BF after that. So it was more like
6.35 WU BF
8 solids and water in sippy (v. Little)
10 BF (sometimes he fell asleep, sometimes he went in the cot awake)
10.15 - 11.45 nap
12 solids and water in sippy (bit more than breakfast)
1.30 BF
2.30-4 nap
4 BF (only sometimes)
4.30 solids and water in sippy
6 BT BF
6.30 BT
We also had a NF around 5am and sometimes another around midnight but sometimes he slept through that one. I never managed to stick with a DF as it just seemed to add an extra feed for us.

I think I gave an extra BF on wake up from the second nap in the early days of 3 solids meals when he wasn't taking much. He always took a decent amount (1-2oz) of water though.

I would just persist with giving a free flow sippy or open cup of water with solid food so he can practise. I wouldn't bother introducing a bottle at this late stage.

Have you tried finger foods? UK recs are to move onto that around 7mo. We did Baby led weaning so never really used purées with DS2 but I'm sure we had stopped by 8mo with DS1 who did start with purées at 6mo. Maybe your LO would be interested in feeding himself if he isn't keen on being spoonfed. 1-2tablespoons is ok at this age though I think. It is only between 8-9mo that the WHo and NHS in the UK recommend adding a third meal at all.

He probably just needs time to recover his appetite and get over his sickness though as well.

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

My kids were all mix fed bm and formula and still did not ever acheive a 4 hr routine...maybe the odd time but we kind of did similar to Ali with solids and milkfeeds...right now DD3 is 7 months and we spoon feed breakfast but do blw at other times (no set meal, kind of just when it works best, either afternoon snack time or supper as she sleeps over our lunch time). I tend to eat small meals frequently as well so my kids are similar!

[*Ali*]

And btw at 4.5mo both my boys were on 4hrly feeds in the day when they were awake 2hrs and then asleep for the last 2hrs. It was only once they started staying awake longer after around 6mo that they needed feeding up before the nap. Actually DS1 never needed more frequent BFs and happily went 5hrs between BFs when his A time was 3hrs and his first nap 2hrs.

[torie2507]

Thanks for all your advice.

I notice from your schedule that you had a longer A time in the morning then shorter A time before nap 2 and shorter A time before bed.  This seems like a good idea.  He often wakes after 30 minutes at nap 1 so maybe this is due to being UT?  An issue I'd have would be the later nap 2 as we need to collect my DD from pre school at 3:15 three times a week.

I started off BLW as this is how I weaned DD although due to pressure from family all saying 'he'll sleep better if he eats more'... I started purree's.  I try to give him finger foods at least once a day whether its fruit for pudding or part of the main meal, however he's not even putting it close to his mouth currently.

I've posted on the night wakings board as I'm now wondering if he's not eating solids due to being overtired due to night waking and sporadic / lack of routine currently.

[*Ali*]

Yeah both my boys seemed to prefer a short A time to bed but I know some are the opposite and need longer A times to bed. The long morning A time was really me trying to push his early waking later as he often tried not to go back to sleep when he woke at 5am. It worked in the end but only when I pushed BT back to 7.30pm as well at about 9mo. Even at 2.5yo now DS2 will sometimes do a 2hr nap from 1.30-3.30pm  then go to bed by 7.30pm and wake at 7.15am so we have a 6hr+ A time in the morning and 4hr A time in the afternoon.

I'm not really suggesting you change your routine to fit into what we did, just showing you how we moved E around to avoid going down for naps hungry. If naps do fall over the school run some days could you have naps in the buggy or carseat?