Cluster feeding and catnaps

[jswerczek]

Question, is baby expected to stay up between clusterfeeds? For example, if I feed my 9 week old at 6 and 8 p.m. he is not able to stay up. If I wake him at 8 p.m. after about a half an hour nap, it is hard to get him to stay awake for the bottle and through the bath and bedtime routine. Any thoughts on this would be helpful!

Also, I see in Tracy's sample EASY routine that after the late afternoon feed, there is a catnap between 5 and 6 p.m. So if I feed at 4 p.m. then sometime between 5 and 6 he should be sleeping a little? Does he have activity after the catnap and before the next bottle?

Thanks for your help!

[cwolff]

I believe the activity that comes after the catnap is the bath.  That's what the catnap is for, to get them thru the bath and bedtime routine.

[Noelle]

In Tracy's book, bedtime is usually between 7 and 8.  If your bedtime is 8:30 or 9 then the clusterfeed would be at 4 and 6 (or 5 and 7) with a little catnap and then his last feed between 8 and 9.  HTH 

[Alibobs]

When we did the cluster feeding at 7 and 9 we did the second feed when she was asleep, effectively doing 2 dreamfeeds. This worked well for us, although we only did this during growth spurts etc.