how go get a 12 week old to sleep for more than 3 hours

[Flo]

Hi,

My DS is 12 weeks old and teaching him sleep is an ongoing nightmare.  He has to be Sch Pat to sleep whilst swaddled and very rarely goes to sleep on his own.

My biggest problem until this week was that he would only nap in the sling and I have finally cracked this now and he is having 2 1/2 hour naps a day (Sch Pat and swaddled).

Now I want to tackle his night wakings.  He goes to sleep about 7.30-8 ish, depending on how long he takes to feed (he is breast fed and has reflux).  I dreamfeed him at 11 ish and he usually goes back to sleep well after this feed.  He then wakes around 2 ish when I feed him once more and he is Sch Patted back to sleep.

Come 4 ish he starts waking again and I Sch Pat him back to sleep but he keeps waking every half hour or so.  This goes on till 6 when I feed him and he is awake for the day.

What can I do?  Should I not feed at 2ish?

Lisa

[Katet]

Can you post your day time routine, then I can give a few suggestions, the day time routine has a strong influence on the night

Is it only 2 x 30min day time naps or  2 x 2.5 hour naps? As if it is the former he is probably suffering from chronic overtiredness.

[Flo]

Sorry I've just noticed that I put 1/2 hour naps - it's one and a half hour naps (that's sleep deprivation for you  :cry: ). 

He is on 3 hour EASY (however the day start times do vary depending on whether he wakes at 6 or 7 or 8am) and I adjust the daytime feeds by quarter of an hour or so to make the last feed at 6.30-7.

Feed times are usually 6, 9, 12, 3.15, and 6.30

The first 4 feeds have a longer nap (one to one and a half hour naps and the afternoon feed is usually only half an hour).

Last night he slept I dreamfed him at 10.30, he woke at 12.40 and I Sch Patted him back to sleep.  He then woke at 1.30 ish and wouldn't go back to sleep so I fed him at 2 and he fell asleep on the 2nd boob and I put him back into his cot.  He woke again at 3.40 and from then to 7 he slept for no more than half an hour at a time after 10-15 mins of Sch Patting each time.  I fed him again at 5 (I was deparate for some sleep by this stage having only had 2 hours myself  :shock: ).

[~Jency's*Momma~]

My son is somewhat the same way.
We are struggling with naps.  He gets a total of 3.5 hours usually (gets another hour sometimes).  He brakes these into one long 2 hour nap and two to three 30-45min naps.
He has a set bedtime of 8:00pm.  I feed him between 6:30/7:00pm no matter what time I fed him last, then he gets his bath, massage, pjs, gas worked out, nose snotter thing, and then I feed him again, we tell daddy night night and then we go down fully awake.  We are working on this getting to sleep (he usually takes 5-10 min but doesn't have to be picked up anymore, we're on night 4).
He used to go 6 hours between the last feed and the next feed andthen it was every 3 hours.  A couple of weeks ago he started only going 4.5 hours and two nights ago he was up every 2 hours and last night every 3 hours (up to eat) but woke up twice between feeds in the morning.
After about 5am he is always a rough sleeper.  He tosses and turns and starts to wake up (so I give him the pacifier) and he always ends up waking up around 6:30/6:45am and if I nurse him he will go back to sleep until what would have been his next feeding (around 7/8am).  Sometimes I don't have to nurse him just pick him up and calm him down. But then he's back up in 30-60 min to eat. 
I wish I could get him to just sleep better in the morning and not wake at 6:30/6:45.  I don't have any advice for you just letting you know we are in the same boat.
He is 13 weeks now.

[travis's mum]

Hi Ladies I'm a bit confused my lo is 11 weeks old and I am still feeding every 3 hours even throught the night is this not right :? ? .Should I be aiming to cut out nighttime feeds? This would be nice :wink: .

I feed him otherwise I know there is no way he will go back to sleep.

I will be watching to see the reply to your posts so I can see if A good night sleep is just around the corner :wink: .

[teezee]

my lo was a great sleeper for the first 2 months!  she would sleep 5 to 7 hour stretches throught the night!!..now on the other hand it is a little less  :cry: i dreamfeed at 11 and then she is usually up at 3 and then at six again...how i miss sleeping more...and don't forget when they go through growth spurts that screws the whole sleeping thing up, just two weeks ago she was getting up every hour and half to two hours all night long...talk about sleep deprivation

[~Jency's*Momma~]

teezee,
how old is your lo?

I have a friend that has a baby a week older then Jency and last month she was saying that her lo was doing that same thing and then last week she said he just stopped.

Well this week Jency started doing that same thing.  I called her and she said it last 1.5-2 weeks.  SO we will see what happens!

[teezee]

dd is 16 weeks...this has been going on for a few weeks...i hope u r right and it just suddenly stops.  she is even getting difficult to put down for naps as much as at bedtime, does your friend have any suggestions?

[teezee]

by the way the last couple days she started getting up every hour - hour and a half again...decided i am starting with some cereal tonight though.  i just got her to sleep for her afternoon nap - it is 6:30!!!!!..talk about throw off a whole routine!

[Katet]

My thought is your lo's have gone through growth spurts & their little bellies have grown, so you need to start stretching out the time between feeds so they take bigger feeds & store some up for a longer stretch at night. If you keep feeding at 2.5-3 hourly, your lo's will only consume enough to last that period & not store up calories... I know it sounds illogical, but as I saw written somewhere "it may not be logical, but it is biological"

[teezee]

katet!!
help!! i think u are absolutely right, but now that i am trying to go on 4 hour easy and EVERYTHING is getting crazier...now even during the day she wants to eat every two hours and i can't implement the feed right after she gets up b/c it's only 2 hours in between..i know u are supposed to alter it 15 min at a time but now do i start at 2 hours??  we had 3 hour easy down pat so i am not quite sure what to do...should i do what my paed suggests and give her water at a feed so we can start fresh the next time she gets up?...i was always against this b/c she was so young but now should i maybe do it to get things back on track?? what is your suggestion?

[travis's mum]

How can I extend the time inbetween feeds my Lo really struggles to stay awake longer then 45min/1hr should I try E-A-S-A-S-E? When I try to keep him up longer than he wants he gets over tired really easy and all hell breaks loose. At what age should I aim for 4hr easy and how long is the age appropriate time for my Lo to stay awake at the moment?

[Katet]

travis's mum. I think at your lo's age 3hours, between feeds is perfect, I think you  need to work on making the sleep time a good solid 1.5-2 hours, awake time is shortish, but if you are only getting 45min naps that would be why.
How long are your naps?
How does your lo fall asleep?
What is your wind-down like

[travis's mum]

if I catch him in time he goes down quite well I found that not to over stimulate during A works best as he's not keen on winding down just feels like it's one-to-one time or starts fussing then gets over tired!When he's over tired it's a nightmare to get him to sleep alot of screaming and squirming! Pat/shh seams to make the situation worse sometimes I find just resting my hands on him and being there for him while he gets it out of his system and offering him the dummy is the best way round. I know this is not ideal :oops: But like i said when I catch him at the right time he goes down like an angel.

Now nap time he usually wakes after 45 min but if I am quick I can get him Back to sleep for another 45 min. It's awfull I really have to be on my toes in order to have a smooth day (WHICH IS REARLY )especially if I have things to do around the house or if we go out, I just can't always be there to catch him before it's to late if you get what I meen.

Bt the way he has taken a nose dive in the evenings he used to only wake once at night to eat 3/4ish then sleep till 6/7ish. Then we had some evenings where he did not take his cat nap and he would get very over tired by bath and bed time. He sometimes would not drink enough would get hungry before I gave him his dream feed  and wake. Since this time (I think) he has been waking through the night, from about 1.45 onwards about 4 times altogether. Now originally I thought he was waking for food but I decided the best thing I can do is feed him once only in the middle of the night (as he used to) and up his bottles to 6ounces in the hope he may drink more during the day, and so as not encourage him to wake all night knowing he was going to eat.  The thing is the last two nights he is still waking alot, I thought I was doing the right thing by giving him the dummy (he never uses it at night to go to sleep only initially but then after half an hour I take it out.)  By giving him the dummy when he wakes am I making matters worse by teaching him to depend on it. Should I try another method to settle him I'm just soo tired at night and he settles so quickly with it :oops: . and I'm scared if I try something else I might upset him and cause him to become fully awake. what do you think could do with some advice don't want to drag this out any further than it is. I was hoping to work towards getting a full night sleep not less w :?  what went wrong?

Any advice would be fantastic I could really do with a visit from TBW so I can get back on track I really do want to get things write and for things to go smoothly (well as smoothly as they can :wink: )