NEW on EASY first day with 10 WEEK OLD, help??

[Janeenesp]

My 10 WEEK old son has now finished his FIRST day on EASY and, I have to say,
he's done great with it... (on target with expected E,A, and S times...)  BUT, is there something SPECIAL I should be
doing for the evening feedings, routines that will help ensure that he sleeps longer through the night???  I heard of
cluster feedings, but is that a MUST?  Heard some not so great things about them too.... hmmm thanks in advance.
 

[Lªuren]

Hi there here is info on Clusterfeeding and some more links for you to read up on.

Tanking Up

One way of insuring that your baby eats enough is to increase his intake during the day, before 11 P.M. By “tanking up”, as I call this strategy, you get more food into his tummy, which, in turn, enables him to sleep through longer stretches at night. Tanking up is also great for growth spurts, those two— or three—day periods when your baby eats more than usual (see pages 115—119).

Tanking up consists of two parts: clusterfeeding, which is done at two-hour intervals in the early evening, at 5 and 7 or 6 and 8; and the dreamfeed, which is given somewhere between 10 and 11 (depending on how late you or your partner can stay up). With the dream feed, you liter-ally feed your baby in his sleep. You don’t talk to him, or put the lights on. It’s easier to do with a bottle, because you just wiggle the nipple into his mouth and that will activate the sucking reflex. It’s a little more challenging if you breast-feed. Before you give him your breast, stroke his bottom lip with your pinky or a dummy to get his sucking reflex started. Either way, at the end of the dream feed, your baby will be so relaxed you can put him down without burping.

I recommend tanking up as soon as your baby comes home from the hospital, but you can start using both strategies any time during the first eight weeks and the dream feed until seven or eight months (by which time your baby is drinking between 175 and 250 ml (six and eight ounces) per feed and getting a fair amount of solid food). Some infants are harder to tank up than others. They might take early evening feeds but not take a dream feed. If that describes your baby, and you have to choose one, concentrate on the dream feed only. Don’t bother clustering. For example, you feed your baby at 6, give her a bath and do the bedtime rou¬tine, and top her off at 7—she’ll probably only take a few ml/ounces. Then at 10 or 11 (if you’re normally up that late, or if your partner is) try to give her a dream feed—never later than 11. But don’t give up after one or two nights. It’s unrealistic to think you can change a baby’s habit in less than three days, and for some infants it takes as long as a week. There are no miracles here, but persistence usually pays off.


taken from Secrets of the Baby Whisperer p94

https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=72130.0
https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=54662.0

[clarapist]

GOOD LUCK with EASY. One thing that I learned is that remember that a baby is a moving target.   My LO also didn't read any of the books that I read, so didn't always do what he was "supposed" to.  If that happens, don't let it discourage you, just "start as you  mean to go on" like Tracy says in her books.
I never did cluster feeding b/c, to be honest, it was TOO MUCH for me. I didn't want to wash more bottles and it was hard to schedule. SO, in answer to your question, it's not a MUST. Every baby is different and responds differently. Try both and see what happens if you'd like.

 PLUS, I learned (the hard way) that sleeping "through the night" is just as much developmental as it is getting enough food.  It's also dependent on the baby's ability to put themselves back to sleep, so concentrate equally on that.

HTH