4 month old wakes every 3 hours like clockwork

[calgal22002]

This is my first post, so I hope I am in the right forum!

My DD is 4.5 months old and is an easy going baby.  She is pretty textbook, I would guess.  We are having loads of trouble with her night time sleep right now.  As a bit of background - she was a slow-gainer from birth and hardly gained any weight by 2 months.  In the past 2 months, I have been very vigilant about feeding her on both sides, every 3 hours, and supplementing with formula.  She is now 40th percentile and has gained 4 lbs in the last 2 months.  I am sure that she does not need to eat as often at night, but we have gotten into the habit of feeding her whenever she wakes because it used to be so important to get those calories into her.  Furthermore, we did a modified CIO with her a few weeks ago at nap time, so she has started to consistently fall asleep on her own during the day and at bedtime.  I KNOW she can put herself back to sleep, but she still wakes every 3 hours and is inconsolable.

The typical day looks like this (give or take a 1/2 hour):

6am - wake and eat
6:30/7:00 - back to bed, falls asleep on her own
9:30/10:00 - wake and eat
11:00 - nap
12:00/12:30pm - wake and eat
1:30 - nap
3:00 - wake and eat
5:00 - nap
6:00/6:30 - wake and eat
8:30/9:00 - bedtime (bottle)
11:00 - wake and cry
12:00am - eat and fall asleep (I know I should be putting her to bed awake)
3:00 - eat and fall asleep
6:00 - wake and eat

So my questions:
1) is she is waking out of habit or hunger - she eats a LONG time and will not fall asleep unless she is full (I have tried to limit the time she eats and she gets angry if I pop her off to early).
2) when is her actual wake up in the morning - 6:00 am when she is alert but will go back to sleep for another 2-3 hour stretch or 9:30 am when she really is up and active
3) when is her bedtime - 9:00 pm when she gets a bottle or 12:00 am when she goes down for the night?

I guess my problem is that I want her to be on a schedule that puts her to bed at 9:00 and wake up at 7:00, but it seems that sometimes she goes to bed for good at midnight and wakes at 10:00am!  What can I do to modify this behaviour and what can I do to reduce the night feedings?

Thanks for any help you can provide!
Marina

[momofclaire]

Hi Marina!  Welcome to the BW boards.

Have you read Tracy Hogg's book?  If not, I would highly recommend it. It was a lifesaver for me. 

Does she go to sleep independantly now?  Are you still using CIO as a method of sleep training?  Tracy was not an advocate of CIO or CC.  She believed that there were gentler ways of sleep training.  All that is explained in her book. 

Are you familiar with EASY?
At 4.5 months she probably doesn't need a night feed but she may because of her slow weight gain at the start.  I would guess that she doesn't need more than two. She may be having a hard time putting herself back to sleep at night and thus relies on you to feed her so she can relax. I would say that first you should concentrate on her daytime routine.  It seems as if her A times and naps aren't consistant.  She could be a bit overtired. 
I would aim for a routine that looks like this:
6:30 wake and eat
8:00 nap (1.5 hours)
10:30 eat
12:00 nap (1.5 hours)
1:30 eat
3:00 nap (1.5 hours)
4:30 eat
6:00 eat and windown for bed
6:30 bedtime

Are you familiar with the dream feed?  You may consider trying that as well.  It is where you go in and feed the baby while it sleeps. Many babies will latch even while asleep.  This helps fill their belly. 
To work on your routine I would advice posting in the EASY forum for help.  It isn't as the name implys (always) but has big payoffs. 
Once again welcome to the site. 
Myia

[calgal22002]

Thank you for your detailed response! 

Yes, I am a big fan of the Baby Whisperer - I have used it with my older boys very successfully.  DD goes to bed independently pretty consistently (at least 95% of the time, I would guess) so we do not need CIO - she just didn't like being held or rocked when she was tired, so we had to resort to putting her to bed on her own when she started fighting being swaddled/rocked/etc.  It worked, so we are thrilled that we no longer have a long drawn out mess at every nap!  Nighttime is the challenge - she gets a bottle before bed and often gets very drowsy, but we still put her down awake.  At night, the feeding often causes her to be asleep before I put her down.  The last few nights I have been really trying to put her down awake and also trying to shift her bedtime to 7:30 or  so.  It seems to be working better as I have gotten a 6 hour stretch (2 nights ago) and a 4 hour stretch last night.  To confuse matters, she seems to have a bit of a cold right now and she woke up a few times in the early morning due to congestion   I also think it impacts her naps, because she has been sleeping A LOT these past few days.  For example, these past few days, she has gone to bed around 7:30 and has slept in until 9:30 or 10:00 in the morning - she gets a bottle at 6:00am and then sleeps another long stretch.  As a result, we fluke into having a 4 hour EASY since she is sleeping for so long at her naps.  I hope it is simply a result of having a cold and will get better when she is feeling better.

Thanks for your help,
Marina

[Stace]

Hi Marina.

A couple of wee things I noticed - her last two naps, she appears to have 2 hours awake time when in the day she only appears to manage 1-1.5 hours - is she possibly getting over tired? Have you tried an earlier bedtime? We put DD down by 19:30 every night (earlier if her naps have been rubbish), we do a consistant wined down which helps us - feed, bath, massage, into PJ's, take up to her bedroom - then last feed, into sleeping bag and mobile on till she falls over.

If she's waking at exactly the same time each night, it may well becoming a habit? If you think she's eating enough in the day then you could always try cooled boiled water in the night (you mentioned that you use formula now and again so assume she'll take a bottle?) which hopefully will put her off waking?

Does DD use a dummy/paci at all? She may just be looking for comfort and if you were willing to give her one, it may be enough to get her back to sleep in the night.

Best of luck,

Stace x

[momofclaire]

If she is sick I would let her sleep a little extra but allowing her to sleep in so much during the day might end up bring a problem. 
Did she wake a lot overnight last night?  It is probably normal for her to have one feed, although you may be able to stop that soon. If you settle into a good 4 hour easy you may find that she is abl to go longer at night.