When to start 4 hour EASY

[Emmakl]

I am ebf my dd - she is now almost 11 weeks and pretty much 3 hourly EASY - though stretches to 3.5 hours at times .
The last few nights she has fed at midnight and then gone through to 5.30am .. but not been keen on feeding at 3 hourly intervals during the day.  She weighed 11lbs 7oz at the end of last week - is it too early to stretch her out to 4 hourly EASY?  I followed the routine with ds but am a bit rusty!  The thing is that I have to wake her to feed during the day - she is such a sleepy little girl so its impossible to follow hunger cues unless I reverse the activity and eating which I'm not keen to do ...also, she only does about 1/2 hour activity after feeding before she is wanting to go back to sleep again!

Thanks

Ems

[*Mona*]

hi

can you post your detailed routine for us please?
if she can't handle 2hrs of A time she's not yet ready for 4hrs EASY.

[Emmakl]

Ok Well, basically, over the last few days its been:

8.30am feed (she feeds very quickly - usually done in 15 mins)
8.45am Change, dress, play on the bed
9.15am back to bed - sleeps while ds and I have breakfast
This sleep may be a bit disrupted as we have to transfer her to the buggy to go for a walk / take ds to nursery etc.
11.30am  Feed
11.45am Activity - usually on the playgym
12.15pm Sleep - I watch her cues and she really is exhausted by this stage!
3pm  Eat
3.15pm  Activity - playgym / watching me preparing supper!
4pm  Sleep (again, she's often crying with tiredness by this stage and goes straight down
5.30pm Often gets up and watches her brother have supper
6pm  Eat - short feed before bath
6.30pm Bath
7pm offer her another feed / into bed
9.30pm she cries for a feed
11.30pm Dream feed
5.30am Wakes for a feed - settles straight back again ...

This is a rough idea of what she's been doing .. I try and extend the activity time - initially she slept most of the day - she is a very sleepy baby, but gaining weight well, draining the breast at each feed (I've had several consultations with bf counsellor re. her feeding speed - she is definitely having a full feed!)

All thoughts gratefully received!
Many thanks

Emma

[*Mona*]

hi Emma

her routine looks ok in terms of following the EAS cycle. the only concern might be that 9:30pm feed BUT if you're ok with this, I wouldn't change her routine yet as she's obviously not ready for longer activity time so as long as she's not able to handle more or less 2hrs, I wouldn't try to move her to 4hrs.

maybe you coud try one thing though- drop this short feed before the bath and feed her right after- she might take more at that point and not be hungry at 9:30. just a thought.

oh, and DF should be not latere than at 11pm as later df may distrup her sleep. Tracy always advised 10:30/11pm latest.

hth
Monika