10 week old falling asleep at breast

[soji]

My 10 week old DS is still falling asleep at the breast.  Not so much a problem during the night feeds, but should I be actively trying to keep him up during the day feeds?  It didn't seem to bother his naps too much before, but we are struggling w/ short naps and I wonder if this is part of the problem.

[catmom]

I would say that sleeping at the breast would contribute to short naps.  Do you think that he associates feeding with going to sleep?

[Mum of 3 + 2 stepkids]

Hi are you on EASY? If not then its a great way of getting lo's to take a full feed along with the other things like changing nappy & winding.

Kate x

[soji]

yes, I'm on a 3 hour EASy and have been on EASY since I brought my baby home.  He's been a really sleepy baby since birth.  The first few weeks were a challenge jsut to keep him awake at all! (Of course, things have changed since then.)  I've been trying to keep him more awake, but honestly there are some feeds where mommy is so tired and we're both so comfortable that we both have a short snooze.  (i know bad mommy!)  But if you think it may be contributing to his short naps then I will make mroe of an effort to keep him awake and see how that goes. thansk!

[Mum of 3 + 2 stepkids]

Your not a bad mommy at all, im sure that most of us (me) have fell to sleep feeding

If you have a short nap have you tried sh/pat for a little extra sleep. If you can get that sleep a little longer then you will probably find the feed is a lot better.

Kate x

[soji]

yes, I am the shush/pat queen these days.  But the problem is, of course, I have a toddler running around for half the day and during those naps it's very hard to be in the nursery tending to baby's nap for more than a few minutes.  Sigh... Some days it's just too much!

[soji]

Hi all - well we saw our pediatrician yesterday b/c DS suffers from reflux.  They referred us to a ped GI at this point.  But they also said that I should only feed DS using the side lying position - our favorite sleepy position!  We always fall asleep with this position so I stopped doing it.  Any tips on keeping (both of us!) awake?

[binxyboo]

Hugs, we have a reflux baby here too. It presents a lot of challenges in so many ways.

Why did they suggest the side lying position to you? Has your lo started on any meds?
TBH, we went through so many feeding issues with Kate, and found her most receptive to feeding while she was sleepy, whether just waking up or going to sleep, so I fed her then, The most important thing to me is that she eats. With my older son (non refluxer), we fed to sleep all the time. He loved lying down and snuggling in like your lo.

Is your lo on meds right now?

I can't give much advice on the keeping awake. I have found myself very sleepy feeding Kte on may occasions, and have dropped off to sleep in the chair with her many days, only to have my 3 year old wake me up!

[soji]

thanks for your response!  I needed the hugs today!   DS is on zantac and prevacid.  He started screeaching during feeds (not lying down) over the weekend and has increased in weight so I took him back to the ped. to see if we need to increase his meds.  I have fast let down so that's part of hte reason to do the sidelying.  We were maxed out on meds so that's why my ped suggested we see the GI ped.  Giving the prevacid 1 hour before the feed in the morning means that we have a tired baby by the time i get to the feed and we both fall asleep during the feed.  So my mornings look like this...

7am prevacid (and hopefully he goes back to sleep)
8am feed
9-11 morning nap

But if he falls asleep at the feed at 8am won't that mess up his am nap?  We are also dealing with short naps altho it's more of a problem in the next 2 naps than the first one.  In the am nap he will wake up early but many times he will put himself back down or i just need to go in once (if it's a good nap).