2.30am NW for 12 week old

[LovelyLilyandJack]

My 12 week old has been sleeping well at night since birth practically, and had worked up to sleeping at least 5 hours in a stretch at night, until a couple of weeks ago when she suddenly started waking between 2.15 and 2.45am.  She cries when she wakes and seems hungry.  If I shush/pat her she will drift off again but only for up to 20 minutes, then she'll wake crying again, or will cry when I put her back in her moses basket.  I always end up feeding her cos I don't want to wake my husband too much.  She'll then wake between 6 and 7.30am without crying (will just look around and snuffle a bit) and often doesn't seem that hungry at her morning feed.  Any ideas how I can stretch that night feed out again?  It just feels like we've gone backwards and are nowhere near STTN (though I know it's a bit early to worry about that).

She won't take a dummy and it seems a bit silly to try and make her now?  Should I just persevere with the shush/patting (can take her into the nursery to do this as she is often calmer in there anyway but won't I then have a problem with her always falling asleep in my arms?).  Trouble is, I know feeding her will get us all back to sleep much quicker as she'll go straight back down afterwards.

Our day looks like this most days:

E: 7am - 7.45
A:7.45 - 8.30 (Nappy, change & wind down)
S: 8.30 - 10 / 10.30  (have to wake her from this nap)

E: 10.15 - 11.00
A: 11:00 - 11.30 (Nappy, songs & wind down)
S: 11.30 - 1.15 / 1.30 (sometimes have to wake her, sometimes she wakes herself)

E: 1.30 - 2.20ish
A: 2.20ish - 3.00ish (play mat / tummy time, story & wind down)
S: 3.00 - 3.45 (currently waking early from this nap but seems OK - doesn't cry all afternoon and goes to bed OK)

E: 4.00 - 5.00
A: 5.00 - 5.20
S: 5.20 - 5.45 ish (often only has 20 minutes here - sometimes wakes grumpy but calms after a couple of minutes, sometimes wakes quietly)
A: 5.45 - 6.20ish (bath)
E: 6.20 - bottle.  Will have anything between 3 and 6 ozs.
S: By 7.20 normally

E:  Often wakes for a feed around 10.30pm.  Straight back to sleep afterwards (gets herself off to sleep from awake when put in cot).  DF before 11 if she doesn't wake.
E:  Normally wakes around 2.30am.  Can string it out til 3ish before crying really escalates!  Feeds for about 15 minutes (not sure if this is quicker cos my boobs are bursting by this point, or if she's just not that hungry).

Shouldn't she be able to go more than 4 hours between feeds at night?  I reckon she could do that during the day most mornings (I don't let her but will go 3.5 hours sometimes without her crying for hunger).  How do I stretch this out more?  Daytime feeds are already very long - not sure I can extend them much longer without impacting on nap time...

Or is this HW as it's at roughly the same time each night?

[anna*]

Honestly, at this age I would just feed and get everyone back to sleep. It's totally normal for her to still need one feed in addition to the dreamfeed.

[Colin Macs Mom]

I agree!

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Can I not do anything to stretch out the wakings though or change anything during the day to help?  I'm sure she's not always waking from hunger (sorry - this wasn't clear in my original post).  I expect to be feeding once in the night and that's fine, but last night she woke at 1.30am after having 8oz at 7pm and a 30 minute DF at 10.45pm.  I shushed her and she went back to sleep pretty quickly and slept til 3 but I had to keep shushing her for a while to get back to proper sleep rather than being restless still.  She then woke again at 5am (without crying) and I ignored her til 6.30am when she woke up properly and cried I started the day with her.  She still wasn't particularly hungry though and stopped crying as soon as I picked her up. 

If I keep shushing her when she wakes before 2 / 3am, say (to avoid 2 feeds a night, when I'm sure she isn't hungry) will she eventually learn to sleep longer and only wake when she's hungry, or is it a waste of time and I should go back to feeding her twice a night?  Haven't had to do that for about 8 weeks now so don't want to go backwards   Also, if I feed her every time she wakes, won't I get stuck doing that?

Or is this all just part of how it works at night and I'm expecting too much?!  Just frustrating that she's suddenly sleeping so badly at night, now I've pretty much got naps during the day sorted at last. 

[anna*]

Yeh I'd say it's fine to shush back to sleep if it's been less than say 3-4 hours since her last feed.

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Should also say that I realised last night that she is probably waking without crying some time around 1.30am most nights - it's just I don't always hear her til she cries and that can be any time between 1.30am and 2.45am.  She often re-wakes (again, without crying) around 5 as well so doesn't seem to be able to sleep for more than a couple of hours at a time after the DF.  She almost always sleeps from 7.20pm to the DF without a murmur though.  Not sure if any of that is relevant or not?!  I guess I'm just worried about this going on forever if it's not always hunger related and I'm fixing it by feeding her, as it's been going on like this for over 2 weeks already.  On the other hand, I also don't want to waste half and hour to an hour every night shushing her to delay a feed which I should just be giving her.

Sorry - can you tell I'm completely clueless?!  I know I'm lucky not to have had to worry about this so far but before all this she only seemed to wake when she was hungry at night after much longer periods of sleep before, so this has thrown me a bit and I'm feeling a bit desperate at the prospect of doing more night feeds rather than less as time goes on...

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Fab, thanks (sorry - posts crossed!).  Will she eventually learn to sleep longer at a time if I shush her back to sleep or should I expect to keep doing this for some time yet?

[anna*]

If you shush her back to sleep and she wakes shortly thereafter crying, I would assume it's hunger. If she's waking habitually at the same time, you could try wake to sleep. Remember there are LOTS of growth spurts in the first year so you can't assume that there will always be a linear progression where she can go longer and longer overnight.

[LovelyLilyandJack]

She's still only managing 2 - 3 hours in one stretch at night - this has been going on for 3 weeks now whereas before she could do 5 hrs in one stretch quite reliably.  It means we're now moving towards 2 feeds a night after the DF, which we haven't had to do for weeks.  The wierd thing is she does seem genuinely hungry when she properly wakes but can go 3.5 - 4 hours easily without a feed in the day.  Or rather, she can in the morning but needs more feeds as the day goes on. 

Is there anything i can tweak in the day to encourage her to go longer between feeds at night?  The last 2 nights she's had a couple of feeds only 2 hours apart at night - it's so depressing feeling like she's feeding more at night rather than less.  It might be a growth spurt (though I thought she had her 3 month one a week or so ago as she did the same then) so I'll let it go on another night or two but after that I'd really like to try and extend them a bit, by tweaking the day if possible.

At what point can I be confident that she can go longer at night?  I'm not talking about STTN, just lasting longer than 2/3 hours when I know she can go longer than that during the day!  I wondered if she's ready to move to a 3.5hr EASY as she's extending her A times a bit and has started waking early from naps occasionally but not sure if this will help or make it worse.  We're currently on a 3.5 hr EASY in the morning and a 3hr EASY in the afternoon, partly because I can't get her to nap for more than 30/45 minutes in the afternoon in one go (often cos we're out and about then), and partly cos she seems to get hungry around 4pm.

So - after lots more rambling - Is there anything I can do during the day to help her go longer between feeds at night, and if not, when can / should I start thinking about cutting down on the night feeds (and how do I do it?!).  She's now 13 weeks / 3 months.

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Or, alternatively, is this quite common and is she likely to just start extending them again by herself?  Just worried she's feeding more at night now, not less.  It can't be a 3 week GS can it?!

[anna*]

All you can really do is ensure she is getting good, full feeds through the day. If she is distractible, you can feed in the dark, quiet nursery while she is still drowsy after a nap. You could feed three hourly during the day, as most don't go to 3.5-4 hourly feeds until they're 4 months plus, so that might be away to get some more calories in. You could try shush-patting back to sleep, but the risk there is that if she is genuinely hungry she'll be awake again shortly afterwards and you'll be getting even less sleep. Also remember to give her a good chance to resettle herself before you go in to her, chances are that she won't need to be attended at every cry.

It is common for them to reintroduce night feeds. Some do extend again by themselves, some don't.

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Great - thanks for your reply.  I might go back to 3hrly feeds then and see if that helps, and feed straight after naps maybe.

[LovelyLilyandJack]

Just a quick update on this - we've had a couple of nights now with Lily not waking til gone 4am for a feed, which is much more back to normal for her.  As ever with her, I'm not sure exactly what did it, but in the days leading up to it, the following happened:

- Went back to 3 hourly feeding and started covering her head with a muslin to stop her getting distracted during feeds
- Gave her her evening bottle in a more upright position which has meant she's getting less wind as I think that was waking her up
- An hour of shush/patting her one night as I refused to feed her before 3am and do 2 feeds.  She actually calmed quite quickly (otherwise I wouldn't have gone so long) but didn't quite calm completely so fed her in the end.  I was a bit worried I just taught her to wait and she'd get what she wanted in the end, but....  The next night and the night after that she's woken at 2/3am as usual but got herself back to sleep, and then gone til past 4am for a feed

So thank you for the help - hopefully we're back on track now - will see tonight!