Is there anything we can do to get him to STTN?

[Lu Lu]

I don't know what else to do with my now 7 month old. He has been weaned off the dummy for a month now and started so well with settling himself, but he was still waking at least once in the night and getting milk.

He then got a cold and so everything was out of the window and we've just come back from a week on holiday and so we now need to get back into our routine properly again.

I am still breastfeeding him during the day but I am going to stop in the next few weeks so then I will be certain he's getting enough milk in the day and not waking due to hunger. He is now on 3 meals a day, with a 'pudding' after lunch and dinner so I think he's getting enough.

He has a pretty perfect routine most days and settles himself for good naps so I don't think it's due to overtiredness, although I have started to wonder whether he needs an extended A time now (currently on 2.5hrs) but he still seems to want that sleep after 2.5hrs.

I just don't know what to do and we desperately need a full night's sleep.

Any ideas?

[anna*]

You don't have to stop BFing him, but you can stop the night feeds, if you feel ready to and you're confident that he's not hungry. It does become a habit for some babies - some drop their night feeds by themselves, some need some help. You can use shush-pat and/or PUPD.

[Lu Lu]

The thing is I don't know if he is hungry or not as he always takes the milk and I don't think he's getting enough during the day.

We do use PU/PD but he just screams and screams until he gets the milk.

He's so good at self settling I thought he must be waking for a reason.

Do you think that persevering with PU/PD is the way to go?

[anna*]

How long have you tried PUPD for? How frequently is he waking at night?

Thing is with night time hunger is, it can be learned. I found, I couldn't force my baby to take more during the daytime - all I could do was stop the nightfeeds and then he would naturally take more the next day.

He may well be hungry when he wakes, but look at it this way. If you set an alarm for 3am, and went downstairs for a sandwich, and did that every night for a week, you'd soon start waking at 3am hungry. It's not that you NEED the sandwich, it's just that your body has learned to be hungry at that time.

[skipper11]

We've had to wean the night feeds a couple of times (after my daughter was sick on two occasions, she would suddenly get her appetite back and wake up for night feeds and then keep waking up after she was recovered). 

We had great success with a plan that I read about here (and is stickied at the top of one of the forums somewhere, but I can't remember where ....) where we slowly decreased the amount of food she was getting at night.  I wasn't comfortable using PUPD when I knew she was actually hungry -- because she was eating at night she wasn't eating enough during the day and then would be hungry at night.  I knew she actually wasn't eating enough because she was bottle fed by that time, so it was very easy to tell when she wasn't eating enough.

So, she was drinking 8 oz at night.  We dropped it to 6 for three nights, then 4 for three nights, then after two nights of only 2 oz she stopped waking up at night.  It probably takes longer than PUPD, but I felt better about it.  Plus, she went back to sleep really quickly after eating (since she was waking due to hunger) so the NWs weren't that bad. 

I believe you're BF, so it will likely be a little more difficult, but I believe other moms have just decreased the nursing time every few days, or limited it to one side, then reduced the time, etc.  I'll see if I can find the link ...

[skipper11]

Hope this works ...

http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=46907.0  

By the way, in case you are bottle feeding, I also used the decreasing the amount of formula plan mentioned in the original post when she was already getting a small amount of milk.  I.e., I went from 6 oz to 4 oz formula with 2 additional oz of water immediately, then 3 days later 4 oz with only 2 oz of formula.  I believe after only 1 day of only 2 oz of actual formula she STTN.  Best of luck!

[Lu Lu]

Thanks all.

Well, he's gone and developed a runny nose again now so we can't do PU/PD and he's not going straight back to sleep because he can't breathe!

Anna - you make complete sense - thank you. I guess he might be taking the milk through habit.

I was going to try the reducing plan. He actually has formula milk in the night so that DH can give it too and only gets 4oz at the moment so I guess it wouldn't take long to reduce it down.

I will read that link also, thanks skipper.