Textbook 4mo suddenly waking every 1or2 hrs

[Khalam's Mama]

Help. My textbook 4mo has gone from 4hrly nf to waking every hr. Sometimes i can settle with sh pat but sometimes i have to feed. We were getting great 2hr naps but now they are getting shorter too. We were on a 4hr easy for 3wk before this. Now he is eating every 2 or 3hrs. He has reflux but i really feel that this is controlled now. It doesn't seem to bother him in the day and he rarely spits up now. I thought it was a growth spurt but it has been over a wk now. I know we have major ot but not sure it is the cause but rather a result. He was am independent sleeper or needs a few pats but lately it is a good 20mins of pupd and sh pat. Any ideas welcome.

[~inbalance~]

This happened with both myu LOs at 4mos and I hear lots of other moms say the same. There is a huge GS at this age that can throw sleep way off. Also both mine started teething at 4mos and cut their first tooth by 5mos. (((Hugs))), it was such a hard time for sleep for us.

[Ima shel Alon]

We also had it hard at this age, it's a tough one.
Did he start these NWs at the same time as the bad naps? It could be that he is extremely OT and that wakes him up at night.
Also, are you BF?

[Khalam's Mama]

I Wil post some easy when on my laptop as too messy on my phone.. He is ebf. Thanks.

[Ima shel Alon]

I am no expert in BF, but I think that GS are a bit more difficult (especially the 4months one because it's a huge one) as it takes time to build up the supply.

[Khalam's Mama]

Our Days looked very much like this until about a week or so ago. Sometimes it is more 8-8 but the general timings aer the same (2hrs A and 2hrs sleeps)
E 7am (5mins is a full feed for him - has never had more than 10min even as a NB-his DB was same so think I have fast flow)
A 2hrs
S 2hrs

E 11am
A 2hr
S 2hr

E 3pm
A 2hr
S 45min

E between 6-7
A 1.25-1.75
S between 7 and 7.30

That was where were were but today was like this.
After NW at 8pm (gave paracetamol in case pain as 45min to settle), 10.20 (7oz EBM), 12, 2(BF), 5 (BF)
7am WU
8am E (late since ate at 5am)
       A=2hr10
9.10 S (30mins - OT, took 5mins mantra crying with hand on his chest)

10.30am E (Hungry early due to short nap and didn't want him waking due to hunger)
            A 1hrs 10
10.50am S (2hrs 20) Took 20min of pupd/shpat while screaming

1.30pm E ( since likely didn't take full feed at 10.30)
           A 3hrs (we were out and he usually sleeps well in buggy but took over 1 hr to go off)
4.30pm S 15mins (woke when we got home)

5.30pm E
           A = 2hrs 35
7.05     BT (5mins mantra crying with hand on chest)

He then seemed to wake after 20mins because I could see him chewing his fists on the video monitor but then he settled without crying out and is still asleep at 9pm.


My breasts do feel fuller today so either the supply has caught up or it is because he hasn't been nursing all day. As you can see we are starting to stretch  the feeds out again and actually got 1 4hr slot in late afternoon.

As for naps they did start to get short before the nights got really bad now i looked back at my logs. The E's got closer before the naps got bad so maybe this is all 4m Gs, supply not catching up, waking from hunger and then waking from Ot too. Ahhhh this is so complicated.

So what do I do? Feed more for supply or feed less now it may be over and we can stop snacking?

Am at my neice's birthday party tomorrow afternoon so sure we will end up with worse OT.

[Khalam's Mama]

Just wanted to say we had a much better night.After bed at 7.05 we did df at 10.30 and only had one nw at 3am which i fed at since 4.5hrs is the best we get here. I hope that means we are coming out of this now. Since we started our day at 6am i should be able to squeeze 2 decent naps in before we leave at 2ish for the party. Wish me luck. X

[Khalam's Mama]

Only got 50min nap this morning i think because the house was noisy with dh and k playing around grrr. I got him down again 40min ago but he seems to be stirring already. He went to sleep ok both times though less than 5min each.

[Ima shel Alon]

Now that I see your EASY I remember exactly how it was for us and we had a period we had the exact same NWs. It's a pretty tricky age because 3h is too little for them to go but 4h can be a little too long.
Your first NW at 20:00 seems like an OT one because it's so close to BT. Then you have a waking around 22:00 that I always treated as DF even if he woke up for it himself. If he didn't wake up for that feed I'd wake him for a DF closer to 23:00 and hope the next one will be later. Then you had one at 2:00 which is 4h after the previous one and another one at 5:00 - 3h. We had it often that A could go different times between feeds at night and there was not much to do about it, and he was FF. It's also a tricky one because if he'll take longer for the last feed and lets say eat at 6:00 he might treat it as his start of the day...
I know that this is not really what you want to hear (especially because the NWs are "new"), but I do think they are normal. You only need to hold on for a little while longer. Maybe in a 3 or 4 weeks time you can start and wean the NF.
This is of course MY experience.

[Khalam's Mama]

I agree 8pm was ot. He sometimes wakes around the df and i feed him. We never get more than 4hrs since he was tiny. We had a bad nap day with lots of cn so i hope it wont mean we are back to more nw. it also meant the e was closer than 4hrs. To be honest i can handle the nf if he is hungry and goes back to sleep but it is the 30min resettling i cant stand. He was in bed by 7pm. Fx for a good night.

[Ima shel Alon]

mmm... I missed that about the 30min settling. I wonder why is he doing that.
Is he taking a full feed or are you taking him off the breast?
Do you change a nappy with every feed? Before or after the feed?

[Khalam's Mama]

He takes a full feed then either falls off or falls asleep. He wakes when i wind him but Will settle himself. It is only when he wakes not hungry that he is hard to settle. Last night it was all feeds so i dont mind that as it is 10min max same as in day but he drains a full breast. I never change his nappy in the night. He never poops or leaks.

[Love, laughter, & PJs]

Hugs, KM!  This is a hard time and we're right there with you.  I think Grace has been in an UT/OT loop as she's needed a routine switch and it's been a process of about a week to get her there.  At least I think we're getting there!    I really had to push out the first A to 2h30 (which still got us a short nap yesterday but I had to wake her at 3h today!) and just kind of roll with the OT until I could get her to a point where she could handle the longer A, if that makes any sense. 

I think we both went to the 4h EASY around the same time so maybe B just needs to push to a longer A?

[Khalam's Mama]

You may be right Kate. He was managing 2hrs easily a couple wk ago. I think part of it is he gets disturbed by k and dh is really noisy too. I hope we can get a gd night then be able to stretch the 1st a more easily. Dh inadvertently stretched it to 2hrs 10 when i laid in a few days ago and he was screaming blue murder and only took 30mins so i Wil have to find a balance.

[Love, laughter, & PJs]

I hear you, KM.  I definitely think this past week G needed more A time but at the same time couldn't handle it.    You may be stuck riding it out a bit until he can handle it.  I *think* we're getting there, but we'll see.  GL tonight.