Hi there, me again
A bit of an update on what has been happening here the last almost 2 months.
At the Dr appointment when Theo had his needles, my DR also prescribed me stool softeners which he said were safe for bfing but unfortunately they did affect him and he started having very frequent, loose poos (I'm talking up to 12 a day, I was feeding up one end and the poos were coming back out the other!) and Theo started loosing weight. He also started waking hungry at night. We went back to the Dr and I was given something else for my own poo issues
and Dr said that Theo was pooing far too much and because of the diarrhea we had to get him better because he was not getting any of the nourishment from his food as he was just pooing it back out again.
I was to follow up with the baby nurse and monitor his weight to make sure he was putting it back on. It took a few weeks for the his poo issues to resolve and he started to regain his weight. I asked the baby nurse about the night feedings and we agreed that if he woke for a feed I should feed him as he obviously needs it atm. (previously been sttn consistently since 10 weeks). Once the poos settled down he started sleeping through again.
The EASY we were on went something like this:
E 6:00 - wake and BF
S 8:00 - 10:00 (1 1/2 - 2 hours)
E 10:00 BF
S 12:00 - 2:00 (1 1/2 - 2 hours)
E 2:00 BF
S 4:30 - 5:30 (catnap sometimes longer)
E 5:30
A Bath etc
E 7:00
S 7:30
These of course are general times and could vary half and hour here or there each day, but it was always up at 6 and down at 7:30. Sometimes he doesn't actually go to sleep until 8:15 but he just fiddles with his blankie or stares at the mobile and talks to himself.
This nice period where everything settled into place only lasted for a few weeks and it has all gone down hill since.
Now we are at the stage again where most days he refuses one of his naps and he is also having a hard time getting himself to sleep for naps (bedtime is fine). More often than not he now cries to the point where I have to pick him up and really settle him down and rock/sing/shh him to sleep. I always try to put him down when he is close to sleep so he can still drift off on his own but quite often he kicks off again. Sometimes I put him to bed and he just goes to sleep fine. I am very mindful of the fact that he is getting older and bad habits are harder to break so do not want to get into the habit of rocking to sleep.
The other problem we are having is night waking has started again. Initially it was because he was rolling over and freaking out. Most of the time I could flip him back and he could go back to sleep. Now he can roll both ways and is also now happy to sleep on his belly so that isn't a problem anymore but now he is waking at random times hungry. I always see if he will settle first without a feed, sometimes he does, mostly not. So I feed him. You would expect that after a night feed he would sleep a bit longer in the morning or at least to our usual time of 6, but he has been waking early around 5. I always give him his blankie and try to stretch him out until as close to 6 as possible. He usually starts crying after 15 - 30 mins. Also when he does wake in the morning after at night feed he isn't really hungry and won't take much milk and he starts of grumpy!
I have just started him on solids 3 days ago, he is not really keen yet but I and just giving him a little at lunch time (around 11) for a week or so, then once he is showing some more interest in eating I'll add a dinner meal. then a breakfast.
So there are my problems, resiting the current EASY, night wakings and early wakings.
I am thinking that he is ready to drop the cat nap and move to 2 naps a day. I also read that early wakings can be because the first nap is too early and robs the night sleep? This morning he woke at 5 (didn't wake last night. I had to go out after Theo's last feed and DH couldn't get him to sleep so I fed him again when I got home at 9:30) crying hard. I fed him and he fell asleep on the first boob (and so did I) he woke back up at 6 and had the other boob. I put him down at 8 and he resisted (bit of crying, some cuddling/rocking/patting, playing with his blankie) but eventually fell asleep at 9 on his own. He woke up at 11:15 when I BF him. I gave him solids at 12. I thought I would stretch out his A time and have a go at 2 naps today. I was aiming for 2.5 hours. He ended up going to sleep at 2. He cried and I picked him up, quickly settled and put him down just in time for him to go to sleep on his own.
Do you think 2 naps will help? The one thing I DO NOT want to do is drop another BF. If he is already waking hungry, dropping another feed will ensure he is hungry at night but I am unsure of how to fit it in! At the moment, the meager amount of solids he is eating doesn't really count for anything.
Please help, how do I make this routine work and ensure that he is getting enough during the day? Sorry about the novel!!!
