How to cut last night feeding for 8.5mo?

[lilamom]

Hi ladies!

Our sleep has been all over the place the past couple weeks, with the major problem being that my 8.5 mo wakes between 5-6am.  We've been trying to hold off on feeding her, but she usually gets worked up so we go ahead and feed her. Most of the time, she ends up being awake about an hour and then goes back to sleep for an hour before starting the day (occasionally she won't go back to sleep).

My theory is that she is waking just because she is accustomed to eating at that time but because she's had a lot of night sleep, she has trouble going back to sleep.  Does that make sense?

Any advice on how to get her to sleep through?

Here are our schedules from the past few days:

Thursday
6:45ish: woke, eat (didn't go back to sleep)
8am: up
9:15-10am: Nap
1:15-2:15pm: Nap
5:50pm: Bed

Friday
6:20ish: woke, eat (stirring at 5:15, 5:45?)
9-10:15ish: nap (stirred at 40 mins)
1:40-2:55: nap
6:30: Bed

Saturday
5:35am: woke fussing, eat (didn't go back to sleep)
9am-10:50am Nap (woke at 20/30 mins)
2:40-3:40pm nap
7pm: bed (happy!)

Sunday
4:30-5:30am: fussed (ate?)
6:45am: up
9-9:35am: nap
1:30-2:45pm: nap (unhappy after)
6:35pm: down

Monday
5:15-6:40: awake, talking then fussing, fed 8oz then asleep
7:40: up
10:15/20-11:40am: nap
2:30/40-4pm: nap
7pm: bed

Tuesday
5:15-6:40ish: awake (ate at 6:15)
7:25am: up

Please help!!  Thanks!

[JDeMelo]

Hi lilamom,

This sounds similar to my little girl who is just under 8 months. I posted below. Will follow along with you if that's ok!

[lilamom]

Oh yes!  I saw your post just after I put up mine.  Somehow it is nice to know that we are not the only ones in this boat! (Even though I'm sorry you are dealing with it, too, 'cus I know how rough it is!)

A bit of research I've been doing seems to indicate just waiting until a certain point to feed/get them up can work.  I'm thinking of just getting her up at 6am the feeding and hoping she starts to adjust.  We might need to do an early nap at 8:45 if she can't make it to 9.

[jessmum46]

Hi there   How much milk and solids is your LO having during the day? 

Would she go back to sleep if you just fed her straight away at that early hour?  I wonder if you did that and could start your day at a more reasonable hour, you could push the whole day out a bit, get BT a bit later and therefore have a better chance of her waking up later?  Your EWs are not technically EWs most of the time as LO is getting at least 10h night sleep - that said, it's earlier than I would want!

You are right that setting an earliest acceptable time to get up, say 6am, can eventually work in helping LO to set their body clock.  However, that means you need to hold them out to an acceptable nap time based on a 6am WU - so if LO can normally manage 3h A time, you do not PD for nap before 9am even if LO is awake at 5am.  It's likely to cause OT, and you may need to do a lot of resettling, but PD for a nap early will only perpetuate the early wakings.

[lilamom]

Thanks, Katherine.

LO is getting 10-12 oz. of solids (purees) and 20-24 oz. of milk during the day (including her 5/6am feeding). When we do feed her at 5/6am she takes 8 oz. and would easily take more.  She isn't hungry for breakfast, though.

When this first started (after the 3-2 transition at 6.5 months), I would feed her right away but then she'd stay awake probably for an hour or so talking before she dozed for a bit.  I can try again, but I doubt she will go back to sleep quickly.

Totally agreed on no PD before 9am (although I've considered 8:45am.. definitely NO earlier!!).  That has been my dilemma... I like her to get more night sleep before her first nap, but it's not quality sleep (maybe an hour at most) and sometimes I get her A wrong b/c I'm not sure when she wakes.  Just thinking as I type, but she can handle up to 4 hr A between naps and before bedtime.  Maybe it's best to go in at 6am (regardless of wake up time), feed at 6:30am, put down as close to 9am as possible and then stretch the second and last A times if necessary?

It seems like a 6:30pm bedtime is best as putting her to bed closer to 7 doesn't seem to be helping right now.  Long term, I'd like to push bedtime back, but I'm thinking it's best to preserve her night sleep and get her waking at a good time first.  What do you think?

[jessmum46]

Her milk intake and solids look great - 20oz or more of milk is ideal and solids are a bonus   so that's one thing we can rule out!

I guess there are a couple of things you could do.  Do you know what personality type your LO is?  Some Mums have tried a set first nap time (though no experience here I'm afraid) but I don't think it's recommended for touchy babies.  Angel/textbook can apparently do well as they can cope with OT better.  The other way to approach it would be to push up your A times a bit - sometimes increasing A times can make LO more tired at BT and therefore more likely to resettle in the early am, even if their total A time for the day isn't increased.  I noticed you had quite a lot of 1h15 naps - that's typically an UT length and may be a sign your LO wants more A time in the middle/later part of the day.

I agree on trying to preserve the night sleep

[lilamom]

She had a weight check recently and is gaining right along her growth curve and is just below the 50th percentile, so I think she is good.

I am thinking of trying set naptimes and a wakeup time (what we have probably needed all along!).  She is probably mostly textbook and can handle some variation in her WT... from 3-4 hours in the afternoon.

6:00am wakeup
6:30am: first bottle
9:00am: nap 1
1:45pm: nap 2
6:30pm bedtime

If she wakes early, then not getting her up until 6am and feeding her until 6:30am will hopefully help set her biologically and "tummy" clock to sleep a bit later.  My biggest hesitation is the long WT in the morning, although I have noticed that if she is resting in her bed awake it doesn't seem to count much to her "A" time.  We could always push the first nap up a teeny bit for a few days and stretch the WT later.  The 6:30 bedtime would mean that she should at least get 10.5 hours of night sleep.

Thoughts?

[jessmum46]

Sounds good to me - I'd stick with it at least a week before you make any changes to give her time to adjust.  Fingers crossed for you!