14 week old waking more through the night

[lyssie28]

Hi my DD is 14 weeks old.  Since she was born she woke between 3 and 4 am for a feed and up at 7.  She would fall asleep about 10-10.30pm. Recently however she wont sleep on the evenings until sometimes well after 10 without being asleep since about 5 or 6 so she us way OT. She used to have a feed or dream feed at about 10 but now she refuses it even though she is due for a feed. Because of this she now wakes at about 1 or 2 am and then 4. She also wakes alot through the night when she breaks of her swaddle. 

How can i get her to sleep better? Do you think its the 4 month sleep regression or maybe something i am doing wrong? She is my first baby and i'm a worry wort! Plus as shes getting older her sleep pattern appears to be getting worse not better.

[PaulsMom]

Hugs.  Yes, around 4 mo sleep can get a but wonky.  Could you post your routine so we can take a look to see if anything can be tweaked?

In this format would be preferred
Wake up
E
A
S
E
A
S

Wrt the df, are you bottle or breast feeding her? 

[lyssie28]

Wake up 7.10

E 7.15
A 7.45
S 8.30

E 10.00
A 10.30
S 11.30

E 1.00
A 1.30
S 2.30

E 4.00
A 4.30
S cat nap at 5.30 until 6.15

E 7.00
S 7.30

I pump breastmilk for her so she is bottle fed.  She gets 5oz per bottle but lately she is finding it hard to take the whole bottle for some reason.  At the moment she is waking up at about 2 am and last night i managed to get her back to sleep but she still kept waking every 20 mins or so until i fed her at 3.  She didnt wake at 4 but from about 5 she starts kicking her legs about and moving around.  I have to constantly swaddle her back up tight but i use her blanket to do it and she can still move her legs about.  I did manage to keep her bedtime at 7.30 but she only slept for maybe an hour and then had to keep trying to get her sleep she eventually fell asleep about 10pm and took a feed at about 10.45.

[Violet's mom]

This might sound crazy to you but at that age my LO wanted to go to bed by 6:30pm.  She would go to bed, wake about an hour later for her last feed, and I would put her directly back to bed.  She then slept until 3 or 4am for her night feed (dream feeding didn't work for us).  One key indicator that that was what she needed was she was miserable after 6:30pm no matter what we did.  Unfortunately for me that meant wake up time of 6am but I got used to it...

Worth a try?  Also, what do you do during activitiy time?  My LO was also undertired as someone brought to my attention because she would party a couple times a night - she became much more aware at this age!

[PaulsMom]

Both of my kids didn't go to sleep for bt at a decent hour until they were closer to 4 mo old.  For my dd, she just wanted cluster feeding and cuddle time in the evenings. Its possible that this is what she wants in the evenings.  I did start to reinforce bt with her around 4 months and it took a good week of sleep training to get her used to going to bed.  I used shh - tummy rub in her bassinet.  I also swaddled but used either a huge swaddle blanket or a swaddle me wrap. 

Wrt swadling, it's developmental that she's going to move around.  You might want to wean the swaddle or get a swaddle wrap (lots of moms like the woombie).  This way, she won't break free. 

Feeding at 2 am seems very reasonable at this age.  You can expect most babies to need one or two feeds during the night so I would feed and put down and let her settle on her own.  Go to her though if she starts crying (not mantra crying but a real "I need you" cry).