E.A.S.Y for 4 month old - help with adjusting schedule

[SanFranciscoMama622]

Hi everyone,
Would love some guidance on adjusting the feeding schedule for my little guy. He will be 4 months old tomorrow. After re-reading the BW, I realized that his night wakings (2 feedings per night typically; now up to 3-4) and short naps (30-45 minutes) *may* be due to the fact that he is eating too frequently.  He is EBF and I always feed him when he wakes up, which means that he often eats every 2-2.5 hours after a short nap. Part of the reason why I'm focusing on the feeding is that I've noticed that he hasn't been eating as over the past few weeks - shorter time on the boob, less interested overall. So, would love some tips for how to go about increasing the time between feeds. My hope is that fewer feeds will make him hungrier and eat better overall. The BW gives a way to implement a 4 hour schedule, but it involves PUPD after short naps and I'm really stuck there. I have NEVER been able to extend short naps. My little guy just escalates his cries after I pick him up until I break down and carry on with the day (meaning that I feed him). Also, it seems like a big jump to go from eating every 2-3 hours to eating every 4 hours. I'm wondering if I should start by making sure that he eats every 3 hours and then gradually increasing the time over the month? Any advice is welcome! (Also, if anyone has advice for increasing a short nap, I am all ears!!) Thanks in advance!!

[Sarah8019]

Hi,

My DS is almost 17 weeks old and up until 12 weeks was also a catnapper, usually 30 minutes on the dot.  I found it impossible to maintain even a 3hr easy with such a short nap.  It may be that adjusting your routine will sort out the short nap problem ( fingers crossed )but if it doesn't then I would look to try and extend naps some how as I think it would be difficult to extend the time between the "E" without addressing the problems with the "S". We did use pu/pd to extend DS naps and it has been successful.  I note that you say you have not had success with this method and I just thought I'd mention that it took us 7 days of consistent pu/ pd before we saw a nap longer than 45 minutes.  To begin with nap times went like this, DS goes to sleep, wake up after 30 minutes, we then do pu/pd, DS screams throughout pu/pd for the remainder of the nap time until the next feed . BUT eventually he learnt that nap time meant being in his crib for at least 1hr 30 minutes and even though he would wake up after 30-45 minutes we were able to resettle for a further 30-45 min nap.  Not ideal but I figured two cat naps were better than one and it would mean that I could maintain a good easy routine. He will now sleep for a solid hour and half most of the time and if I do have to resettle at the halfway mark it is minimal.  If that method is really not for you I have seen other people on this board mention using wake to sleep to extend naps but I have not tried this myself, or if you absolutely cannot resettle could you get him up for half and hour or so then put him back down for another nap so it would be more like an E A S A S?

With regards to increasing the time between feeds I would definitely try to increase it gradually and I would have thought that at four months he would easily be able to go 3hrs.  The thing with a 4 hr routine is that not only do they need to be able to go 4hrs between feeds they also need to be able to stay awake for around 2hrs between naps.  My DS is still on a 3.5hr easy at 4 months, whilst he is able to go 4 hrs between feeds he can't make a 2 hr wake time yet so a 4 hr routine would be too difficult to maintain at this point. 

We are still struggling with NW ourselves at the moment so I can't be of much help there, DS night sleep is all over the place and changes every 2-3 days, is suspect it is just his age and the dreaded four month sleep regression that I keep hearing about!  Hope some of this helps 

[jessmum46]

Some great advice there from Sarah!

I agree he's showing signs he needs to go longer between feeds now.  What I would suggest is if you would normally feed at say 2.5h, next feed just distract him or put it off for an extra 15 mins.  No more, this isn't about doing huge jumps or starving him, just aim to get to 2.75h before you feed.  Once you've done it, you know he can!  So then if you do one or two feeds like that, next time just add another 15 mins and you're already at 3h!  I was surprised when I did this that often LO would be totally happy for way longer than I expected, and it took really no time at all to get to 4h.  Sarah's completely right that not all EBF babies will manage 4h but see how far you get with this way of extending the time - he may just surprise you!

In terms of routine, with short naps you have two choices: try to resettle and extend, or just go with it.  Pick the option that causes YOU least stress . If you choose to go with short naps for now, I would focus on keeping the feeds well-spaced and then just do more naps in a day.  You'll need to have an EASAS or AEAS pattern at certain times as Sarah suggested - just try to plan ahead as much as you can to avoid eat/sleep clashes.

If you decide to go with PUPD, it can be very effective but only if used in conjunction with an age-appropriate routine.  If the A times are wrong, no amount of PUPD will send LO back off to sleep again.  It's also important you do it in an age-appropriate way - How to PU/PD (inc age adaptations) - and at 4 months that will be primarily shh pat and soothing in the crib. 

Did you want to post a recent or typical day to see if we can make any suggestions?