Author Topic: 3 month old - which step to start with?  (Read 987 times)

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Offline WestonJames

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3 month old - which step to start with?
« on: October 12, 2014, 19:59:25 pm »
My son is 3 months old. He was born 5 weeks early but seems to have caught up very quickly. He's 13 lbs already! Once our Dr. Said it was ok to stop the wake to feed every 2-3hr thing we've tried to start sleep training. Here is our schedule right now.
Day time eats every 3 hrs - 4oz
Morning nap-45 min typically - then cat naps here and there until a longer afternoon nap lasting between
1-2 hrs.
Nighttime is our issue more so then daytime. It take us over an hour to get him down.
We have to start our night time routine around 7p or he gets pretty upset
Eats-7p
Asleep by 8-8:30. ( with lots of help... Rocking , swaying, you name it)
Eats- between 1am-2am
Eats-5am
Eats between 7a-8a
I need help getting him down and cutting out the 2am feeding.
In the book it gives the 4 S's and the dream feed as things to try. Should  we incorporate them at the same time? Or just try one?
We are also transitioning from the rock and sleep to the crib. He has been in his own room since 7weeks but not in a crib.
Too much at once?
Any help would be great. Thank you

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 3 month old - which step to start with?
« Reply #1 on: October 13, 2014, 11:11:53 am »
Hi and welcome :)

Shh pat is a great technique for starting to teach self-settling - Teaching Sleep to Newborns and Young Infants The 4S is a good example of a predictable wind down for sleeping that tells LO that sleep is coming, so yes I would definitely use something like that. You can adapt it to suit you, it doesn't have to be exactly as described. For example our nap winddown is into room, into sleeping bag, cuddle and sing twinkle twinkle then put down in crib.

I've never personally done a dreamfeed but yes you could definitely introduce one if you want to. It might push out the 2am feeding later although for some babies it can disturb their sleep rhythms a little and cause more wakings - just something to bear in mind.  You don't mention if your LO is breast or bottle fed but either way, going from 7pm feed to 1/2am and then 5am is fantastic for this age!  Two or even three feeds overnight would be totally normal so you may alternatively just see what happens if you let LO wake naturally. I know it's exhausting, I'm up for two feeds a night with my 19 week old but STTN is not a one-way street or even the norm at this age. In fact the technical definition is only a stretch of 5h which your LO is easily doing :) but I guess there a chance that a DF may push the night feed to closer to 3/4am then LO will probably make it to morning without another feed. The only way to know is to try!

The other thing which may help with your evenings is trying as best you can to avoid overtiredness by keeping A times short and appropriate to your LOs age.  It's a bit tricky with prems sometimes, the A time they can handle is often somewhere in the middle of their real and corrected ages.  For reference at 2 months an average A time is 1h15-20 and at 3 months up to 1h30.  If LO is frequently awake longer than that in the day it may well be that overtiredness is what makes him so hard to settle at bedtime and an earlier bedtime may help you. 

Hope that helps to start, let me know if you have more questions :)
« Last Edit: October 13, 2014, 11:15:03 am by jessmum46 »

Offline WestonJames

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Re: 3 month old - which step to start with?
« Reply #2 on: October 15, 2014, 17:57:35 pm »
Thank you so much for your feedback.  We also transitioning him to his crib this week. He's been in a rock n play in his on room but not in the crib so I know that's part ok the night wakes.  The shh pat has worked great for getting him settled at night and naps. I think I'm going to try the dream feed tonight and see how that goes. Thank you again for the feed back.

Offline jessmum46

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Re: 3 month old - which step to start with?
« Reply #3 on: October 16, 2014, 12:28:26 pm »
Hope it went well?