Normal Behavior or Sleep Crutch

[albers30]

Here is my concern.  My little girl just turned 4 months and has moved from her basinet to her crib.  She has been a pretty good sleeper since only a few weeks old sleeping a 6 or so hour stretch at the start of the night then just one other waking around 5 am to feed.  She goes to bed around 8 wakes around 2 or 3 and then 5 am, up for the day around 7am was her typical schedule before.  For the past week or so (starting before transition to crib) she started waking around midnight for a feed then again at 3 and 5.   She is very vocal about needing to eat and is impossible to settle when hungry and generally takes a fairly large feed at midnight and often 3 am and a smaller feed at 5.  She is pretty good at settling herself to sleep by herself for with a little shushing and/or patting by me however, this has not worked at any of the these waking times without a full feed first.  My first thought was this was just the 4 month sleep regression and/or growth spurt but its been going on a week now so I just wanted to get some input to make sure that we're not feeding into a sleep crutch of needing a bottle (she developed a preference for the bottle when I returned to work a few months ago so she nurses very little and receives pumped breastmilk or formula from a bottle most of the time) and a full tummy to sleep.  She does have a bottle before bed but generally settles in bed on her own or with a little help from me but doesn't get a bottle before naps most of the time and settles with just a little help in her crib then and naps well.  Thoughts?

[lauradj]

It sounds like it could be a growth spurt, especially if her appetite has really increased, which it sounds like it has. I wouldn't stress about it too much at the moment but if it carries on for another week, we should revisit it. You could also try sneaking in an extra ounce at each bottle during the day and see if that helps at all.