Help needed! Confused with Shush-pat and using a dummy

[kentmom29]

Hi

We're just starting out using shush-pat to get ds2 to sleep longer stretches at night mostly but also to help his naps. He's been on EASY since day 1 as a basic routine of never feeding to sleep, and keeping him up for the appropriate A time. We've used a dummy from early on, as Tracy suggests as he was initially feeding every hour at night so we tried the dummy as a replacement for me! I always thought he settled pretty well, we could just put him in his cot awake and sleepy and he would settle to sleep, with his dummy in. I guess the issue is when he stirs without the dummy in that's when he wakes.

He has never slept a long stretch at night, he wakes at dreamfeed time, and then at best every 3 hours through the night, at worst every hour. The complication is that we struggle with feeding as he has some reflux issues, so I've been reluctant to withhold any feeds at night as he needs to feed little and often, but over the last couple of weeks, after a feed at 10/11pm, and a 2 further feeds during the night he is never hungry for his feed at 7am. So we want to push him to take the dreamfeed and just one other feed during the night by using shush/pat. Does that sound like a good plan?

What we now do with the dummy? We successfully did shush/pat with DS1 and continued to use a dummy until he was about 18 months, just for naps, as it worked well for him and he gave it up with no issues. Also for DS2 the dummy is useful during the day when he's suffering with Colic/reflux issues.

Do we have to get rid of the dummy altogether as it's confusing for him to have it sometimes but not at night anymore when we're settling him with shush/pat?

Thank you so much for any advice...

[jessmum46]

Am I right in thinking your aim in using shh pat is to get rid of the dummy?  Just wasn't quite clear from your post   if you're using it to get rid of a feed rather than the dummy though I'd hold onto the dummy for now, as otherwise you'll be struggling to tell if he can't settle because he's hungry, or because he's missing the dummy.  How old is he?  I'm not always super-keen on advising people to wean night feeds in the early months as growth spurts come and go and often feeds go away and then return for a while until solids are well-established.  It's not a problem though if you think the issue isn't hunger to try a dummy instead, then if he wakes again in a short time (often 15-20 mins) hunger may actually be the answer and you can feed.

From the reflux point of view any chance that's what is causing the frequent wakings?  May be another reason if so to hold onto the dummy...

To answer the confusion question though - no I think it's ok for there to be different rules at night vs in the day, for example some babies may sleep all their naps in a pram but at night happily sleep in bed.  At the end of the day it is really up to you

[kentmom29]

Hi thanks for replying to me. No, the reason we're trying shh/pat is to resettle him at night, and when he wakes after 45 minutes at naptime. I do want to keep the dummy at the moment, so what I'm not clear on is how we use shh/pat and the dummy? Once we've settled him with shh/pat do we then give him the dummy? He doesn't wake when the dummy falls out so I know that's not an issue.

He's 15 weeks tomorrow, so I know what you're saying about weaning a night feed already, but my thinking was that because when he feeds twice at night plus the dreamfeed he then won't feed at all when he wakes at 6/7am.

In case it helps this is his usual routine;

7am wake  - only feeds if he's not fed at 5am
8.30 S in carseat to/from DS1 preschool
10am E
11.30am S in carseat collecting DS1 from preschool
1pm E
2.30pm S in cot in his room
4pm E
5.30pm - 20 minute catnap in chair or cuddling on the sofa
6pm E
6.15pm - bath
6.45pm - E and bedtime, asleep by 7
10.30 DF bottle from DH, at best he takes 120ml, more often than not only about 80ml

After he goes down at 7pm he will wake at least 2/3 times, sometimes more. We used to try just using the dummy but that doesn't work for long, at times I have resorted to feeding him worried that it was hunger. Since using shh/pat things have improved and he only wakes perhaps once before 10pm. He will then quite often wake between 12-1am, we've starting using shh/pat to get him to 2am before feeding. He then will wake sometimes only an hour later, but whenever he wakes now we shh/pat until 6am at least and then feed him.

Do you think shh/pat is the best option to get him more settled overnight? Sometimes I'm up every hour, and with DS1 being an energetic 2 and a half year old i'm really starting to struggle coping during the day after the accumulation of over 3 months of hardly any sleep at night. What we're assuming is the issue is him not being able to self settle during the night, through his sleep cycles, do you think that's a good assumption? (His reflux has really settled down over the last 3/4 days which i'm hoping continues, unfortunately it's not helped his sleeping much!)

Thanks again

 

[jessmum46]

No if you're keeping the dummy, just shh pat with it in

His EASY looks great.  I wonder though if he may need just a tad more awake time now to sleep a bit more soundly at night?  By 4 months/17 weeks some babies can quite easily handle a 2h awake time and need to be on 3 naps/2 long naps plus a catnap.  I certainly found around 15/16 weeks having 4 naps made the nights worse.  Perhaps something to consider?

The other thing is reflux......frequent waking can be due to pain even if he isn't actually bringing much milk up.  Have you for example got his crib on an incline?

[kentmom29]

Great! Thanks for clarifying about the dummy. What i'm not sure about is that when he wakes in the night, putting the dummy in instantly stops him crying, so we don't really need to shh pat, but then he can be awake again 20 minutes later? Is the dummy causing the issue? It's confusing because at other times, both day and night, the dummy will drop out after he's fallen asleep and he doesn't wake up for hours?

We've actually had a big break through in the last 3 nights, he's not waking before the dream feed, and he's then going until at least 2/3am until next feed without any settling, and then through to 6am! I can't tell you the relief after nearly 4 months of being up every 1/2 hours at night!

I think extending the A time has definitely helped, and seems so obvious as soon as you said it! He can't quite handle 2 hours, so we've gone for 1.45, he's still waking after 45 mins during naps and sometimes I can resettle him, other times not, so we have to do some adapting! It just so hard being on the go taking DS1 to and from pre-school etc he's in and out of the car or the buggy all day.

His reflux has also improved in the last week/10 days so perhaps that's also helped with the nights as you suggest, we did have the crib inclined but he seems to be coping much better.

The other thing i'm not sure about is the 6am feed, he empties one side and then falls back to sleep. Should I be starting his day at 6am, or allow him back to sleep? I have let him stay asleep the last 3 mornings after that feed and he's then woken at 7.15/30 which works quite well for our routine of being out of the door at 9am for DS1 pre-school run. But he won't feed again after 6am until about 8.30am which I think affects his feeds and naps for the rest of the day, should I try shh pat at 6am to get him to 7am to feed and start his day then?

Thanks again for your help, this forum is such an amazing resource, I use it endlessly as every post get such great replies and advice. Thank you for helping me!

[jessmum46]

How's it going?

At this age if he wakes again at night 20 mins after a dummy replug I'd be inclined to feed.  Though it sounds like things are going fairly well if you are just getting one wake now between DF and 6am

With A time I would slowly extend just a touch more if you are getting a lot of 45 min wakeups.  He may be tired but just not quite tired enough to transition. I'd slowly work towards 2h over a week or two and see how that goes. 

For now personally I would just go with feeding at 6am and just have an AES pattern if you need to for the rest of the day.  That feed will likely push out closer to morning given time or you can encourage it to do so when he's a bit older x

[kentmom29]

We're not doing very well at all unfortunately, it feels like 1 step forward and 3 back. Last night he was awake every hour 

He's just so inconsistent, some nights he'll go from his dreamfeed to 3am and other nights he wakes at 12.30/1.30 and I feed him when he wakes around 2am. Last night he then wanted to feed again at 4am and then slept until 7am. I feel so demoralised that I must be getting something really wrong.

We've pushed the A time to 2 hours, and yesterday we had 2 two hour naps without any waking, but this morning back to 40 minutes and not being able to be resettled.

My gut feeling is that hunger is behind all of this becausw there's no pattern to it? I feel as though his nights just won't get better until we starting weaning? During the day when he feeds it's always super quick, 2/3 minutes each side, as he only feeds after the initial letdown. He always feeds for longer at night when he's sleepy, but I don't want to fall into the trap of feeding him to sleep during the day. I'm also worried about him snacking, so I did consider feeding as soon as he wakes from a nap and then feeding again just before his nap time but not in his room, so he's awake when I put him down. But then I worry if he only sleeps 45 minutes when do I feed again after that?

I also wanted to try topping up with a bottle after i've BF him, but I can't express enough, and all of a sudden after 3 months of happily drinking formula 2/3 times a week for his DF he now won't accept it at all, which means I can't even go to bed early and leave DH to feed him :-( I feel it's a bit of an unsustainable cycle...

Thanks again for any advice x

[jessmum46]

(((hugs))) you're doing nothing wrong, these little ones aren't robots and unsettled nights are normal at this age   there's a big developmental leap around 15-17 weeks which often plays total havoc with sleep - have a look for '4 month sleep regression' and the Wonder Weeks for a bit more information about it.  If you think it is hunger at this age I would treat it as such - once LO is a bit older and in a more settled pattern of feeds and solids it may well be easier to tell which night wakings are for hunger and which for something else xx