I would love anyones opinion on how I can help my son to sleep more at night.
He is 9 weeks old and exclusively breastfed. Overnight he feeds 2-3 hourly and he is generally unsettled from 430am until we get up. It is really starting to take it’s toll on me. I’m so exhausted I can barely function. I know I’m not much good to my son or anyone else if I’m this tired but I am really at a loss as to what to do.
I know that BW says babies should feed 3-4 hourly but he can barely make 3 hours. I have tried to use the dummy to push his feeds out overnight but that doesn’t settle him. Before starting BW (it’s been 3 days) I would just feed him before he woke fully so he went back to sleep easily. Maybe I’ve created bad habits?
He usually has about 10 feeds during the day, full feeds too. He finishes both side during the day (only one side at night) and I try to make sure he completely drains it so he gets the hindmilk.
During the day he sleeps in his bassinette in his room. He is a catnapper generally. He struggles to roll over into the next sleep cycle. Sshh/pat doesn’t seem to do too much. The dummy helps him to fall asleep. If it falls out when he is asleep, he is fine. If he loses it before he is fully asleep he will cry.
At night he is next to our bed in his bassinette.
Is there any way I can stretch out his night feeds?
Should I let him fully wake up during the night to see if he’s really hungry?
Here’s our EASY for yesterday.
6:25 – Wake and E (I was aiming for 7am but what can you do?)
6:45 – A
7:30 – E (4 mins)
7:45 – S (45 mins, 35 minutes of shh/pat, another 45 mins sleep)
10:00 –Wake and E
10:15 - A
11:30 –S (2 hours 25 min – this NEVER happens! – No resettling required)
2:00 – Wake and E
2:20 – A
3:30 – S (50 mins)
4:20 – Wake and E
4:45 – A
6:00 – S (10 mins broken, very unsettled)
6:20 – Wake and E
7:00pm – S (He went down really easily)
9:50 – E
12:45 – E
2:45 – E
4:30 – Grunting and unsettled, tried dummy to push out feeding.
5:45 – Unable to resettle, Fed and up for the day.
Thank you so much for your help. I need it. :/