4 hourly routine, too early??

[Dips05]

Hi there,

I have recently moved my LO onto 4 hourly feeding. She is 11weeks, has recently been confirmed as having reflux so on anti-reflux milk and at her last weigh in earlier this week was 10lb 3oz.  Before moving onto 4hrly feeding she was taking 5oz every 3 hours. I initially went to 6oz every 4 hours but the total in the day was equivalent to 5oz 3hrly. I spoke to the HV who said it would make sense to offer 7oz 4 hourly so this is what we are taking now.

Prior to these changes my little one was finishing dream feeds at 11pm and waking at 6am to 6.30am but has now decided to not finish dream feeds (so sleepy its a struggle to get her to drink full amount) and is waking closer to 5am (which I know is great).  I usually try and make bedtime 7pm but when she wakes at this time I'm really confused by what to do as when counting 4houtly we end up at 5pm and then 9pm.

Can anyone share what they would normally do? I.e. Would you treat 9pm as bedtime? I also wondered if I'd moved onto 4hourly too soon?

Any advice greatly appreciated!!
Thanks,
Pardeep xx

[Lolly]

My refluxers moved to 4 hourly feeds earlier than 4 months as they just weren't hungry before 4 hours. I's fine and fairly common for formula fed babies but you do need to tweak the EASY a bit until their A time catches up.

If she is comfortable taking the bigger bottles less often then I would stick to it, but if she shows signs of being uncomfortable or refluxing more go back to smaller feeds. I stuck to the 7pm bedtime as much as possible, if they woke before 6am I treated it like a nightfeed and tried to resettle. You could just offer a small bottle at 5am and see if you can resettle until 7am (or whatever time you ant morning to be) and offer another feed then to start the day.

I wouldn't have 9pm as a bedtime, like the morning you can offer a smaller feed at the last feed before the bedtime bottle so she is hungry at bedtime. Do you do bath then bottle and bed?

Laura

[Dips05]

She seems comfortable so far with the bigger bottle every 4 hours.  On a couple of occasions when she has woke before 6am I have given her a small amount to see her through which seemed to work but wasn't sure if that was the right thing to do. We tend to start bedtime routine at around 6.30pm which does include bathtime and feed for about 7pm.

Any suggestions on how to tweak the EASY? My LO does seem to stay awake longer already..

Thanks for the reply!!
Pardeep xx

[Lolly]

What's your whole day like now? Can you post an EASY for me?

My DD was a lower sleep needs/ higher A times baby and she was pretty much on 4 hours by 12 weeks and had dropped the catnap before she hit 5 months. It worked for us!

I think the main tweaks are just to watch that you don't feed to sleep. If their A times aren't up to it then you will get some E times right after an A time in the day. I would try longer A times, you can add on 5/10 mins and hold for a few days, if all ok and she's not getting OT then move it again. Providing she is napping well keep the A times, scale it back a bit if it's a shot nap.

Laura