when does baby get over "developmental" wakings

[micah'smom]

hi everyone

my ds is 4mo. he was always a great night sleeper - consistently fell asleep at 8pm, woke at 3-4 to BF, then up for the day at 7am.

but these days he's been learning how to roll, and so he's waking almost every 2-3 hours. also i tried feeding him a little rice cereal (diluted) but i think he's reacting to it b/c it sounds like he has gas too.

agh! feels like i have a newborn again. when can i expect him to learn to sleep through the night again?

thx
selena

[lil'monkey]

Sorry to say this but as long as there are new skills being mastered, teething, illnesses, etc.  you can expect those night wakings to appear again.  One suggestion that's been given to me is to be consistent and patient when dealing with these wakings. 

Just like Tracy says, once you thought everything is back on track, something comes along and messes it up!   :roll:

[Nikki~Nathan&Danielle]

Yep, they come and they go.  We still have developmental night wakings with our over two year old - teething, talking, going to daycare etc.  All new things can cause wakings for somem kids for a week or two, you get back on track until the next thing.

[zelkad]

I know this isn't your main concern, but I just had a thought about the rice cereal...our little one could not tolerate it at all!!  When we switched to oatmeal things were so much better.  It's funny because rice is supposed to be easiest to digest yet many moms I've talked to says it creates horrible gas!

[micah'smom]

you know, i was wondering if the rice cereal has something to do with it too. so switching to oatmeal is ok? why do they rec to start with rice cereal first then??

i think he's waking b.c of hunger too. i bf'd twice last night and he was gulping. he's 4.5 mo - should i go back to 3hr easy or just try to get solids in him?

thanks!

[zelkad]

From what my doctor said, any one of the single grains are ok to start with (rice is more often preferred).  We began with oatmeal and we still use it along with his veggies/fruit now.

Our little guy (now 6 months) was waking at three months once or twice to bf.  He was quite big for his age and would take full feeds.  (We did not introduce cereal until I think 4.5 months) My doctor told me to let him cio because he technically had enough body fat to sustain him.  I did not like this idea at all so i tried something diffeent that I read about and it worked ever since then.

Over several days I gradually weaned him off his night feedings.  The first night I would let him nurse for let's say 7 minutes and then I would take him off.  He was not happy but I would hold him until he calmed down.  he cried for about 3 minutes which felt more like 30.  He then went to sleep.  The next night I let him nurse for 6 minutes and did the same.  The following for 3 or 4 minutes and I think the fourth night he never woke up.  It's recommended to do this over 7 days...it worked for us but we could have just been lucky.  And if you bottle feed, you're supposed to remove one ounce a night.

I know you're saying he seems exceptionally hungry but like I said our little one was the same and he was just used to waking to eat and was learning to be hungry at those times.  At least that's what our doctor said..then again, he recommended the cio method!

Not that I'm an expert, but I don't think you should go back to 3 hr easy because you'd just be going backwards.  As for solids I don't know..we started at 4 1/2 months because breastmilk was not longer enough to sustain him but many people do start earlier!

Hope this helps!
Zelka

[Aarismom]

zelkad--I believe the term of what you did is called "fading". You gradually "wean" the baby off of something slowly by taking something away every few nights. Kind of like the "move the chair out of the room" procedure to get your lo to get use to going to sleep without your presence in the room. This usually works pretty well from what I've read, but takes patience. Frankly though, if you have patience enough for PU/PD and/or pat/shh, than you have enough patience for that procedure

*HUGS*
Sonya =P