Need help with dreamfeed!

[becky1969]

We've been trying to add a dreamfeed for our 3.5 week old. However, whenever we do it, he is really fussy and hard to get back to sleep again. Last night it took my DH 2 hours! Normally he is not fussy at all, so we're not sure what we're doing wrong.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Noelle]

Hello!

Sometimes it can take up to a week to implement...if you can't get him to take it within 5-10 minutes I would put him back down right away.  If you find after about a week of tyring, that it's just not working I would then concentrate on the clusterfeeding instead.  HTH and let us know if you have any more questions.

....and oh...maybe you can tell us "how" you are doing the dreamfeed?  Maybe something will stick out at us

[Mariek]

Hi Becky

The first thing that struck me is that you're saying he's hard to get back to sleep afterwards? Are you waking him for this feed?

The idea of the dream feed is actually to feed them when they're asleep - so you get the calories in them without disturbing them. The theory behind it is that sucking is a reflex action in babies so they will do it automatically in their sleep.

It can be hard to get the hang of not waking them, you just need to make sure you do everything at a slow pace and keep the room dimly lit. When you're starting the feed if you stroke the cheek nearest to you this will stimulate the rooting reflex so he'll open his mouth and you can pop the bottle in. He should strike up sucking automatically. If he stops sucking then try stroking the palm of his hand or rotating the bottle to get him to strike up again. He probably won't need winding unless he's a particularly windy baby as they swallow much less wind when they're asleep because they're more relaxed.

If he's waking before this feed is due then try giving him the feed before the time he usually wakes without waking him.

HTH

love

[becky1969]

Thank you! I think our mistake is that by the time we are doing the dreamfeed, he is stirring a little bit (tho not totally waking up). He then wakes up during the bottle and is difficult to soothe back to sleep.

The other problem is my DH is doing this feed, so I don't think he's as careful about not waking up the baby. He's trying to be helpful by doing the 11 pm feed so that I can get a long period of sleep (8 pm to 4 am), but I always end up waking up because DS starts crying really hard while DH is trying to do this feed! I think I'll volunteer to do the feed tonight and see if I can't make it a TRUE dream feed.

Thank you!

[Noelle]

My kiddos always stirred a little bit and sometimes woke up too, but the feeding always put them back to sleep for the most part.  What time does your ds go to bed?  Maybe try doing the dreamfeed 1/2 hr earlier...maybe he'll be in a deeper sleep?  Just a thought