Author Topic: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped  (Read 1937 times)

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Offline Cory'stiredmommy

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Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« on: March 02, 2006, 17:43:16 pm »
Cory wakes many times during the night (4 times between the DF at 11pm and 7am). He is learning to settle himself back to sleep (I tossed out 10 soothers the other day ;D. Around 2:30- 3:30 he gives the hunger cry and I feed him.

I have 2 questions:
1) Is it still considered excessive night awakenings if he settles himself back to sleep within a few minutes?
2) I’ll give him the feed at 2:30-3:30ish and he isn’t very interested in his 7am feed… He falls asleep very quickly after being put on the boob at the 2:30-3:00 feed.
What should I do? Let him go back to sleep? Push the feed?

Points: Cory is 4.5 months old – In between and Angle Baby and Text Book Baby.
Schedule: E = 7am A= 7:45-8:55 S = 9ish – 9:45
        A = 9:45 – 11:00 E = 11:00 – 11:30 A=11:30 – 11:50 S = 12:00 – 2:15
        E = 2:30 A = 3:15 – 4:20 S = 4:20 – 4:45 A = 4:45 – 5:50 E = 6:00
S = 7:00 – 11:00ish Dream Feed: 11:00ish. Middle of the nigh for another    Dream Feed.

Total Sleep: 3hr and 20 minutes
« Last Edit: March 03, 2006, 16:04:25 pm by Cory'stiredmommy »





Offline Katet

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #1 on: March 02, 2006, 22:25:27 pm »
If he self settles without your intervention, then it isn't really a "wakeup"... even though he wakes you up IYKWIM

I think he may be overtired if he falls to sleep on a 7am feed...looks like  gina ford routine to me & I think (as do many others) that her sleep times result in an overtired baby & that makes for a baby who stirs/wakes up more.

Personally I'd suggest 1.5 hours from 9am & 45mins at 4.30pm. 

I think if he can be awake for the 7am feed you may have more luck cutting the 2/3am one.
dc1 July 03, dc2 May 05

Offline Cory'stiredmommy

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #2 on: March 03, 2006, 00:51:26 am »
Thanks Katet!
I should clarify... he is definitely ready to start his day by 7am. Cory is always bright eyed and bushy tailed but he just isn't interested in eating
You are right.. It is Gina Ford. I don't totally stick to the schedule because Cory needs more sleep than what she suggests.
Given that he fully awake and happy at 7am, do you think he still needs more sleep during the day - frequent night wakes? in 24 hrs he is sleeping 15.5hrs.
« Last Edit: March 03, 2006, 00:57:38 am by Cory'stiredmommy »





Offline Cory'stiredmommy

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #3 on: March 03, 2006, 23:24:56 pm »
Thanks Stacy,
I have been putting a lot of thought in to this. I think I am going to change his schedule slightly and give him more sleep during the day and slightly decrease his night time sleep. I find that he is waking a lot between 5:30 and 7am. This suggests to me that he isn't very tired. I want to cluster feed as you suggested but I find that Cory doesn't eat unless he is hungry- around the 4 hour mark. Do you think I could get him in to the habit of Cluster feeding? I would love to increase his calorie intake during daytime hours:-)
As a note, since getting rid of the soother, Cory has been learning how to settle himself back to sleep. I find that he is not waking as much and he is able to settle himself back to sleep during the night. I also am decreasing the middle of the night feed to only 1 boob.
Thanks for your help.
Cory's mom (Sarina)





Offline Cory'stiredmommy

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #4 on: March 03, 2006, 23:54:50 pm »
My communication sucks these days;-) My thought was to have him sleep more during the day and put him down a little later in the evening for the night sleep. This way he gets 5 hours worth of naps between 7am and 6:30pm and then 10 hours during the night. The last 2 hours (hours 11 and 12 between 5am and 7am) always suck. Cory wakes up a lot. I'm thinking he may only need 10 hours in a row.
If you think this may backfire, please let me know.
« Last Edit: March 03, 2006, 23:56:48 pm by Cory'stiredmommy »





Offline Kimberly®

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #5 on: March 04, 2006, 18:21:07 pm »
I have a radical suggestion for you. Drop the dreamfeed. We found that Kayla started waking at 3:304 for about a week ate then wouldn't eat in the morning, she also had a VERY full diaper in the morning, it may be time to drop that feed. When we did the first night she woke at 5 and wanted to eat I fed her she was up at 8 and fed. The next night she woke at 7 and ate, now a month or so later she's down at 7 and sleeps to 7:30-8am and eats.  She was about 5-5.5 months old when we did this. While its recomended that you don't drop the dreamfeed till they're older some don't need it.

When you do your bedtime routine try Bath, story or song, then feed, then into bed. When your LO gets that last feed right before bed it encourages them to sleep longer.

Try to find the magic number for your LO. The magic number is your LO's built in bedtime. 7 actually seems to be a pretty good number so far for you, but you can try 7:30 and see where that gets you. Start your bedtime routine 45min-1hour before bedtime and be consistent. Make sure your LO know what to expect. At 4.5 months its ok to have a night wakeing. Its not uncommon. If he wakes try doing Pat/Shush or PU/PD to settle first, then feed. Make sure you give the technecs a good go first, you'll know if its a lots cause. Trust yourself. What your goal now needs to be is to have him eat first thing in the morning, so try dropping that dreamfeed and go from there. Once he starts eating in the early AM start increasing his intake slowly at each feed and hopefully he'll get those calories he needs.

I'm assuming you breatfeed? if so how long and one or both sides at each feed?? I think you said you did.
If not sorry, how many OZ? what kind and type of formula?

Kimberly

Offline Cory'stiredmommy

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #6 on: March 04, 2006, 23:59:13 pm »
Stacy and Karita
Cory is 4.5 months. I actually think Cory loves his sleep and gets frustrated, especially at 5:30am when he can’t fall back asleep. Every night, for the past 3 nights (I’ve been writing it down), Cory is waking between 2:30 and 2:40am and 5:15 and 5:30am. I decided not to feed at the 5:30 waking and he continued to fuss until we turned the lights on at 6:45. He didn’t ask for a feed until around 7:15… So I know the 5:30 waking is his internal clock. I don’t think it is an issue of a dirty diaper or too warm. It is too clock work like for either of those scenarios.
I did feed at 2:30am – 13 minutes (down from 20 min 3 night ago) and he fed next at 7:15am – It was a really good feed, something that has become a rarity lately!

At 5:30am he tries to go back to sleep – and gets very frustrated because he can’t seem to be able to. Generally, he can put himself to sleep on his own but not at 5;30 am. I actually can barely help him. Sometimes standing in thebathroom with the fan on works! That is not a habit I am willing to continue:-) Otherwise, Cory's naps at and 7pm sleep is awesome.
I am thinking about the wake to sleep method. I am not totally sure how to do it. Cory sleep besides me after the DF – so it is hard to sneak away;-) Generally, he is a tough kid to wake, though!

I never thought about dropping the dream feed. He does wake around 11pm giving me what I thought was the hunger cry. Is it better to keep the DF and 13 minutes in the night at 2:30 or try to drop the DF and wait until he wakes up on his own and give him a feed if he asks. Last night, who knows if tonight will be the same, we DF at 11pm, he ate at 2:30am and then again a great feed at 7:15am.
As for his schedule, I am now feeding at 7pm (instead of 6pm) to get that feed closer to bed time.
Other facts: I do BF and sometimes he takes both sides and sometimes 1 side. I would like to load up his day time calories but he sure has a way of telling me he has had enough!!!
What are your thoughts?
Thanks, by the way. I am a new mom and don’t have any real support figures around to ask these questions.





Offline Kimberly®

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Re: Lots of night wakening & morning feed skipped
« Reply #7 on: March 05, 2006, 05:01:03 am »
I'd say that if he continues to only wake once then stick with what your doing, if he seems to wake more or his diaper seems to be waking because its so full then drop the dream feed. With Kayla we had to it was the diaper waking her not hunger, it would get bad enough that when she'd pee it would go right through the diaper. We figured that if we dropped the dreamfeed and she wakes at least its neater, for lack of a better way to explain, we just got lucky and she stopped waking. Your LO is still young and one night feed is not unreasonable. It sounds like your making progress.
Kimberly