4 month - need help with routine please to aid cluster feed

[Lovejoy]

hiya all

my dd normally eats every 3 hours, although it can be less ( i confess when she is crying and she's not tired and i don't nkow what the reason is, i offer my boob)
anyway we wake up between 7.30-8am and i give her a feed and she is sleeping between 8-9pm (there are sleep issues and we've slowly brought her bedtime from 10pm to 8-9pm, hopefully soon we get to 7pm)  I'm attempting the df this week, 2 nights it's not worked but i will persevere for a week.
Basically i need some assistance with times, ideally IF this was my routine how should i be clustering her to tank her up, ie what times? How often?

E7.30
E10.30
E13.30
E16.30
E19.15pm
DF10.30pm

Much appreciated

PS forgot to add if i'm df with breast, how long do i actually need to feed her?  (normally in the day she feeds 10 mins max per feed)

[Samuel's mum]

With the df length, I would go as long as you can. A lot of babies end up being so fast asleep that in the end they aren't actually taking any more. I think go until you fall out!
With the schedule you could try and bring the final feed a bit closer to her going down. If she's sometimes not sleeping until 9pm then 7.15 to 9 is quite a gap. The A could be a short song or story as long as you have some break between feeding and sleeping. You could try 16.30, 18.30, 19.45 (or later if bedtime is later). Good luck but cluster feeding doesn't work for everyone. Some bf babies just aren't interested but I would at least recommend bringing the final one later.

[First Time Mom]

Hi Lovejoy, according to one of Tracey's books, she says not to cluster feed after 8 weeks but to continue w/ df. I just found this out yesterday as I picked up the "solves all problems" book. My dd is close to yours in age and she goes to bed at 6:30, I was waking her at 8 and again at 10 to feed but found she didn't take much at 8. I now let her "wake naturally" and her time is around 9 for her feed, I no longer do a df so dd feeds a total of 6 times in a 24 hr period (that's w/ one night wake). Once you move your lo's bedtime up earlier (say 6:30-7:30ish) you'll find she may wake on her own for a feed 8-10ish. I found df went well at first (dd is bf'd) though sometimes she would be in such a heavy sleep she wouldn't take much, so that's when I started waking her (I know it's terrible, but I wanted her to eat and she did go right back down). Now I don't wake or df her. Not sure how many times your dd night wakes for feeds but you may not need a df?

[daisymelan]

All I would like to add is that some babies never make it to a 4 hour EASY.  I personally just watched my los cues and followed him and eventually he spaced himself out to 4 hours.  Just watch your lo.

Good luck