Waking up at night at 7 months old

[Daniel's mom]

Hi!, my ds is 7 months old. He has being in an EASY routine since he was born. This has work great for us. I guess he is an angel/textbook baby, because he adapts very easy to everything. He has not waked up at night since he was 3-4 months. And when he did, he could easily fall asleep on his own. But recently, the last 3-4 days, he has starting to wake up during the night, either at 8.30pm, 11 pm or later. I dont know if it is because he is teethiing or because he is hungry. His routine is as follows:

7 am             Feed. Bottle (between 5-6 oz)
7.15-8.30am  Activity time. The activity time varies each time, either reading books, singing, playing on his own on the floor or on the chair. It all depends on his "mood". If he gets bored, I changed the activity and position, etc.
8.30 am        Fruit. Around 50 gms
8.50 am        Sleep
11 am          Feed. Bottle (5-6 oz)
11.15-12.30  Activity time (as above)
12.30           Food: vegetables, fish, chicken or soup. Around 50 gms
12.50           Sleep. Here it varies, can sleep only one hour or two.
If we wakes up at 14, then is activity time and eat at 15.  If he wakes up at 15, then
15.00          Feed. Bottle (5-6 oz)
15.15-16.30  Activity time
17.00          Cat-nap. 45 minutes. Sometimes, however, he doesn't want to sleep at all
18.00          Bath, activity time
19.00          Feed, bottle. (5-6 oz. Sometimes less)
19.30          Bed time

And usually he sleeps with no problem instantly. Some times he talks and takes him some time before falling asleep, but we know he will eventually fall asleep with no problem. And he used to wake up until next day at 7 am. If he waked up before, usually was just fussing or manta cry, so he fell asleep on his own after a few minutes. When he woke up some times at 6.30 am, he would talk to himself, and wait until we came for him around 7 am. And when we did, he would give us a HUGE smile. And we stopped using the pacifier since he was 5 months old. He preferred sucking his tummy instead.
So, as you can see, he was just in a great routine! But suddenly, this last 3-4 days, he has being waking up 2-3 times at night. Before yesterday, we wake up very often, crying. It took a while before he managed to fall asleep. Yesterday, he woke up at 11.30pm, and took me ONE hour before I decided to give him the bottle (he did not eat very well that day. AT 7pm he did not want his bottle, so he ate at 8.30 4 oz and back to bed (my mother in law took care of him that short evening at our house). So after trying to make him asleep for one hour, I thought he could be hungry. He ate 4 oz and fell asleep right away. He woke up again at 2.30 am, crying, but it took me just a few minutes before he fell asleep again, and then until 7 am, as usual.
During the day he behaves beautiful, smiles and plays the whole time. However, sometimes he doesn’t want to eat al the 6-7 oz at 7 pm, or he doesn’t drink at all his dream feed (we are working in cutting the dream feed, as suggested by T.H.)
I don’t know if it is because he is hungry, or because he is teething, or any milestone, or overtired? I don’t want to do any accidental parenting. We worked very hard in not doing anything like that before, so I don’t want to start now!

Please help! Is this suddenly night waking a normal behavior???

[PaolaG]

I am no expert on this, especialy as I have an (almost) 8 month old going through night wakings at the moment.  But looking at your routine, I wonder whether you could introduce a late afternoon meal.  From about 7 months, Lea started eating at between 5.30 and 6pm as well as breakfast and lunch, and it is the time of day when she often eats the most.

Apart from that, I think night wakings are usually about teething or moving around.  Again, as Lea has become more mobile, she wakes more at night, trying to sit or pull herself up on the cot bars, and I think this started from about 7.5 months.

good luck with it

Paola

[teezee]

i think it is a combination of too little food (my lo was on 3 meals/day at 7 months) and getting way too much daytime sleep.  at about 6-8 months lo's usually outgrow the catnap and will start to refuse it (which your lo is). and it does seem that his naps are fairly long as well.  again, i would try introducing more solids (slowly work up as you don't want it to affect formula intake at all), 1 meal at a time.  also, unless lo REALLY needs the catnap i would forgo it completely.  if that doesn't solve all the wakings, you may want to shorten the morning one a little and see if that helps.  i think you could also play with and extend A times a bit.

[Daniel's mom]

Thanks for your advices. In fact he was eating more than 50 gms on solids, but then he refused to take the bottle. And at this age, I just thought it was more important for him to take a good intake of milk than solids. But honestly, I am not sure about it. I usually gave him at 4.30pm baby cereal (fortified with iron, which they are supposed to need after 6 months age) with fruit. He could eat a lot, and then refused to take his bottle at 7 pm. That is why I wonder if he is hungry and therefore waking up at night. He also sometimes complains because his teething.
Uff, it is definitively not an easy period now!
And he has never take more than 7 oz per feed. Besides, it is supposed that when we introduced solids, we should reduce the same amount on his milks...So if he drinks 5 oz and eat 2 oz solids, I guess it should be ok...
As you can see, I am just wondering all the time.
However, today in the afternoon I realized he is starting with a flu, since he had running nose...Maybe he was not feeling well and that is why he is waking up at night?

[Daniel's mom]

I just checked the routine I wrote, and I realized I forgot to write that at 4.30pm he eats ceral with fruit. So he eats 3 meals a day, plus his bottles (4 a day, if I am lucky, and sometimes his dream feed, which we are trying to cut).

[teezee]

at a little over 7 months i cut out the df as it was causing so many night wakings! tracy suggests that approx 7 months is the time that it will start inhibiting good sleep rather than contributing to it.  it could very well be illness that is causing the wakings also, i know when i don't feel good, i don't sleep well either. good luck - hope lo is feeling better very soon - and keep me updated!