3 month old - too early to wean night feeds???

[jsorrow24]

I have stopped giving my 13 week ds a bottle when he wakes at night. Reason is he is usually waking at around 5am then up at 7am. If I feed him at 5 then it messes up his morning feed. But last night he woke at 12:30, but more restless it seemed. Then at 2:30 and then at 4am and then slept until 6:45am. But he doesn't want to eat when he first wakes. He usually waits a good 45 min before he will take his bottle. He has been on 4 hours EASY going on 2 weeks now.

Should I feed him if he wakes earlier than 5am? He really wasn't fully awake any of the times he woke last night. I think he might have had some gas...he tooted one of the times he woke up.

Jennifer

[jsorrow24]

I forgot to mention that my ds is over 17lbs too. Don't know if weight makes a difference in his feedings at night.

 

[teezee]

well at three months lo's have a growth spurt so i would suggest if lo is waking at random times 12 or 2am whtever - then feed.  my lo fed at least 1 to 2 times/night until 6 months.  at that age lo's are growing so fast they need all the calories that they can get!

[estherofi20]

I stopped feeding my DS his 4-5ish am feed at 3 months, what i did was try for one night to give him a bottle of water instead, if he is really hungry he will be hungry in 30min or so, if he is not then you can start weaning that night feed! My DS took the first night i did that like 3oz of water, the second he took 1oz, and the third he took nothing at all! And if your LO weight that much, i think its OK (IMHO). And he has been sleeping through the night since then  . I do give him a DF too at 11pm. Hope this helps, and good luck!

[jsorrow24]

I think he might be going through a growth spurt too now, because he has just started doing this the past 2 nights. Other nights he goes until 5am and I just give him the paci for a few minutes to suck on and he sleeps until 7am. If he wakes erratically tonight I will probably feed him.

Thanks for the advice.

Jennifer

[teezee]

you could try getting lo to take more calories during the day to try to deter the night wakings also..

[jsorrow24]

Hey Stacy, remember we were talking about how I thought I wanted to do pu/pd? Well, I figured if it ain't broke don't fix it. My ds goes down so easy after his bedtime routine that I am not even going to think about pu/pd until absolutely necessary. I mean, ds knows that after his bath and lotion massage it is time for bed. If I try to do anything else like lay him down for a minute to go do something or go to a different part of the house, he starts getting fussy. All I have to do is give him his paci and swaddle him and he starts to relax. Again, I do take the paci out before he goes to sleep and I just pat/sssh him to keep him calm. Works like a charm.

Anyway, back to this post. After last night, I really had a feeling he was hungry. But the only time I don't think he wasn't, was when he woke at 12:30am. He had a dreamfeed at 10:15p. But when he woke at 2:30 and 4:30am, I was thinking this morning he may have been hungry.

During the day he is taking around 6 ounces every 4 hours, so in total consuming 30oz  with 5 feeds (that includes dreamfeed). I offered him 7 tonight at his 7p feed and he drank it all. Do you think that 30oz is enough for him? He is 17lbs or more.

I dreamfeed every night especially since we have moved to 4 hour EASY.

Let me know what you think.

[jsorrow24]

Well, the first feed of the day he plays around with. He will drink, but it takes a full 30 minutes. It's like he trying to talk and eat at the same time, lol. I will try offering 7 ounces and see how that does. Usually he would stop at 6 ounces and sometimes 5. If he only takes the 6 or less then I will start feeding him again if he wakes at night again. I had a feeling he wasn't getting enough.

Let me ask you this. If he wakes at 5am, I should feed him right? If he eats a little, should I try to feed when he wakes after 7am? He usually is ready to eat around 7:45am. Do you think he would take a full bottle then? I guess the only way to know is to try it. I know that before he wouldn't take his bottle if he ate at 5am. I will see how he does tonight.

Thanks!

[teezee]

the only thing that i could suggest - if lo is waking a couple hrs after feeding than it's a really good chance that lo is not hungry and i would shh and/or pat back to sleep. i really think (from experience and b/c tracy says so too ) that three months is really too early to start pu/pd as it is way too stimulating for a lo that age.  if lo is waking at around the 3 - 4 hr mark you could try resettling and if it takes a long time and lo keeps crying - probably hunger. if lo does settle at this time but wakes within an hour than feed b/c that would indicate that lo is hungry. hth!

and i would def try putting more oz in the bottles - if lo ate 7 than go for 8 and see how much he will actually eat - if he's not hungry he will turn it away - may be a little waste but worth the chance if he actually takes it imho!

if lo is waking at 5am and then not taking a good feeding in the morning you may want to try extending the feeding by a few minutes every few days til you finally get to the 'wake up' time (very very slowly though for a lo that young!).  have you tried resettling a the 5 am wake up and see where that gets you??

[jsorrow24]

teezee, up until a few days ago he was sleeping until 5am and I would resettle him with a paci and he would sleep until 6:45 or 7am. But the past few days he has woken up several times and I would resettle with paci, but then he would wake up about an hour later. So after that happened I was thinking he was probably hungry and hitting his growth spurt this week instead of at the 12 week mark he is doing this week at 13 weeks and it was just the past few days. I fed him last night and he drank 4 ounces. He also had a little gas that was waking him up, so I went ahead and fed him. Then he woke close to 7am and I waited until 8am to feed and he drank 6 ounces. The other bottles I fixed today have 7. The only reason I fixed 6 this morning is because I usually have a hard time getting him to focus on eating and he usually will only take 6. I will try the 8 ounces.  I will see how he does with 7oz this weekend. He is with my aunt during the week so I really don't know if he takes it all.

When he does wake earlier than 2am or so, I do ssh/pat him back to sleep. And like I said when he was waking at 5am I used to feed him then when I saw it messing up his morning feed, I started giving him the paci and he would go back to sleep for 2 more hours. But I really do think this week is a growth spurt period so I am going to feed him if he wakes earlier than 5am.

Thanks for all the advice...I love this website!! 

Jennifer

[jsorrow24]

Well, my lo is now waking again 2 times a night! First at around 2:30 and then again at 6:30 (not so bad though then). I fed at 3am last night because I am thinking he is going through a growth spurt. So when he wakes up this morning we didn't go in until 7am. I figured he would be hungry...not a chance. So we try again at 7:30...again no. Finally at 8am I feed him and he takes the bottle and then is ready to go back to sleep since of course he has been up since 6:30am. I didn't put him directly down. I burped him and then changed his diaper so he wouldn't associate the bottle with going to sleep. He slept for 1.5 hour but it wasn't time to eat again, so then about an hour before he was supposed to eat again I let him go back down til the next feed. Trying to stay on EASY is not so easy sometimes. But he is such a happy baby.

I just don't know what is going on with the night wakings. He busts out of his swaddle everynight and I think it wakes him more. I am going to try it without tonight. Both naps today I didn't use and he slept very well. And I may try wake to sleep again tonight. It has worked the other times he was waking at 3am on the dot. Also, I think I may be going in to early.

Andy advice??

[brightside]

If your lo is 17lb then I wouldn't think that 30oz is enough. My DS is 16 lb and takes 35-38oz every day. Every baby is different of course but I think he would need more than 30oz. Just as another side  note, my DS also started waking a lot at 3 months. My Health Visitor told me that it is very common at 3 months because they are starting to get more active and can wake themselves up. He did calm down after a couple of weeks and we even managed to get a couple of weeks of solid sleep but now the wakings seem to have started up again! 

[jsorrow24]

Stacy, the feedings are not watered down at night...I only will offer him 4 ounces. Should I water them down? Also, he has begun taking 7 ounces a feed so now he is taking in about 32-35 ounces now a day.

I guess we will just see how tonight goes.

[jsorrow24]

Let me know what you hear....and refer them to my email address here at home. jamby24@earthlink.net

[jsorrow24]

Stacy, one more thing to mention to add to the bottle feeding questions..he will not take more than 7oz at each feed and sometimes only 5oz. I have tried, but I am not going to force him. Usually for the dreamfeed he takes 6oz.

Jennifer

[*Natasha*]

Hi Jennifer,

At this age it is common for babies still to wake once a night for a feed, you will generally find if they wake about the same time every night then it is not out of hunger but habit.
Anyway it sounds like you have increased the amount he is havng during the day which is great. The reason he isn't hungry when he gets up in the morning is he is still full from the night feed. If you want to eliminate this feed try decreasing the amount you give him every few nights by 1oz. So soon he will only be down to 1-2ozs which hopefully he will find is not worth waking for and keep sleeping. When he drops his night bottle you will find he will take all the bottle first thing in the morning.

[jsorrow24]

Natasha, thanks for the advice. I will try tonight. Last night was crazy though. I thought I would try not dreamfeeding just to see what happens. Not such a good idea. He woke at 11:30 anyway, so I fed him. Then he woke at 3am, wasn't sure if I should feed so I put him back to sleep. He slept until around 5am I think. So I asked DH to feed him. I had fixed a water downed bottle and he only took 2 ounces. Then he woke a few minutes after dh put him down and was wide awake at 5:30 so I let him lay in the crib to see if he would put himself back to sleep...no doing. 6am starts crying so I do the thing you shouldn't do and brought him to bed with me. I know wrong, but we had to get up in less than an hour anyways to get ready for work. And on top of all of this, our 3 year old dd does not want to sleep in her bed. She says she can't sleep by herself. So, with her in the bed it was a long night. She was tossing and turning and all of us in a queen size bed. So when I brought Jacob in, my dh and her ended up going to my stepdaughters bedroom to sleep so we could at least get some kind of rest this morning. It was just a lonnnng night.   I am going to post something on the toddler board to see how I can ease my 3 year olds fears to get her back into her bed. It all started when the our ds arrived 3 months ago.

Anway, ds woke up at 8am this morning and did not want to eat so I went ahead and took him to my aunts and we arrived there about 8:45am and he still did not want to eat.

I guess all you can do is roll with the punches and look back on this one day and laugh. 

Wish us luck on getting back on track.

Jennifer

[The Vern]

I have a couple of questions along the same lines.  My 13 wk old dd wakes up at 3 am every night and takes a full feed. She then sleeps until about 7 am (except when she breaks out of her swaddle1), and again takes a full feed.  My question is: so long as a lo still takes full feed at night and in the morning, can one assume that the waking is out of hunger and not habit?  Also, when counting how much formula she takes 'in a day', so I count all feeds, including night feeds?

[jsorrow24]

Well, so you are saying if LO takes morning feed and middle of night feed then they are waking from hunger? Then if that's true, my ds is not hungry when he wakes, he just can't be because I have the hardest time getting him to eat when he wakes. We usually have to wait a good hour before he will take anything. Then by that time he is ready to go back to sleep.

I love this, I really do... I know it's going to get better. 

No wonder there is not an instruction book for babies, they would have to revise daily and make one specifice for each child...lol

[LŠuren]

jsorrow24
My Lo at 3 months was still waking twice a night (with no d/f ) at 2am and 5am at each feed he got 3 or 4 oz, his 7am feed was sometimes slightly less than the rest of the feeds in the day.

DS actually instigated and dropped the 2am feed himself when he was just under 4 months - his 5am feed moved to 4am, so I was only getting up once. The one night feed lasted another month, again he fed him 3 or 4oz before I realise he wasn't hungry anymore i.e. it took 20mins to take 1 oz. After that when he woke out of habit, I put him back to sleep, he then started sleeping through himself.

I strongly believe that LO's should be instigating the drop in night feeds and I say this to any mum/dad who asks me - your baby sounds genuinely hungry and is not able to settle as a result - I remember sittine at the end of my bedding after getting up every 3 or 4 hours, head in hands thinking when will this end? It is still far too early to water down feeds, as he is obviously not getting enough during the day - Natasha's plan looks good to increase the day time core feeds. The night will look after themselves.

[jsorrow24]

Thanks Calums_Mum, I will just keep doing what I was doing then. I don't want to deprive my sweet ds if he is hungry. I know he will adjust when he needs to. As far as daytime feeds, I have been able to get him to take 7oz at most of the feeds, but sometimes he will only do 5 maybe 6. So I will keep offering to him. At least it's more than what he was taking. And I am sticking with the dreamfeed it works well.

I do think last night had a lot to do also with me not swaddling him. I have decided to wean him from it...he just breaks out of it anyway.

You guys have been great, thanks for all the help.

Jennifer

[LŠuren]

https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=57448.new;topicseen#new - have alook here about your swaddle

[LŠuren]

Have you tried a faster teat? Not sure if your still using a slow flow or have you moved to med flow - just a thought 

[jsorrow24]

We use the medium flow nipple. I have tried the fast flow and it's too fast for him, he doesn't like it. Maybe next month he will be ready.

On the swaddling, he manages his hands pretty well. Not as much flailing as in earlier weeks. Yet, he does scratch his face from time to time. I will try wrapping those up tonight. He can break out of the miracle blanket with no problem. Really, he seemed to sleep well without being swaddled especially when going down, he didn't wake at all and I think if I would have done the dreamfeed he would have slept right through until 3am.

I am really not worried...I know this will all get better and then there will be some rough times. Been there done this once. lol. I wouldn't know what to do if he wasn't here...sleep more I guess, but then I wouldn't get to see his smiling happy face everyday. He is just a joy to me.

Love this website...all the info is great!! Thanks ladies.

Jennifer

[jsorrow24]

Update on ds night waking. I don't think it was hunger last night. Woke at 3am, offered him a bottle and he just rolled it around in his mouth and spit out the milk. So I gave him a paci and he went back to sleep until 6:45 am this morning. He ate a full bottle at 7:45am and did so at his next feeding. He is consuming around 6.5 ounces a feed and sometimes 7. I guess that's all he wants and he is content with that. I think I am going to have to try wake to sleep again. I am going to see what time he wakes tonight. If it's 3 again then I will try the next night.

Last night I also swaddled only his arms and this worked well and he did not break out of it. I think his legs were too long for the miracle blanket and when he would kick it was loosening the upper part of the swaddle.

Just wanted to give you an update and see if you had any thoughts.

Jennifer