DS has had a cold now for 5 weeks. He is MUCH better now but still has an ear infection which he is now taking antibiotics for. The good thing is that you would never know he was ill. He is in great spirits during the day. However at night he has been waking for up to 2 hours at a time and just will not settle until sheer exhaustion kicks in. When he was doing this, we would shh/pat and only occasionally pick him up if he was very upset. After a few days of this, I wondered if it was a growth spurt and so fed him. He took the whole bottle!
However, this has now gone on for about 4 days and now seems to have developed into a habit of a regular night feeding. The time also seems to be the exact same time. We are now on day 2 of w2s but he still woke at 12.30 last night. My worry is that now he seems to NEED the feeding because its become part of his daily calories. He also wakes up at 5.30 for another bottle and takes about 6oz of that! I'm just not sure how to respond to his wakings. Even after a feed it can take him a while to settle but nowhere near as long as previously without the feed. His cry is mostly a mantra cry. How long should I leave him doing that? Prior to this cold, I've not fed DS in the night from 8 weeks old and he has been a pretty good sleeper apart from the odd brief waking.
He sleeps well during the day, taking regular naps from 40 mins to 2 hours so I don't think its overtiredness. During the day he has 3 solid meals (started solids about 4.5 months) and 5 bottles around 4-6oz each. He doesn't use a dummy anymore and has a lovey (small teddy).
The routine at the moment is something like this:
12.30am wakes for 8oz bottle-think this is a habit waking as is the same time every night-can take 30 mins or more to settle again, sometimes goes back straight away
5.30ish has 6oz bottle and back to sleep after about 1/2 hour
8am wake
8.30 breakfast of baby rice and pureed fruit (4tbsp rice+1 tbsp fruit)
9.30 3-4 oz bottle
10.15 nap
12.15 wake-sometimes this nap is just 1.25 hours making the next nap a bit longer
12.30 pureed veg and sometimes fruit too
1.30 5-6oz bottle
2.45 nap-sometimes earlier if am nap was shorter
3.30 wake
4.30 veg+ sometimes fruit too
5.45 nap
6.30 wake
bath, 7-8oz bottle
bed 8.30
I was doing a DF at 10pm which I had moved forward to 9pm so as to cut it out. Even at this time he would still take 7oz. When he started having a bottle in the night though the DF was only a small amount I decided I might as well not do the DF. I Know it would mean that if I did it again, he might not be hungry at 12.30 but he would still wake up and the only way to settle him in less than 2 hours was to feed him. I feel like everything has become a big mess.
Thanks for any help.