what to do with 5am feed

[gracie1]

Hi
I'm new on the board and about to start 4 hour EASY with my 4 1/2 month old baby. He has had some sort of a routine over the past 2 months but still contained accidental parenting e.g. rocking to extend nap time. On the whole he is pretty good an angel/textbook baby.

The two main problems are nap length (which I will do pu/pd for) and waking at 5am for a feed. He is hungry as he will down 4-5 oz in under 10 mins. The problem is that he will not take his 7 am feed which makes following the routine difficult. What should I do with this feed? Cut out or reduce gradually? He is a healthy baby, gaining weight well, but smaller than average. Oh we have tried leaving him to re-settle himself and go back to sleep which worked until he hit a growth spurt, then the 5 am feed returned. He is not the best feeder during the day so it is difficult to increase his intake (I have tried adding extra to all feeds but he won't take it.

help much appreciated
Grace + Joe

[linfran]

Can you post his current routine please?

[gracie1]

Hi
yes, sure

5am feed 4oz
7am up (offer feed may only take 1oz), activity
9am feed 6oz & nap (45mins, trying to extend)
9.45am activity
11am nap (2hr)
1pm feed 6oz, activity
3pm 30min nap
3.30pm activity
4pm feed 4oz
5-6pm 40 min cat nap
7pm feed 6-7 oz
7.30pm bed
11pm df 4-6oz

sleeps from 7.30pm until 5 am with no probs
thanks
Grace & Joe

[Southernbelle]

Have you tried going in at 5am and giving paci and resettling?  My DD (16 weeks right now) did the same thing and after a week of resettling without a bottle she extended to 6:00 then 6:30 and now close to 7am.  My DD would totally down a full bottle if I gave her one at this point in the morning.  Obviously, if you Lo will not resettled within about 20mins, I would go ahead and feed.  I usually take it that DD is really hungry if she wont go back down.  Does your DS wake crying at 5am or just wake and talk to himself?  If he doesn't cry, I would leave him to play and he may go back to sleep on his own.  That's what my son did at about this age.  HTH

[bethann]

My 3 mo LO will do the exact same if she either misses her DF- (sometimes she just won't take it) or if she doesn't cluster one extra feeding at night- either around 5:30-6 or at 8-8:30. It never fails- if she doesn't get that one extra feed, she wakes at 5- like clockwork (and it quite hungry and won't typically go back down until she eats- although I have the same problem in that if she does eat at 5- she wants to sleep until 8:30 and it screws up her entire day's schedule!), but if she does get that extra feed, she's down until 7am- no problem.  I would try giving your LO one more feed around bedtime and see what that does...

[gracie1]

Hi

Thanks so much for your advice, I have tried leaving him to re-settle which did previously work but not now. He did actually make it until 5.45am during the past 2 nights. I hope this is going to eventually progress until 7am. I haven't actually tried to re-settle him without feeding him so I will give that a try. He doesn't wake up crying, just talking, he may talk for 30mins before beginning a mantra cry which will eventually escalate in volume to a real cry.

About the df and bedtime feeding, I did try upping his afternoon feed to increase total days milk but he then took less at bedtime and woke at 9pm for a feed. He then wouln't take his df. I tried upping his bedtime feed to 7oz but he then wouln't take much of a df or none at all. The only way to get him to take a 5-6oz df is to feed at 3pm 3-4oz (he won't take more at this time) then 6oz at bedtime. If he doesn't have his full df he may wake anytime from 1am onwards as well as 5am.

I think I will try to re-settle him for 20mins and if that doesn't work feed him. I was thinking of trying to reduce this feed by 1/2oz every 3 nights to try to encourage his 7am appetite, what do you think is this a good idea?

thanks
Grace & Joe