4hr EASY and awake time

[abbysmomma]

Hi all!!

Quick question: LO is on 4 hour EASY (19 wk old) but usually can't stay awake for 2 hours, especially in the morning. I moved to the 4 hr b/c she just wasn't really hungry after 3 or 3.5 hours. I thought i would just go with the flow and let her nap and be awake when she wants and only keep the feed every 4 hours. However, a lot of the time her feed time and her next nap time coincides, and so she falls asleep during her feed and is impossible to wake up. Around the same time, she's been starting to wake up at night (sometimes 4-5x where previously only once or twice to feed). My question: should i move back to 3.5 EASY until she can consistently stay awake for 2 hours, so keep at my schedule? Is this feeding followed by sleeping causing her night wakings?

Here's her current schedule:

A: 7am
E: 7:30
S: 8
A: 10
E: 11:30
S: 12pm
A: 1:30
E: 3:20
S: 3:30
A: 4:30-5
E: 7
S: 7:30

While it looks like she eats then sleeps right away, it only happens twice out of the four feeds during the day. She's usually awake for at least half an hour for the other two before sleeping. I don't dream feed, she is bf (one side each time). Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

[nikkik]

I guess I'd try to feed her right away when she wakes in the morning then have the awake time.  The feeding is probably making her sleepy now.  She'd probably have a better awake time with her full tummy.  Good luck!

[Gage and Sophie's Mom]

do you think the increase in night wakenings are due to the need for food? Do you think your lo is getting enough during the day? The night wakening could also come from being overtired. If your lo cant stay up I would scale back the time to 3.5 hrs and then gradually work up later.

[* Paula *]

I agree with PP's.  I would try and feed her as soon as she wakes up in the morning, so that she has a better A time with a full tummy.

I do think that the increase in her night wakings is down to her being over tired.

If you are finding that your lo cannot handle the 4 hour easy, I would go back to the 3.5 hour or even 3.75 hour and see how you get on.

Have you tried clusterfeeding before bed to help your DD tank up?

HTH's

Paula x

[abbysmomma]

Really? Overtired? She gets around 5 hours of sleep during the day... wow...

Well, yesterday I tried 3.5 hr EASY, with kind of cluster at end of day, and it was one of the WORST nights.. went to bed around 7pm, woke up 11, 11:15, 11:40 - at which point I fed her. Then she woke up at 3am, 3:20, 3:45 - at which point I fed her again. Then she woke up at 6am, slept again until 6:45am where we started the day. Anybody else's LO wake up again and again after 10-15 min of sleep? I kind of thought that if she keeps waking up, she's probably hungry. And she was at 11:45 but not really at 3:45. Settling her back to sleep only took 5-10 min, but the waking after only 10 min was driving me nuts! This has happened previous nights as well. Once I just putting her back to sleep, and it went on for 2 hours! This is all from the DD that would go 10 hours during the night! Now I can hardly get 4-5 hours at a time.

[* Paula *]

The overtierdness could come from her being awake from 4:30 to 7:30pm - she is awake for 3 hours.

It may be worth while trying to feed her at 6:30 and have her in bed for 7:00.

[abbysmomma]

yeah, that's what I did yesterday. And I let her catnap from 5-5-5:45. oh well. I tried some infacol today before her last feed - I've noticed that she's pretty gassy at night when I go in to soothe her. I guess we'll see tonight! thanks for the help all!

[yaya]

hiya! how r u getting on?

[abbysmomma]

Ugh.. it was terrible last night. She got up.. too many times to count. I gave her the infacol before her last feed of the night, and once at 1am when I fed her again. Almost every time she got up she passed gas. I don't get it.. during the day when she passes gas she doesn't seem to be in any pain. So I don't understand why this is bothering her at night! Or if that is the problem.. Anyways, any suggestions of what to cut out of my diet to help with her gas? I tried no dairy for 5 days with no effect.. maybe i'll try again for longer. What do other people do when their baby has lots of gas? Anyways, thanks for the replies!

[* Paula *]

What type of foods is she eating?