Habit or need?

[becky1969]

Ok. After nearly 3 months of a night time bottle, I'm finally going to ask this question:

My LO will be 13 months this week. WE got rid of all night feedings at 12 weeks by adding a dream feed. At 7 months, he was ready to drop the dream feed - and did easily in 3 days. Then, about 2 months later, he started waking for a bottle again! At first, I didn't realize he was hungry (to be fair, it had been 6 months since I'd seen him wake for a feed!), so DH & I would try to soothe him back to sleep. It would take 2-3 hours. Finally, out of desperation, we tried a bottle - he downed 8 oz and went immediately back to sleep. Eureka! We didn't think it was a habit because a) he would wake anywhere from 11 pm to 5 am for a feed, and b) in the prior 6 months, when we tried to give him a bottle during a night waking he'd either drink 1-2 oz or none at all - never 8 oz.

HOwever, now that we are going on 3 months of this craziness, I'm wondering if I'm messing up? Should I NOT be giving him this bottle? He's eating 3 meals a day, and I recently also added a couple of snacks (they usually just consist of crackers with laughing cow cheese, cheerios or Gerber puffs). He generally has 2-3 8 oz bottles during the day. He's also teething almost non-stop since 10 months. It looks like 4 teeth are coming in right now, so I don't know if that's influencing his need to suck.

What do you all think? Oh, I should mention besides this wakening for a bottle, he's sleeping WITHOUT A PEEP for 12-13 hours at night. His naps during the day range from 2-4 hours. I know that seems highly variable, but it's because of teething. When he's not teething, he sleeps 2hr45 almost every single day. But right now he needs extra sleep when his teeth hurt more.

[Lana]

Hey I am going to move this over to Sleeping for Toddlers for you

[Lana]

Hey there

While I agree that if a baby wakes at erratic times at night they are usually hungry I think once they reach a certain age they should be able to go all night without.  Have you tried to drop the ounces in the bottle every few days and slowy add the calories to the day time?

[Katet]

I'm guessing it was the 9mo growth spurt & now it has become learnt hunger, his body just expects the calories in the night.
I'd start dropping/diluting the amount you give by about 20% every 3 days & then sooth him to sleep... also offer more in the day... offer water at night when he wakes too

[becky1969]

Thanks everyone! Will try that!

[mari]

Does he have a snack close to bedtime?  I offer Alex a snack before her bath and she usually wants it, then I put a sippy in her cot incase she is thirsty. 
Does he go off to sleep independently?

[niche]

Hi there,

We are facing a very similar issue with our 12 month wee lad. He was a fantastic sleeper initially doing 7am to 7pm from about 6 weeks til 7 months. He then started waking between 4am and 5am for a breastfeed from about 7 months. I just kept doing it because it was easier and he went straight back to sleep til 7am. He has had 2 naps a day since about 7 months for 1-1/2 hours. He is also good eater having 3 solid meals and a few snacks during the day when he wakes up (usually 7.30am, 10.30am, noon, 3.30pm and dinner at 5.45pm. He also usually has 4-5 milk/breast feeds (4am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm, 7pm).

We went over to Europe from Australia for Christmas to stay with relatives which disrupted his routine a lot and I started feeding him when he woke at night to just settle him, also thinking the central heating made it quite hot in the room for him. He also developed quite a bad cold and throat infection so thought he could do with the extra breast feeds.

We are now home and all caught a bad gastro which dried up my milk so figured a good time to wean. The weaning has gone well but I cannot lose the 4am Breast feed (even though I am sure there is no milk there!) and am not sure what to do. He has also started waking at midnight and drinking about 125 ml of water. The PU/PD worked really well to get his sleeping back on track returning from Europe and the walk in walk out worked well to deal with the separation anxiety and disruption following the trip and subsequent illness and all the change.

However I seem now to have a habit or need issue at midnight and 4am to deal with! I am still not sure if he needs the liquid (quite hot summer over here) or not. Especially given he drinks it and goes straight back to sleep but without it just refuses to go back to sleep. His waking also tends to correspond with quite noisy times around our house (midnight when a music bar closes down the road and you can hear the patrons leaving and 4am when the heavy vehicle traffic tends to start on the road).

After a month of waking every couple of hours I desperately need to go back to the days of old and would appreciate any advice.