Feeding on demand vs routine

[boomba]

What Kelly said

Ren Hun you have to do what you feel is right! Myles started sleeping through at about 6 weeks but this only lasted about a month! Then the routine word was put to me by many people dn "teaching" him how to sleep! This has never sat right with us so we didnt sleep train! We feed "on damnd" or when he is hungry so I couldnt tell you if he has dropped feeds or not!


Sorry hope this makes sense i am bit all over the place this morning!

You do what feels right for you and bub! Good luck xx

[Lucy]

My babies were all breast fed by their needs not by the clock. But I can recall with Charlie and Lexie that they did "drop a feed" at around the 12 week ish mark. (For the life of me I can't remember with Olivia: it was too much of a blur!)

Charlie had an evening/bedtime "routine" of bath, boob and bed at around 7pm, then would wake around 11ish for a boob. At about 12 weeks he droped this to wake at around 3am instead, BUT then woke again for a big feed at around 6am.

Lexie, had an evening/bedtime "routine" of bath, boob and bed at around 6.30pm, would wake at around 1am for a bood, then again at about 4am. This did my head in for weeks, LOL! But then at around 13 weeks, she didn't wake for that 1am feed, instead waking at around 3am, & then not again till around 8am.

Bear in mind these times are very approximate.......the only reason I know them is that I have checked my blogs for them both......

[meow]

Thanksfor your replies. I'm not considering a routine for us- we're doing great and I'm coping well. I don't feel overly tired anymore andon the weekends I hand him to my H to settle so I can go straight back to sleep and get in maximum snoozing

I was just curious if this dropping a night feed was at all a natural pattern- seems it often is too. The only baby I really know their sleep patterns is my niece and she was waking every 2 hours for 11 months- so we're already doing way better than that thankfully!

[MantaRay]

Ren, I agree that they are all different. Both my boys were bfed and DS1 started sleeping through from 6 weeks, DS2 didn't drop that 2am-ish feed until 12 months, and that was with a dream feed! Just go with the flow and see what happens - if he drops the feed early well and good, if not, know that it will happen one day. FWIW, DS1 might have been sleeping through early, but stopped sleeping much at all at night at 7 months. Whereas DS2 would wake for a feed and go straight back to sleep, and now sleeps through. So DS2 ended up giving me more total sleep despite the slower start. I think it's swings and roundabouts.

[meow]

Ah yes- good point mantaray. My sister said that after a year her daughter is now sleeping wonderfully but now the other chidlren from her mother's group who used to sleep no longer do!

I'm feeling like I can manage the sleep how it is for a long time (not that I'd say no to 8 hours sleep ) so I guess if we stick with this I can hope for lots of sleep later!

[Sammiejane]

REn, Molly Jane dropped a feed last week and it has been the nicest surprise!
I have totally demand feed (despite all those people saying that i should not let her rule my life) and it has worked well and i agree she knows when she is hungry more than i do.
The last 4 nights she has slept from approx 8-9pm to 4-5am!!! last night it was 9pm to 5am, the first night i was in agony though and had to get up to express a bit off as it was so painful, but i have found that thats has settled too.
Still every night i expect her to go back to needing her 2am feed!
Coincidentally i started wrapping her again (stopped 3 weeks ago as she was kicking out of it with wind) and she started sleeping longer from that night - i put it down to the wrapping, but maybe she was just ready to drop a feed? dont know
Good luck

[leebee81]

Oliver is demand fed and his night feeds have been naturally spacing out more and more. Occasionally he will sleep 8 hours, once or twice lately he has slept 10 hours, but usually he wakes after 6 hours for a feed. He doesn't really have set feed times (they are all over the place) and I don't take notes so I don't know if he has 'dropped' feeds or if he just feeds more before bed and when he wakes up to compensate.

I agree that he knows his tummy best so I just go with what he wants.