Dream feeds

[Sammiejane]

Well i have just been reading an article about dream feeds and it seems that they are not what i thought at all

I thought that a dream feed was when the baby woke but still semi asleep needing a feed and you feed them back to sleep and they continued sleeping and feeding...

But from what i just read, a dream feed is something that is instigated by the mum, picking the baby up in its sleep and offering a feed shortly before its due to wake for a feed...
i guess in the hope that the baby will not wake at all???

Does anyone do this?
Does it work?
Can i start now? MJ is waking more frequently over night and needs a feed sometimes, other times just cuddles.

thanks

[Catastrophic]

I did the dream feeds with Izzy...
I can't remember what time i started tho about 3-4months... I woke her up about 10.30 where she would fed/burb/ go back down to sleep and would sleep till 5.30 / 6... it worked really well from me. If she didn't get her dream fed she would be up at 2

HTH

[queenbee]

I did dreamfeeds with my DD and cut them out about a month ago, now she wakes all night. Could be the reason, or developmental but I'm thinking of giving her a small top up to push her through. She has milk around 6pm but used to have a 9pm dreamfeed. She was asleep but would take the bottle fine and drink most of it, really worked well here.

[luna moth]

I have done it for other people's kids while babysitting, and I have done it both ways you suggested (both bottle fed - of course! - don't know if that makes a difference)
For one, a little girl that I looked after a lot (was her 50-60 hour a week nanny + one night a week babysitting) I went up to her room at about 10, knowing that she might normally wake at 10:30 or thereabouts. I did that from 8 months on. She would wake about one in 5 or 6 times, but then go back pretty quickly afterwards.
The other is a little dude up here in Brissy, he had been ill and his mum & dad were worried he hadn't had enough fluid. I heard him stirring, so went in with the bottle. He stayed semi-asleep and then went straight back down afterwards.

Both worked. And it doesn't matter what you call it, if it works for you :-)

[Arimeh]

we woke DS up at 10 to give him a feed to try to stop him having that 3.30/4am feed. It worked really well until he was about six months and would just scream every time we would go to give him a bottle - cos we had woken him up. So we just let him go after that and he wakes up during the night but it settled with a dummy (still).

I'm not sure if we will do that with DD - at the moment she has a bottle around 7.30/8.00 and goes to sleep until around 6.30am. If she wakes during the night she is settled with the dummy. We decided not to try to get her to take a bottle because one night she woke up at 3.30, drank 40ml and kept falling asleep, so it was a struggle to even get her to drink that!!! She is, unfortunately, not a baby that can suck and sleep at the same time. So we tried the dummy instead and it worked.

[ShootingStar]

I do dream feeds with DD and did with DS. DD is usually asleep sometime after her 6pmish bottle and i wake her (by changing her nappy) and feed her just before i go to bed. She ends up falling back asleep on the bottle and has slept through from 4 weeks using this method. Worked the same for DS.

[MantaRay]

I did dream feeds for a few months with DS1 and for a 12 months with DS2. With DS1 it got him through the night. With DS2 it meant he woke for one feed instead of two (usually). I swear by them, but I don't think it works for everyone.

I would just get them up and feed before I went to bed. They very rarely woke up - maybe once or twice ever and even then they went straight back to sleep.

[KatieRabbit]

I did it for about a month and then DD started waking up fully when I lifted her up. She didn't go straight back to sleep wither but wanted to play with mum. So that was the end of that! The other thing to consider is if bubs starts to get into a habit of then waking for a feed at the dreamfeed time at the time when they should be then actually sleeping through the dreamfeed feed- kwim? (It makes sense to me!) Worth a go if you get to have a longer sleep.

[queenbee]

Did a dreamfeed last night for the first time in ages, my DD slept much better. Unsure if it was just one of those lucky nights as I only gave her 100mL of milk around 8.30pm. Her last one before that was 6.00pm and she went to bed at 6.15pm. Will try again tonight

[Sammiejane]

Thanks guys

I tried last night, picked her up at 11pm ish and offered her the oob... She didnt stir at all, wasnt interested in the slightest, so just popped her back to bed...
She was awake in an hour needing a feed.

I think that i will persevere for a little while, see how it goes, but wont stress too much, she has never had them, so maybe its not worth starting that habit

[shell_120308]

SJ - I have been trying to dreamfeed DJ at around 11'ish before I go to bed sometimes and DJ will still wake up at 3am for a feed..... drives me nuts..... so sometimes dreamfeeding doesn't work. It used to work when he was younger.

[Sammiejane]

tried again last night, she had a dreamfeed at 1030ish, but was awake again at 2 for another feed, so fed her and then changed her to make sure that she would take the other side, but was awake again at 4... didnt feed her, but took a while to settle and i gave in and took her back to our bed as i was tired.

MR - thanks for your comments on cutting back on solids to see if this makes a difference, i think i will give this a go too, se if it helps.
Thanks again

[MantaRay]

Best of luck SJ. Interestingly, two of my baby buddies when through the same thing at pretty much the same time, and cutting back the solids worked for all of us. Not long later I increased his solids again and he kept sleeping well. I really hope this helps you too.