[Jenflea]

I think it's unrealistic to expect a young baby to go 12 hours without milk. I fed my baby at least 2 or 3 times during the night if she woke for a feed, until about 12 months.
I only stopped feeding her all together at night was once she started sleeping better (7 or so hours in one stretch) at about 17 months.

[Pup-pup]

It is not unrealistic to expect a baby of 6 mths to go overnight without milk (as per pp). That doesn't mean they all will. I think your routine sounds pretty good. My DD2 who is now 8mths, is fed before bed at 6:30pm & generally sleeps through to 6-7am. There was a time she'd wake & usually I'd feed her back to sleep, but that phase passed. She also was still on 3-4hrs naps per day at 6mths. Dropped to maybe 3hrs at 8mths. If you can try and be consistent for one nap per day, I.e in the cot for am or pm nap, it might encourage a longer nap time. The other thing I started doing is sometimes my DD2 would be still awake after I fed her of an evening, I'd still put her down awake. But if she falls asleep breastfeeding that's ok too. I am trying to gently encourage her to self settle rather than completely feed to sleep, as I fed to sleep with my DD1. At the time it worked really well and she's always been an excellent sleeper, but she still has a bottle before bed and her nap (2yrs old), and it's not going to go without a fight. I also think that at 6mths, sleep is a sleep issue and not a food issue. As my DD1 ate very little and slept 12hrs, my DD2 eats a lot and slept 12hrs.

[ifaith17]

Oh, thanks awfully, everyone - that really does help! Much appreciated!

[Molly Joyce]

Hi,

I definitely think you need to teach babies to self settle and not be fed to sleep. They remember the last thing before they went to sleep so, if they were sleeping in your arms when they fell asleep they expect to be there when they wake up. I had a sleep consultant from Tranquil Baby come to my house when my daughter was 6 months old and it was the best thing I ever did!!!! In 3 days my daughter was sleeping during the day and through the night till 8am every morning. Previously she was only sleeping 40mins 3 times a day, going to bed at 11pm and waking 3 to 4 times through the night thereafter. The Tranquil Baby consultant (Penny) was fantastic. She was empathetic and very flexible. She really listened to my concerns and the techniques she taught me were priceless!! Definitely worth it!! Good luck!!!

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Reason for edit: removed link to website

[sjm218]

My 6 month old DS self settles every night without fail and has done since about 1 month old. She still wakes 2-3 times a night for a snack feed. I have plenty of milk (a freezer full is expressed EBM to prove it). She was only waking once a night until about 1 month ago, but is now doing the sleep regression thing associated with learning new skills. She has learnt to roll, close to sitting, pigging out on solids and going through a growth spurt - all reasons to wake up more.

Personally I would rather feed in the middle of the night and have a cuddle for 5-10 minutes than try to settle her without a feed. I did it with DS (now 2) and he started sleeping through consistently at 10 months, with occasional regressions due to teeth and/or development. I really can't see any problem at all with what you are doing, ax long as bubby is happy and content - its all good. Go with your gut.

Good luck!

[SylviaPlath]

It is not unrealistic to expect a baby of 6 mths to go overnight without milk (as per pp). That doesn't mean they all will

This.

I just wanted to add, DS at 4.5 months was sleeping 30 minutes every two hours during the day (with a 2-3 hours gap between feeds) and from about 8pm, he would do one 3 hour block of sleep, then wake every 1.5 hours throughout the night. The only way I could settle him was to feed him to sleep. I was averaging a total of 5 hours a day of broken sleep and was literally losing my mind. I was told by so many people (including my OBs receptionist) that "some babies" are wired like that and I had "one of those babies". And I accepted that.


My maternal health nurse was so concerned by my well being, she instructed me to go to sleep school to "have a break" and learn some settling techniques. I didnt want to go because I felt like a failure. She said, "What do you have to lose?" So that's why I went.

Sleep School has changed everything. DS consistently sleeps for two sleep cycles every sleep and sleeps from 7:30pm-8am EVERY SINGLE DAY (with a dream feed). And it purely came down to strategies and techniques to help baby learn to self settle. It required a lot of consistency and hard work (it's much easier to give boob or bottle then to pat/rock etc for 40 minutes for example). Obviously when they are going through certain changes like crawling, starting solids, teething they will have restless nights etc, but I witnessed first hand close to 80 babies in 4 weeks go from cat naps during the day, 1-3 hourly wakes per night, mothers feeding/rocking babies to sleep, to babies having longer day sleeps and sleeping through the night by day 5. Primarily because baby learned to self settle. Therefore I dont believe it's a food issue, unless they dont get enough food during the day. If 97.5% of the babies that went through the sleep school program, sleep through the night at the end of the sleep program, I think the evidence speaks for itself.