Hi everyone

I am not obsessing about this and I know there have been previous posts about this so I hope I’m not re-hashing, but I would love all of your wisdom on this.

My boys are fully BF and turn 11 weeks old tomorrow. They are both 4.4kgs. They were on 5 feeds a day around 1am, 6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm. They dropped the 10pm feed the first week home from hospital and have had their long sleep – 6/7 hours from 6pm to 1pm.

Someone from my mother’s group suggested that we wake them at 10pm and maybe they might have their big sleep and “sleep through” from 10pm to 5/6pm. We tried this last weekend and we thought we did it the first night – they slept until 4.30am. The next few nights they woke at 1am again and reverted to 3 hourly feeds during the day increasing it to 7 feeds per day. Last night I was so exhausted that we dropped the 10pm feed and I went to bed at 8pm– I needed sleep! We are thinking of leaving them be and not waking them now for a 10pm feed and just wait for them work it out themselves.

Someone else told us that babies that are 6kgs should “sleep through” at least 8 hours, that they are big enough to not have to wake in the night for a feed and by the time they get to 9kgs they should sleep 12 hours. Since our bubs are still only little, we are thinking they still need to wake in the night until they put on some weight.

When did your bubs “sleep through”? and did you manipulate their sleep or feeds in some way or just wait for them to do it themselves? We are feeling selfish, but we would like some more sleep and not have to go to bed after the 6 o’clock news so we can function during the day.


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Hi There,

My guys didn't sleep through until around 7 to 8 months and only after we went to sleep school.

It is such a hard time isn;t it - trying to function with out too much sleep. Hang in there it does improve!

We had ours into a routine of putting them to bed at around 8:30 so that when they did start sleeping better we got more benefit from it. Now at 21 months they still go to bed at around 8:30 and wake around 8:00-9:00 AM - suits me cos I'm so not a morning person! Never tried the roll over feed

good luck

Mags

Hi There,

My guys didn't sleep through until around 7 to 8 months and only after we went to sleep school.

It is such a hard time isn;t it - trying to function with out too much sleep. Hang in there it does improve!

We had ours into a routine of putting them to bed at around 8:30 so that when they did start sleeping better we got more benefit from it. Now at 21 months they still go to bed at around 8:30 and wake around 8:00-9:00 AM - suits me cos I'm so not a morning person! Never tried the roll over feed

good luck

Mags

Sleeping through! The $64,000 question!

My girls have only just started consistently sleeping through (7pm-6am with 10pm dream feed) at 11 months of age, following controlled crying.

For the first 6-7 months they fed every 2.5 hours during the day, and usually 3 feeds at night. At 7 months I decided that they didn't need the night feeds anymore, as they were putting on stacks of weight. I thought they were waking out of habit, rather than hunger, and I think I was right, as they quickly got used to being 'patted and shushed' back to sleep rather than fed. I then started doing the dream feed at 10pm, and their sleeping improved quite a lot. So, I'm a big fan of the dreamfeed and would recommend you try it.

However, from 8-10 months their sleep got steadily worse again until we became desperate enough to try controlled crying - which has worked!

So I think your little ones are doing VERY well to only need a 1am feed overnight at the age of 2 months! I know how hard sleep deprivation is, but judging by how well your two are sleeping now, it won't be long until they are sleeping through, so I wouldn't panic too much yet. Try the dream feed for a week or two and see how it goes. I used to go to bed early and set the alarm for the dream feed.

It is quite normal for babies to still need overnight feeds until 6 months or more, so try not to rush things unnecessary, and really enjoy that proper full nights sleep when it finally happens.

Good luck, I hope your boys 'sleep though' really soon.

Narelle

Hi.
All bubs are different but my twins are 4months and ds goes to bed at 10pm and wakes at 8am and dd goes to bed at 10pm also and wakes at 4am every morning like clockwork. Dd is a little bit smaller also and doesnt drink as much.
They are bottle fed.

Hi there & congratulation’s on your new additions.
My boys are nearly 4mths and have only been sleeping from around 6.30 - 7.30pm to around 4 - 5am, for the last 3weeks. They are both bottle fed thou. I also had spoke to a baby sleep therapist, which gave me a lot of useful tips to use.

Hope you get some well earned sleep soon

My girls were fully formula fed from 6 weeks so that may affect how relevant our experience is to you. They slept through from after the 10pm feed until 7am from about 10 weeks. We did a "dream feed" at 10pm (ie woke them up - quiet, dark, no talking or playing). At about 4 months we decided to try dropping the dream feed to see what happened and they both slept through 12 hours (and have done 99% of the time since then).

Good luck with whatever you decide to do - hope you get some sleep soon.

Maree

Eleanor 1/8/03
Harriet 1/8/03

Good luck with your boys. Mine still don't come close to "sleeping through" now at 9.5 months. They still feed to sleep every hour or two, so your 6-7 hours sounds like heaven to me!

I was always made to believe that babies would automatically start sleeping through by 4-6 months. I found out the hard way that this isn't true and struggled for several months because I thought we were doing something wrong.

We don't believe in controlled crying of any sort, and co-sleep with our boys for at least part of every night, so we won't be having sleeping "success" like some other mums have had.

Remember that your babies are individuals, and generally you can't MAKE them do anything. Be grateful that they are happy and healthy and that you can breastfeed them. You're doing a great job and I hope your two sleep through earlier than ours!!

Take care
Tracey