My 4 month old daughter is in a pattern of doing most of her eating during the night. She still wakes up 3-4 times a night to eat (breastfeeding) and she eats really well every time. It ends up being about every 2-3 hours that she's waking up. During the day, however, she's more of a snacker. She can go up to 4 hours between feedings and even then she won't really finish her meal. Our pediatrician suggested that I try to feed her more frequently in the late afternoon to try and get her more full so she'll start to get more of her calories during the day. It's only been a few days that I've been doing that and I might be seeing some positive progress, but it's too soon to tell. I thought I'd ask around and see if anyone else has had this problem and what other options I have for getting her to eat during the day instead of at night. She's a good sleeper at night, other than waking up to eat. Oh, and she doesn't take a bottle, so trying to fill her up with formula before bed won't work. We're trying to get her to start taking a bottle, so that might be an option down the road, but right now she isn't going for it. Thanks for any advice or ideas you have!
So it's been about a week and a half since I asked for help and we have already had improvement. My milk supply has been kind of on again-off again the last month or so and so we decided to get my daughter to take a bottle. My husband worked really hard last weekend and finally she started taking it. We had to go through about 4 different combinations of bottles and nipples, but she'll take it now. He has been giving her a bottle at her first waking after bedtime (usually around 9 or so) and last night she went 7 hours between feedings. She is still waking up at the time that she used to eat - about 3 hours after her last feeding - but my husband helps her back to sleep and then she goes for several more hours. I think we finally turned a corner on this one! Thanks for all the advice!
My son (5 month) also snacks during the day and only eats really well during the night. I read somewhere that it is common at this age because they are so easily distracted during the day. Nighttime is the ideal feeding environment because it's quiet, dark and they are pretty drowsy. So whatever you can do to replicate that environment when you feed during the day will probably help.
My son was also a snacker during the day. He did however switch from breast to bottle without difficulty. My pediatrician suggested making him wait 5-10 minutes longer to eat every feeding each day, so he would be more hungry and eat more with each feeding. He told us to do this until he was eating with appropriate time between feedings. It was hard to let him cry, but it didn't take long and we were much happier when we were not feeding him every 30 minutes. Also, I was having difficulty getting my son to sleep through the night. He depended on the bottle to fall asleep, so when he woke up at night he didn't know how to go back to sleep on his own and wanted the bottle. I bought the book "how to solve your child's sleep problems" by Richard Ferber. It only took us 2 nights and he's been sleeping through the night since. Good luck!
M.,
I could have written your question. I am in the EXACT same place with my 4 1/2 month old son. He was a great sleeper at first, ate great during the day, and slept an 8 hour stretch at night. Now, he is up all the time, and will go LONG stretches during the day. We were on an outing this past Friday morning (at an animal farm with my 2 year old) and my baby wouldn't eat for the whole 6 hours we were out of the house. I kept trying to get him to eat (mostly because I was getting uncomfortable and was worried about leaking all over) but he was just way more interested in what was going on around us to take time to eat. Needless to say, he was up all that night eating. He also doesn't do a bottle (glad to hear I'm not the only one with that problem too!).
I do notice that if my 2 year old is out of the room, or if I go into our room and use the rocking chair and boppy where I feed him at night, he does much better (I don't use a boppy usually during the day). My older son just turned two last month and is still in a crib, so sometimes I will put him in there with a pile of books and cars and then feed Joey, if there are less distractions it really helps him finish his meal.
I have also used (a few times) a necklace with big beads on it to keep him focused on me during nursing, and that seems to help.
Good luck, and I hope to see some other advice as well!
J.
SAHM to 2 year old Charlie and 4 1/2 month old Joey.
I only breastfeed for a month with my son, but when I got tired of him latching on, I got him use to the bottle asap. When Nathan was around 4 mo. and feeding on formula, the best advice I got (which WORKED and allowed US to sleep through the night) was adding rice cereal to the bottle. I know it sounds iffy, but let me tell you, it filled up his belly and he didn't need those extra feeds in the middle of the night. I gave him the cereal bottles for breakfast, early afternoon, and Bedtime. If you use a faster flow nipple, it will let the cereal past through. The only downside to that is the body passing the thicker meal through, but once the baby does that, shes good to go. You could still use breast milk AND inbetween meals, still breastfeed normal.
Good luck and hopefully this is an option for you!
One thing that we did for awhile was say if I fed my son at 7:00 pm and then he went to bed then I would wake him up at 10pm or whenever you think is a good time and feed him and then put him back to bed. That seemed to help it out a lot. I did that until he was almost 6 months- he sarted to not really eat when I would wake him up. I was also very persistant on making sure he would eat well durring the day so that he was not snacking. I dont think is is necessary to fill them on formula before bed if you are nursing, unless maybe there is a milk production problem. Sometimes we would use breastmilk in a bottle.
While our son was little (he is now 10 months) we tried to instil that daytime is for wake and eating and night time is for sleeping- so I fed him every 2/1/2- 3 hours at first and then gradually spread it out at night until he didn't need to eat at night anymore. I think making sure they get enough nutrition in the day is important so that they are not needing it at night.
Part of the problem is that she is in a growth spurt right now and her body is making up for lost calories at night. So I would agree with your doctor, by feeding her more in the afternoon/evening, or cluster feeding, she will get more calories and be a little more filled up by bedtime, her body will eventually rest itself. In the meantime, have your husband try to soothe her for one of her middle of the night wakings.
I know its stressful but once you get past this 4 month growth spurt its kind of all smooth sailing! LOL its the longest and hardest!
