Re: night feeding
Asked by nellie16

Question:
 

Hi, My maternal and child health nurses tells me that now my son Cameron is 6 months and having 3 meals a day that he shouldn't need breastfeeding in the night. That night I went

home with all intensions of not feeding, but he was waking every hour until I gave in at 130am.  I then fed him at 5am. Last night he woke at 1030 pm so I just fed him. I sshhh him at 2 am and fed him at 5 am.  I guess I really want to know is should I feed, ? re-introduce the 10pm dream feed or try and stop all together. Has anyone just stopped and how long did it take for your baby to stop waking?

My Advice:

 

One thing that child health nurses seem to forget is that babies don't read books nor do they care what the books say. I was told the samething. My 6 month old is bottle fed and takes anywhere between 3 and 5 240ml bottles a day on top of 3 meals a day. I was told to cut her down but all that did was leave me with a very hungry amd upset child.

I continued to feed my Baby when she needs or asks for it. She has set feed times which she has set herself. She wakes at 6am and has a bottle, sleeps til about 8am. At 8:30am she has breakfast followed by juice at about 10:30am. At 11am she has her lunch bottle and a nap for about an hour. At 1230 she has lunch and a juice. At 430 She has an afternoon bottle at 6pm dinner. Then anywhere from 9pm til 2am she will wake for a bottle.

You need to continue feeding when your baby needs or is used to it. Eventually they will sleep through or play through a feed and not worry about it. Growth spurts means they will eat more, its not worth restricting their milk. Your baby will decide when they don't need the night feed anymore.

I strongly suggest you continue with what you were doing. If you do wish to wean him from a night time feed you will need to do it gradually rather then just telling him he can't have it anymore.

Good luck and I hope that it all settles down for you.