I have a question my friend Nichole has a newborn and she is small and she is complaining she is int gaining enough weight. I asked her if she is sleeping throught the night Nichole said yea she sleeps all night long. So told her I think new borns are supposed to eat about every 4 hours maybe you should wake her up to feed her throught out the night. And I asked if her doctor knew she wasn't feeding her through the night she said yea that she was lucky she sleeps throught the night. If im right that she should be feeding her through the night if you could e mail me somthing that says that, so I could pass that on to her. I m also gonna keep looking my self.
my son was the same slept all night and hes growing fine and putting on plenty of weight. might be ur friends child is just small by nature unless wen u pick her up u can feel her bones or even see them then start to worry. let ur friend know that its is a concern and will be unless the child starts putting weight on. tell her to get the dr to check the weight cos a newborn shouldnt be under to much. if not just get her to give her child more food instead of 60ml every 4 hours give it 120ml or more every 4 -6 hours it works for me and mines healthy as.
Hi, my son slept through the night since he was 1 week (now 15 weeks) l was told by my midwife and baby doc to let a newborn sleep for 6 hours only , then wake to feed. You say her doctor knows about this and has no concern about the baby sleeping, usually the doctor does not worry about this if the baby is gaining weight....but if she has concerns she needs to go see a baby doctor and ask questions and get her baby checked out if worried. It sounds like the baby is full and does not need the feeds. l was worried with my son and asked, l was told he was sleep because he would pig out every 3 hours during the day and by night he was full and didnt need the feeds - he is still every 3 hours during the day. l hoped this helped
with newborns you can leave it up to 6 hours, after that their blood sugar levels start to be affected, so if they want to sleep for 6 hours then great but i'd wake them up after 6 hours to give them a feed.
as long as baby is gaining weight and not actually losing weight.
if baby is losing weight then they need to be checked by a doctor if they are gaining the bare minimal then a doctor might suggest keeping an eye on the situation.
believe it or not sleep is also important because sleep helps baby gain weight.
both my boys were being fed at 10pm and slept right through til about 4 or 5 am and that was in their early weeks they both grew up to be healthy and normal sized adults
the amount of weight gained I think is less of a conern than the rate of weight gain. So if the baby keeps to the same percentile for weight, then I think baby is doing pretty good. But on the other hand, if baby is in the 50th percentile (for example) and all of a sudden drops down to 10th percentile for weight in a matter of a month or two, then that may be a cause for concern.
It's hard to specific suggestions as we don't know the specifics.
I asked this question to a doctor not long ago. He said that babies need 100ml for each 1000grams in weight. So for a baby who weighs 4000grams they would need 4 feeds of 100mls in a 24 hour period. If baby is sleeping over night then its a blessing and nothing to worry about as long as they are having sufficient feeds during the day. If your friend has any concern, she could simply ask her health nurse. Babies all gain weight at different rates, some babies are smaller than others, other are larger.
I've never heard of a child needing to be woken to be fed. They need to sleep in order to grow. Newborns do lose weight for the first 10 - 14 days. It can take a month or more to get back up to birth weight. I don't really know why. If its a serious concern it might be worthwhile to get her breast milk tested to make sure it has enough nutrition in it. A doctor might also want to check baby's faeces to make sure her digestion is working properly. Some children are naturally petite of course... A well-built friend of mine had 2 who were really small; both perfectly healthy; grew into petit young women. Very attractive!
It is true that your friend is lucky that her baby sleeps all night. When speaking to my maternal health nurse today she said up until six weeks the baby should have a feed evry 6 hrs max, you shouldnt leave it any longer then that. What i suggest is your friend adding a little extra milk each feed so teh baby is still full during her sleep.
firstly why is there concern about weight gains? Is it because bub is not gaining what the HP's deem to be appropriate or is bub losing weight? Remember BF babies gain weight differently so as long as bub has some weight gain and is showing the signs of getting enough milk :- www.breastfeeding.asn.au/bfinfo/lowsupply.html
This article also covers a babies need to feed often. Babies need to feed roughly 2-3hrly during the day and 3-4hrly at night. Many people think they are lucky having a baby that sleep through but newborns especially need to be fed often. Not feeding often can often lead to low milk supply and premature weaning.
Sleeping through the night can also be a sign of bub not getting enough milk. If bub is not getting enough milk during the day then it could be that bub is just tooo tired to cry for food.
perhaps she could contact a local breastfeeding helpline (ABA in Australia, La Leche in other countries) and chat over what's happening.
Every baby is different and no set rule will ever be right for every baby. She is incredibly lucky that her baby sleeps well. I would have given anything for a whole night's sleep in the beginning!!
Yes they say a newborn needs to be fed every 4 hours.. But at the same time, if her baby was hungry, she would wake up. They just do that.
Tell your friend if she is concerned about her baby's weight gain, then she needs to talk to her doctor. Just out of curiosity, how old is the baby? I know my baby only gained about 200-300 grams each week for the first couple of months. As he got older, he gained more... But my little man is a chubba bubba.
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Rosalinda
