Breastfeeding mums

Hi, I exclusively breastfed both of my babes and (one nearly 3, one 6 months) and they both went through periods of brilliant sleep and terrible sleep. You're definitely not the problem ❤️

No you are not the problem, I think it is just luck, mine sleeps through and this is what MAY have helped perhaps, I feed her frequently during the day every 2.5-3 hours. I don't let her suckle for comfort or suckle to sleep. I also tried a dummy dummy instead of feeding her when she woke in the night and she went back off to sleep in the early days for another 4 hours, that is how I knew she wasn't waking for hunger and just wanted comfort. I do think it is just pot luck unfortunately and some babies just prefer to eat little and often but making sure they get their ounces in the day has deffo helped usx

Definitely not you! The 4 month regression hit us hard and my LO started waking every 2-3 hours then went to every 45 mins so we started co-sleeping. She’ll be 6 months in a week and it’s getting better - some nights I can put her in the next to me and she’ll do 3 hour stints (on a good night). Keep telling myself it’s not forever x

Definitely not you! I formula fed my now 3 Y/O and he slept amazing from 10 weeks but further down the line had phases of good and bad (still does now) and EBF my 6 month old. She slept through from 6 weeks (winning - or so I thought) but now wakes once in the night around 3-4am for a feed and sometimes twice a night. completely depends on her. I haven’t changed anything I think we just have to remember everything is a phase x

Mine is 7 months and wakes at least every two hours or minimum six times a night

I EBF and my baby can (very rarely ) go 6/7 hours so I don’t think he needs the food. He now does 2-4 hour stretches consistently which is a lot better than where we were a couple of months ago

Mine can do 5-8 hour stretches. He does have a bottle of formula in the morning so we’re not exclusively breastfeeding but pretty much as breast milk is all he has for the rest of the day. There are formula feeding parents who struggle just as much with sleep so it’s not you or the fact you breastfeed xx

Ours is a bit hit and miss since he turned 5 months but we still get the odd 6 hour stretch and even got a 9 hour one the other week and that's with teething so it is possible. We were similar with him regularly sleeping through until 4 months, I think if they could do it then it's still possible but they have so much going on that they're learning at this age thag sleep gets so disturbed. That's what I'm hoping anyway 🤣

We are EBF and have taken a similar approach to @Emma Cunningham except my baby hasn’t had a dummy at night since she essentially self weaned off of it at four months. She typically sleeps through 9-10 hours every night, wakes for a feed then does another 2.5/3 hours. Obviously can’t say how much is nature and how much is nurture!

Thank you all. I think feeding to sleep in the problem but anything else I try he just screams so I’m not sure what I can do and i won’t let him cry 😢 just not enjoying being a mum at the moment and finding it so tough being sleep deprived as he wakes hourly, feel like it’s never going to end x

@Emma Cunningham out of interest how many times in 24 hours do you feed your baby. I'm still feeding mine like 7 or 8 times and I wonder if it's too frequent but I'm a bit nervous to spread it out more in case he wants to feed more at night.

@simone 5. I do one upon waking then after every nap (so after 1st nap, 2nd nap 3rd nap then one before bed. She used to have 6 if on 4 naps xx

Mine is EBF and wakes every hour until 11pm/12pm then goes until 2am then 4am, then wakes hourly 4am-6am, then every 15 mins until wake up at 8am 🙌

Feeding every hour in the day

I co sleep with my boy so we’re both less disturbed and I get more sleep. He feeds on and off for the first couple of hours and then snuggles in every 2-3 hours after that for a feed. The sleep deprivation used to reallyyyy get me down but after reading and research I saw that night wakes reduces the chances of SIDS, so the waking for a feed brings me comfort and it makes me happy knowing my boy is well fed and nourished 🥰 It’s hard to flip the narrative to a more positive mindset but it’s helped me so much 🫶🏻✨

EBF and on demand. He sleeps 7:30- 8 with one occasionally 2 wake wakeups for a feed. I don't use a dummy and he suffered a bit with the 4 month regression so I started rocking to sleep instead of feeding. He was waking after an hour of sleep abd then could be awake for over 2 hours. Next teething started so he learnt to self settle which has helped massively. 2 sharp teeth popped through yesterday so I'm hoping he'll start napping for longer 🤞