Middle of the night feeds
kristine618
member
What's your routine for the middle of the night feeds? How long does it take you to fall back to sleep and how often are you getting up? I've been lucky that LO has only been waking up once each night since week 2, so I do not ask for help from my husband and can let him get a good night sleep.
She feeds for about 30-40 minutes, then I change her diaper, swaddle her, and rock her in the rocking chair about 10 minutes. After about an hour of being up, I set her in her RnP wide awake and she drifts off to sleep quietly. Then I go downstairs and eat something because I'm usually too hungry to go back to sleep. If it's earlier in the night, though, I feel like I've had a nap and I'm WIDE awake for hours. I tend to get fed up and take a benadryl after an hour or more of trying to fall back to sleep, but at that point I only have 1.5 hours or left before she's up again, and I'm sooo groggy come morning time. When she sleeps later through the night and it's closer to morning, I just feel like I've just had a bad night sleep and can fall back to sleep afterwards with no problem. Curious what your experiences are in the middle of the night...
Re: Middle of the night feeds
Now it is about 9am and she's back asleep probably for 45 mins until gas hits or I move.
My suggestions would be stop the diaper change unless you really have to. Also, keep some snacks beside your bed so you don't to get up. You could snack on some nuts while feeding your LO.
If she poops during that feeding, though, then it's feeding, change, burp and feed, and that's about an hourish.
I don't really have a problem getting back to sleep unless that longer routine falls around the 3 or 4am waking. For some reason, that one will have me awake for an hour after she's back to bed. Sucks.
Our routine is:
~8 PM: change diaper, swaddle, read books, and then begin nursing (usually only one side).
~8:30 PM: LO is finished nursing, so he's burped and put in his PnP with vibration on and Sleep Sheep on.
~2 AM: Feed on one breast (~30 min), burp, unswaddle, LO stretches while I use the bathroom, change diaper, then feed on other breast (~30 min), burp, then back in PnP with vibration on and Sleep Sheep on.
~5:30 AM: Same routine as 2 AM.
~7:45 AM: LO awake for day.
Every once in a while LO has trouble latching from side lying and I have to sit up and feed her. That wakes me up much more and those are the nights I wake tired, otherwise I usually feel rested in the morning.
For the most part, he wakes once during the night. I have a small LED light by my bed that I turn on, then I lift him out of the rock n' play, leaving him swaddled. I sit up against the headboard of my bed and nurse him for about 20 minutes. He typically pulls off the breast still sleepy, so I lay him back in the rock n' play, turn on the sleep sheep, turn off the LED light and go back to sleep.
On a more challenging (rare) night, he will be up more frequently or have a hard time falling back to sleep. In those cases, I unswaddle him and side-lie nurse him in bed with me until he falls back asleep...then I scoot away from him a little bit and go to sleep myself.
ETA: I agree with PP's. No more unswaddling or diaper changes unless she is pooping in the middle of the night! I think if you break those habits and get back to bed sooner, you won't be so starving either (I find that if I'm up in the middle of the night for an hour, I'm ravenous...but for only 20-30 min, the hunger isn't bad enough to keep me awake).