wakeful + bfing ...the debate... need advice

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I read on Kellymom (my source for all things bfing) that I should nurse the baby during the wakeful because he is more than likely hungry.

I'm reading conflicting things though and now i'm confused.

He sleeps from 7-1or2am. Then he's waking every 1.5-2 hours until 630 am when we get up officially. Everytime he wakes up, Ive been offering the breast.  (I should note that Dylan has always been a "slow" eater... eats some, comfort sucks, east some more and on we go) Sometimes its been so soon since the last time we nursed, I hardly get any letdown and I know he's mostly comfor sucking. 

He goes back down very easy each time and is able to do drowsy but awake.

I don't want to "teach" him he can eat at all hours of the night but I don't want to deny him if he's hungry either.

Any advice from mom's who are going through this or have?  I've been tempted to offer a bottle of formula at the first wake-up to see if its a "im not full" issue .

UGH.... help.

 

IU_baby

Have you tried offering a pacifier instead?  If my DS is truly hungry, he will suck on the pacifier for a few seconds and spit it out. 

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IU_baby:

Have you tried offering a pacifier instead?  If my DS is truly hungry, he will suck on the pacifier for a few seconds and spit it out. 

I will try that tonight. I haven't done that too much because he's rejected the paci for the most part since he was about 3 months old. He used to love it and I think he wants to break up with paci.

thanks for this advice... again, I'll try it.

Idhreniel

Will he take a pacifier?  If DS isn't really hungry sometimes just sitting in the glider with the pacifier is enough to get him to drop off again.  There have been nights when he was just wide awake at 3am, though.

DiRi

My DS is FF and we still went through the wakeful. The only thing that made a difference for us is that he got fed more throughout the day and we did sleep training (Ferber) at night. Things are going really well for us so far.

CommAve07

I feel your pain.  We went through the same thing.  I would sometimes try to rock, pat, comfort DS and put him back down knowing he just ate and couldn't really be hungry again.  He sometimes went into his swing to try to get him back to sleep.  Most often though, he would want to nurse.  Not what you want to hear.  I took him into our bed to nurse so I could at least do it lying down since I was so exhausted. 

 

Hope it passes soon.

GL 

nolebride

I have no advice but I just wanted to let you know I feel your pain. We're going through the same thing. I have no idea what to do. I'll be watching this post.

jane.says

If possible, can your DH/SO go in and try to soothe him back to sleep so he doesn't see/smell you? My DS is still under 4mo, but this has worked for us on the occasions when he has woken up more than usual at night. If he's truly hungry, he won't go back to sleep for my DH. We can usually tell in under 5 minutes what the outcome is going to be!