- Pregnancy
- Baby & Toddler
- Parents
- Getting Pregnant
- Baby Names
- Product Reviews
-
Registry
- Community
-
More
Want a personalized experience?
Download the free app
Multiples
STTN question
Hi,
My boys have been consistently waking up to eat once during the night (they are 4.5 months). They have both made it 11 hours (7pm-6am) a couple of days, but never in a row!). Yesterday for the first ever, they both made it from 7pm to 6am.
Last night though, they were back to 1am and 4am (one time each).
My question is...since I know they CAN do it, should I expect them to naturally do this on their own and settle into that eventually...or should I try to soothe them when they wake up without feeding them??
The reason I ask is because the times I have tried to soothe them, it never really works. So it takes me 20+mins to soothe them (with no guarantee they will go back down) vs 10 mins of just feeding them!...just don't know if I'm creating monsters 
I have also tried waiting like 5 minutes before going in to see if they self-soothe back to sleep, but they never do...and they end up waking up the other baby!.
They don't take the paci (even though I have tried all brands and seriously try every day to see if they would take it!)
This discussion has been closed.
Re: STTN question
2 chem preg, 4 failed IUIs, 2 canc IVFs, 2 BFN IVFs, IVF #5 = BFP!!!
3/23 Beta #1 @ 17dpo = 913, Beta #2 @ 19dpo = 1724, Beta #3 @ 21 dpo = 3240
First u/s 3/29 @ 5 weeks 2 days - 3 sacs 6 weeks 3 days - 3 heartbeats 8 Weeks - Lost Baby C, Babies A and B going strong
I agree...although lots of babies go that long. I'm not expecting them to make it to 6 or 7 am everyday, nor would I force them to....but what about when they wake up at 1am, 2am?. They are NOT starving (sometimes have 2 oz and are done)....
I always feed them because I find that nothing else works (since they don't take the paci)....
ETA: So my question really was, do I try to soothe them when they wake up that early, or just feed them. The reason I ask is because I know they are really not hungry at that time (because of the way they eat and the amounts) and I feel like they're using food to soothe back to sleep....BUT that's easier for me than actually trying to soothe them.
So, to save my self time, I just go ahead and feed them and I don't know if that's helping them learn to go back to sleep on their own.
Does that make sense?
we had similar experience. they would sttn (all the way) and then go back to waking at their favorite time (vivi at 1am and audrey at 4am - but they moved the times around too).
we really got to the end of our rope as audrey decided even after eating she didn't want to be put back in her crib. and vivienne would just be awake for 90min in her swing... just hanging out! so at about 5mos gest age we ST.
soothing instead of feeding did not work for us
for vivienne before we ST dh started watering her bottle down and making it progressively a little smaller. she is our big girl (off the charts) - no way she really needed to eat. there were a few rough nights for audrey. some so-so nights for vivi. they caught on quickly, but it wasn't really a linear process.
you have to know your own kids... if you think they're still hungry or not. i knew audrey was not hungry. she would nurse at night, and wouldn't really eat too much by the time we ST.
yours are a little young. but that is just IMO. a mom i know let her first sleep in her bed till 18mos, the second was ST at 8mos, the third was ST at 2mos. i don't think you're creating monsters if you keep feeding them at this point!
yeah, if they are hungry of course I would feed them because I know they are still lil' peanuts!...but I know before 3am or so, they are not really THAT hungry...is more like they woke up and don't know how to get back to sleep....
I swear every single day I try to see if they would take a paci because I really think that would help!!!
The only problem with the paci is they spit it out and need help getting it back in. J uses one but E does not. We are going in every hour through the night to put it back in his mouth because he cries when he wakes up and doesn't have it. I am hoping he will find his thumb soon - although I know there are downsides to that also.
2 chem preg, 4 failed IUIs, 2 canc IVFs, 2 BFN IVFs, IVF #5 = BFP!!!
3/23 Beta #1 @ 17dpo = 913, Beta #2 @ 19dpo = 1724, Beta #3 @ 21 dpo = 3240
First u/s 3/29 @ 5 weeks 2 days - 3 sacs 6 weeks 3 days - 3 heartbeats 8 Weeks - Lost Baby C, Babies A and B going strong
I've wondered the same thing. Mine go down between 7-8 and M will 99.9% of the time sleep through until 6:00 and still not even want to eat until 8 in the morning. H has done this a few times, though more often than not she'll wake up around 4 or 5 to eat and then take a short snooze until 6:30 or 7 in the morning and eat again at 8.
I've wondered if we should try to soothe her at 4 instead of feeding her, but she sounds hungry so we feed her and she downs the bottle, so I'm comfortable with our decision. If she just ate an ounce or 2 and conked back out, that'd be a different story...I think. But she sucks it down and seems like she was truly hungry.
I'd go by their cues, and give it a bit more time. For a while, we were still dream feeding at 11 so we could all get 1 longer stretch of sleep instead of a middle of the night waking. That was from about the 3 1/2 month mark to the 4 1/2 month mark. One night we just decided to try to drop it and see what happened and boy were we (pleasantly) surprise!
Good luck!