When can I let him sleep?

JrzyMeeba1

We're going to talk to the nutritionist on Wednesday at a growth and development follow up appointment, but I'm curious what your experiences are.

It was suggested to us that even though we're home and feeding on an ad lib schedule, not to let Hunter go longer than four hours between feeds.  During the day, he wakes anywhere from 2-4 hours after each feed, so I never have to wake him.  At night, it's usually 3-4 hours, but last night, I had to wake him at the 4 hour mark.

He's gaining weight wonderfully.. I'm wondering if we can stretch his sleep periods at night and see if he adjusts for it during the day?  I've read term baby mamas don't wake to feed at night, but obviously preemies are always a different story.

 Thanks in advance

AFwife1106

We never woke her up to feed, but she has never had problems putting on weight.  When she came home, she was putting on almost a pound a week with feeding on demand.. we also never had problems with reflux.

I would say go for it.  We keep track of how much she eats a day, but not when she eats.  HTH some.  

msalinardi@live.com

We woke her up for the first couple of weeks that she was home, but we noticed that she would really just rather sleep. So we would start her feedings at 6 am and then every 3 hours after until around 10 pm or whenever we went to bed. It was great because she has pretty much always slept through the night since we decided to stop waking her up.

mek10976

We were told the same thing.  I think the first time Simon was asleep at 4 hrs. we woke him, but he was also gaining weight like a champ (50% by 4 months) so we just decided to let him call the shots and if he didn't wake then we didn't wake. 

witt0198

I can't remember exactly when we stopped, but I do remember the reasons. Evan just got to the point that he really needed that sleep, and trying to wake him resulted in poorer eating all around. He wouldn't eat well when we were trying to rouse him and the next feeding wouldn't be all that great either. If we just let him get the sleep he was seeming to need, he's eat SO much better when he did wake up. I remember waking him up every 3 hours for a while though....I wanna say 2-3 weeks at least, but honestly I can't remember anymore.

GL

Becky

meldoo2002

We were told to wake them at night until they were 9lbs.  It was right around then that they started sleeping in 7-8 hour stretches themselves.  We never woke them during the day, but it was never an issue.

SkypekWithoutAC

Our pedi said to stop waking her once she hit 6lbs (she was born at 3lb 12oz, so not quite double her birth weight). When her weight started to fall off the charts, we had to wake her again. 

Lavender444

When Andrew weighted 9-2 at one of his appointments my Ped said I no longer had to wake him for feedings. We've never had to wake him though, he still gets up every 3-4 hours.

JrzyMeeba1

Thanks for your replies!  I didn't set the alarm last night, and he woke up at 4.5 hours, so I'm not going to complain about a half hour.

He hasn't had any weight gain issues, so I'm hoping the growth and development people are okay with this.