Anyone using the EASY schedule...please help. When the heck does it get easier?

Nic.NY

Okay.  I am trying to follow this darn EASY schedule via the baby whisperer and I have a few question....hoping someone could answer them and make my life somewhat easier.  I have a 7 and a half week old and getting him to sleep is a nightmare.  He needs to be rocked or walked for a bit before going to sleep, which is fine.  This is what I am confused about:

1. The schedule has the baby eating every 3 hours and then napping for what seems like an hour and a half, then up eating again, activity time, then sleeping, etc.  What do I do if my DS naps for three hours in mid-morning?  Wake him to eat or just continue with the schedule once he wakes up?

 2. Yesterday I kept track of how much and how often he ate and it was on target for what the whisperer recommended with her schedule.  I am BF and we are supplementing with formula, so I gave him formula for the last feed thinking that would fill him.  He was still up at 2 a.m. and this seems to be a pattern whether he gets BF or FF.  I thought he got all of his calories during the day and felt like I was tanking him up, but I guess I wasn't.

 Please help...what am I doing wrong?  Any advice would be appreciated for this first time mom!

Princesseliss528

My advice...Throw that dang easy method out the door, and go with your LO's schedule!  BF digests quickly, so the LO's will wake up in the middle of the night to feed. At 7.5 weeks, they RARELY sttn. I gave up on everything baby whisperer & babywise & we both couldn't be happier! Good luck!

WannaBeCrunchyMama

I think what you need to remember is EASY isn't a SCHEDULE it's a RHYTHM. 

If he wants to sleep, let him sleep. If he wants to eat, feed him. Etc. But try to follow the rhythm of eat, then do an activity, then go to sleep. 

As for him waking up at night, whether he gets all the calories he needs during the day or not (which you have NO way of being able to tell) most babies stomachs and bodies are not capable of going all the way through the night without food.

If he's only up once a night at 2 am, you should consider yourself lucky. My 6 1.2 week old still wakes up every 45 mins-2 hours.

He should be going through a little growth spurt right now, from what I've read the end of this growth spurt should bring on some longer sleep periods.  

utlawgirl

I will say... I didn't find EASY so easy. But, here's my $0.02:

1. The Baby Whisperer says not to let them sleep longer than a feed cycle (so, 3 hours). So if you're keeping to the EASY method, you wake him to eat after 3 hours. The theory is that you're taking away from good nighttime sleep if they sleep too long during the day. Plenty of room for disagreement there, though. Most people will tell you never to wake a sleeping baby.

2. Babies know when they are hungry, and you can only do so much to "tank them up." His schedule just may be to be up at 2 am for right now. I'd keep doing what you're doing for a few days to see if it makes a difference, though.

FWIW, I don't think you're doing anything wrong at all. My kid rarely naps for longer than 45 minutes or so at a time, pretty much no matter what I do, so EASY didn't really work for us, other than as a loose way to organize the day. I think they are just pretty young for a schedule at this point, so you just have to be flexible...

Nic.NY

Okay....glad to know I am not the only person having issues with the whisperer.  I told my husband she needs to make house calls.

Angel5218

I haven't even heard of the Baby Whisperer but I will tell ya what is working for my DS.

He is BF and eats about every 3 hours. He wakes up in the morning around 7:30am (almost always) and nurses and is up till about 8:30 where he falls asleep for about 2 hours. He wakes again to nurse and is up for another 2 hours before he is ready for another nap. The second nap is usually the longest, about 3 hours long before he is ready to wake up. He went as long as 4 hours a few times but it was when he wasn't feeling well so I let him sleep. 

In the mid afternoon/evening hours he stays up longer and his naps are shorter. He doesn't quite have a good routine yet for this time of the day but I am noticing around 5pm he will nap for about an hour and then again at 8pm but that one is usually around 45min. If I am lucky he will nurse again around 10:30pm (this feeding is when he chows down, usually he is a one side at a time nurser but at his last feeding for the night he will nurse from both sides). If he is down by 11pm he will sleep till about 7am. Randomly he will wake up around 3:30am but I am noticing that is becoming less and less. 

I didn't do anything to put him on this schedule, this was the schedule he put himself on. I really just focused on his cues. Feeding is simple...he makes it very obvious he is hungry but the naps were a bit harder. I noticed when he started to get tired his eye lids would get a tint of red to them. If I don't catch that clue then he starts in on rubbing his eyes and getting fussy. If I catch him early and nurse him then he is easy to put down. If I miss the early signs and he starts to get crabby then I have issues getting him to go down for a nap.

I was never big on the books that tell you the best ways to raise your kids because I always felt that you just need to do what works for your individual baby. (I did get the Happiest Baby on the Block though, love that book!).

Sorry this got long-winded. I say just do what the above poster said and toss that method out the window and do what works best for your LO. Each baby is different, my LO naps for long periods of time during the day and sleeps just fine at night.

IncogNeato

WannaBeCrunchyMama:

If he's only up once a night at 2 am, you should consider yourself lucky. My 6 1.2 week old still wakes up every 45 mins-2 hours.

He should be going through a little growth spurt right now, from what I've read the end of this growth spurt should bring on some longer sleep periods.  

THIS. One night waking is awesome. I'm so jealous!

momofmanyinthemitten

I just follow the routine: wake up, eat, play, nap. Even if she naps for only 30min, when she wakes up, she knows that she gets to eat (and she lets me know that!). At night, she will generally sleep 9pm-8am, with 2-3 feedings in there.

Nic.NY

I should clarify, my little one is not only waking at 2 am, he is also waking at 4ish and then at 6:30/7ish and will usually finally wake up at around 8:45 - 9:00 am.  I know that it takes time and he is still little, I was just wondering about the "schedule/routine."  Thanks moms!!