Feeding Question

tiffanymuegge

It has been too long since DS1 was a baby and I've forgotten....how do you know when to go up on their oz per feeding?  Right now, the twins are 6w4d and are taking 4 oz every 2 1/2 - 3 hours. 

Also, I see lots of people posting that their babies STTN around 8 weeks.  We are still getting up every 3 hours.  Would giving them more at their last bottle make any difference as to how long they sleep before waking up for a feeding - or when do I start decreasing the oz. in their middle of the night bottles?

I go back to work on Monday and I'm sooooo dreading all the middle of the night feedings and then having to be up at 6:00 a.m. 

I would love to hear suggestions as to how to drop one of the night feedings to start getting them towards STTN around 8 weeks or so....

AlishaMay

Our pedi told us that using the formula of 2-2.5oz in a 24 hr period is a good rule of thumb to go by, and this always worked well for us too.  Also, I'd read somewhere that babies are generally able to take in enough nutritionally to sustain them through the night when they are around 11lb.  That's when my girls did it, at 12 weeks.

When I decided to set my mind to getting my girls to both STTN, I took a look at how much they were eating in a 24 hour period. Then I tried to reorganize what they took at each feeding to get them a larger bottle at what I wanted to be bedtime, then I was just 'topping them off' when they woke up. At one point, our bottle schedule looked something like this: They consumed 18 oz in a 24 hour period
7am - 3oz
11am - 3 oz
3pm - 3 oz
7pm - 4oz
11pm - 3 oz
3am - 2oz

As they got used to this, I'd 'rob Peter to pay Paul' and take ounces from the 11pm and 3am feeds, and add them to feedings throughout the day. Pretty soon they dropped down to just the 3am feed, and were only taking 1-2 oz when they woke up. At this point I knew that they really weren't getting full from this bottle, and didn't really need it nutritionally.  Shortly after that, they seemed to realize it too, because they just stopped waking up for it!

 

shellshavintwins

My girls started sleeping at nights w/o feedings at 12 weeks. By then they were up to 6 oz every 2 - 3 hours.

ProwdMommy

My boys will sleep for around 5 hour stretches on most nights and they are taking 5 oz when they have a bottle.  I mostly BF so I assume they are getting 4-5 oz when they BF too.  And sttn for some people may be defined one way and for others another way.  So when my guys sleep from 12-5 with no feedings I say they have sstn, but others may say that is not sttn. 

erinruns

If my girls were consistently draining every bottle I would go up an ounce and see how they did.

Like the previous poster, when I started getting serious about STTN I looked at their daily intake and tried to get as much of that as possible in them during the day.  The biggest part of that was feeding every 2.5 - 3 hours, which you're already doing.  

You're close!  As they can start taking more during the day, they'll stretch out their nighttime sleep.