4 month growth spurt or sleep regression? Do you feed?

kerby1013 · August 2012

I am all kinds of confused.....FTM for ya:-) So my LO is now waking up every three hours during the night where he was sleeping 9-10 hours straight before. Is there a 4 month growth spurt and I should be feeding him? Or is this what people say the 4 month old sleep regression is? Do I feed my LO? I have been and he feeds and goes right back to sleep but I have read that some say if your LO slept that long before, you shouldn't feed them as it gets them dependent on you again (not sure if I believe that). What are you doing???? Help!!!!!

mben1119 · August 2012

Feed him. The idea that they dependent on it is mostly bull_shit. DS went through his wakefuls, and I fed him every time he got up, and he STTN just fine.

waltzingmatilda13 · August 2012

We are going through this right now. I tried the first couple nights to soothe and put the pacifier back in, but he refused to go back to sleep, so I fed him. He ate and went straight back to bed. If your LO is eating, he is hungry, so don't hesitate to feed him. He should go back to sleeping better soon.

nicole0066 · August 2012

If they are hungry and eating feed them. Even if it not a standard growth spurt they are doing so much continuous growing and might have a "hungry" few days. You could also try patting back to sleep, but if it doesn't work then I wouldn't hesitate to feed them.

oliversmommy32912 · August 2012

We are going through the same thing. Well, except the used-to-sttn-thing....DS never did that lol. But now he is waking three times at night instead of one time. He is taking five ounces at each of those feedings so he is obviously hungry. If he was only taking an ounce and going back to sleep we would probably try to soothe in other ways instead but I figure if he is taking full feedings he must be growing and need the extra calories.

anythingelseplease · August 2012

We went through this- at 4 months she went from sleeping 5-6 hour stretches to 2 hour stretches on a good night. Sometimes when she woke she wanted to eat and other times she wanted to be rocked back to sleep. I would rock her and try to soothe her first, if that didn't work I would feed her. It just kept getting worse and worse and she was waking 6-10 times in the night and I was feeding her like crazy so we turned to sleep training. We let her CIO, but only to get her to go to sleep initially, if she woke in the night I still went to her and fed her. Within a few days of starting she cut her night-time wake ups down to 2. So I feed her at these times. I was very afraid to make her CIO in the middle of the night not truly knowing if she was hungry or not. So she did not become dependent on all of those night-time feedings (but she also didn't need to be fed so many times either). Now that she is able to get herself to sleep without my help she only wakes when she is hungry so I feel more confident that she needs to be fed when she wakes. I am thinking (hoping) that she will let go of these feedings when she doesn't need them any longer.

jeffsjayme · August 2012

We went through this for a week or so - just ended last week. I fed him, for the most part. A couple of times, I was able to comfort him without feeding him, but for the most part, he wanted fed. Eventually it ended and it only took a week for us.

Sportsync · August 2012

We are approaching 4 months and we're going through the same thing. She has always been a great sleeper (9pm-4am then again until 7am almost every night since we got home from the hospital), but the last 10 days or so has been up at 12am, again at 3am, and then 630am she's up for good. This isn't "bad" comparatively, but after being used to having 7 hours of sleep, it's exhausting to only get 3 at a time!

I fed her every time she woke since she always eats eagerly, and that gets her back down to sleep easily. The last 2 days we're back to the 9p-4a schedule, except now she goes back to sleep until 8am or 9am! I think she's just growing and trying to build my supply up for the next few months until we start her on some food. If they're hungry- just feed them. They should know the difference between night and day by now, but their tummies might not know it yet. I think they are too young to learn the cause and effect of waking & being fed before about 6 months or so. At 4 months, I'm still going to give her whatever she "asks" for

Good luck getting back to those long sleeps!

bitsybubbles7 · August 2012

Still going through this. LO was sleeping 10-12 hours a night until about 4 1/2 months. Then he was up 3 times a night, then 2, now we're at one... I'm hoping he's back on his was to sttn. Good luck.

4 month growth spurt or sleep regression? Do you feed?

Re: 4 month growth spurt or sleep regression? Do you feed?

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