My 7 week old is very hard to wake and feed properly at 10pm
My 7-week-old daughter is still fed with a split feed at 5pm and 6.15pm and then sleeps from 6.30pm until we wake her at 10.30pm. This is a major challenge, she absolutely does not wake up naturally and is often extremely difficult to wake up (this sometimes taking 30-40 minutes); she then eventually feeds well and sleeps until 4-4.30am although she sometimes wakes at 2.30am and cries for 15 minutes. She does not seem ready to go to one feed at 6pm, as when we get back from her little walk at 5pm she is immediately unsettled and starving and I have no chance of allowing her to play under gym until bath time at 6. Any thoughts or advice would be gratefully received.
She sleeps very poorly at her lunchtime nap. The most successful method so far is giving her a small (30-40ml) top up before she goes down, but she still wakes without fail 45 minutes later and then will cry on and off for half an hour before often (but not always) sleeping through to 2.15 – can I change or improve this? I cannot remember a day that she has slept through in her lunchtime nap.
She weighed 9.2lbs at birth and now weighs 11.8lbs. She is breast fed. 7am 10-15mins one side, 10.30am 10-15mins one side[ difficult at times to get to 10.30am] 11.45am 30ml top up of breast milk, not always accepted. 2.30pm 10-15mins one breast, 5pm 10-15 minutes one breast, 6.15pm 80-90 ml expressed milk in bottle, 10/11pm 10-15 minutes one breast, 4.15am 10-15 minutes breast feed, one breast having expressed 70-80 ml to make sure this feed is not too big. At all feeds my daughter has never wanted the second breast, seeming content with one side only.
She naps at 8.45-9.45am, 12-2.15pm and 4-5pm and is settled by 6.30pm.
Many small babies can be difficult to wake for this feed, but your persistence is paying off as she is feeding well and settling until 4.15am. It can sometimes help to begin waking a young baby around 9.45pm. Put on the lights, open her covers and put on some background noise such as music or the radio. Waking naturally is best for her but you may need to stir her a bit during the next 20-30 minutes by rubbing the backs of her hands and arms and talking to her.
If she continues to sleep well through the night to beyond 4am then accepting she takes time to wake at 10pm is the best idea to follow. If you find you are getting too tired to stay up this late, consider offering this feed as a full expressed one which could be given by your partner so you are able to express and then get an earlier night. As long as your daughter is fully awake whilst being fed she should continue to sleep well at night.
Learning to sleep through the 45 min sleep cycle by day can take time. Your idea of giving her a top up is a good one as you will know she is not waking through hunger. Continue to offer this until she is better at resettling herself or managing to sleep through to 2pm. It can take 20-30 minutes for a baby to resettle themselves. It maybe hard for you to hear her cry but you are letting her learn such a valuable skill. It may take a few weeks for her to manage to do this without such a spell awake at lunchtime. When this happens begin to cut back on her afternoon sleep a little, or she may do this herself having slept better at lunchtime.
Make sure her room is really dark at her nap and also that she is well tucked in. Her Moro reflex may be waking her after 45 minutes if she is not. Use a cotton sheet lengthways across the cot with rolled up towels placed down each side of the cot spars to keep her secure.