I don't know what I'm doing with feeds! Help!

[mouse9210]

Im confused as to what is best with feeding my baby...sorry for the long message but I'm so confused!

My daughter is 3 weeks old and I have been expressing since day one with her. I express every 3-4 hrs in the day, and at night I just do it once or twice so She usually has one or two forumla feeds in the night. I'm expressing about 100ml each time, and she has most of this each feed.

In the daytime I have been feeding her every two hours...if she is asleep I will wake her up to feed her. At night she sleeps for 2.5 hours at a time then wakes up for a feed herself. The HV suggested I wake her every two hours in the day time as giving her shorter sleeps in the day will encourage her to sleep longer in the night.

She is generally quite awake from 9-11am and then from about 4-8pm...in the evenings she will feed little and often and nap in between but won't have a deep sleep.

Has anyone else done this? I'd it ok to be doing scheduled feeds in the day but on demand at night?

I feel like this is all such a minefield and I don't know what I 'should' be doing!

 

[MrsT2011]

It's entirely up to you Hun but I've always fed on demand and I exclusively express all Bs feeds.
I've never woken him up for a feed, sometimes he will nap for 1 hour during the day or up to 3 hours! No matter how much he sleeps or eats he sleeps the same at night 7.30 pm to about 3 then back down till about 7.
I believe in following baby's lead xxx

 

[Kayelle]

I personally wouldn't wake baby to feed, but I feed on demand. Sometimes he slept a few hours a day others barely anything, but wether we have a good day or bad, and however many times he wakes for a feed at night he will sleep from 8/9 ish till 6/7/8 ish (with at least 2 feeds a night)

 

[Karate Kid]

I have always fed on demand, it's personal preference but my view is baby know what s/he needs. Sometimes C will cluster feed and go down for longer, now that I am BFing he will sometimes 'snack' meaning he has smaller more frequent feeds! Xx

 

[mouse9210]

Thanks guys!

Amazingly she slept for 3.5 hours twice last night so I'm feeling loads more rested this morning!

I love the idea of dong it on demand in the day, but when we did this at the beginning she had longer sleeps in the daytime and shorter ones at night...

 

[Butterflykisses]

I have always fed on demand and LO is breast fed. He will go 2 or 3 hours during the day then after he's had his bath at night it's every hour which I feel is him filling up to sleep his normal 8 hours which he does most nights, has wee 15 minute top up and will normally sleep another 2-3 hours. It was hard at the start but to be honest I've just gone with the flow and it has definitely gotten easier.