So... Eowyn seems to be outgrowing her 3-hour feeding/nap schedule now... but I'm really not sure how to try to adapt it. She's just now going all night without nursing, still having a dream-feed at 10ish and waking for a feeding at 5 am (or 4...yuck)... so I'm loathe to do anything to get her waking up more, but I think she is trying to tell me that she doesn't need to eat as often during the day-- right now she tends to just eat a little at certain feedings and then scarf food down at the next. Partly I think she's just getting really interested in everything around her, but I'm kinda at a loss as to schedule ideas.
One more complicating factor is my job 2 days a week. We have to leave at 7:10, drive for 1/2 an hour, and we leave school at 12:50ish, and drive at least 1/2 an hour home. She often falls asleep in the car, and then won't usually stay asleep or nap once we get home. I can nurse her between 7:45 & 8:15 and 10:30 & 11:30.
Suggestions welcomed!!!
2 comments:
Hannah is often in the same boat. Since I nanny three days a week, she, too, naps in the car and sometimes throws things off because of it. I just try to feed her when she wakes up, even if she has only napped for a little while, just to keep her in the eat/wake/sleep pattern, even if it's not "time" (sometimes she refuses this, sometimes she doesn't, but it generally gets her back on track). When that gets messed up, for Hannah at least, everything else sort of snowballs.
I think the not eating well and then eating a lot thing is typical. I usually try to find a more private place, and she does better then.
How many naps is she taking? Hannah typically naps twice for one or two hours and then has a third "half nap" in the late afternoon/evening. This does not count those dozes in the car, unless they happen to be 45 minutes if I'm running around everywhere. For a while now, she has pretty consistently been up for an hour and a half, taken a nap, up for another hour and a half, taken a nap, skipped her next nap (3 hrs. awake and straight to feeding) and then signaled me for that last half nap by getting cranky too early for bedtime--the timing varies.
This is just Hannah, but I know babies often fall into the same patterns, so maybe something could help. She's a doll! Good luck!
Another thing you might try. Work on dropping the 5 o'clock feeding and then do her first morning feed at 6:45 (just before leaving). Then do your next feeding at 10:30. Try and save the nap for the drive home? and feed her at home. It's funny how being a schedule feeding mom requires flexability isn't it? Annie's right about just trying to keep the eat/awake/sleep cycle as the most important part. And in a month or two it will have all worked it's self out (believe it or not!: )
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