sleep length

Now I'm assuming its normal I just want to check..

Ethan has always slept well during the day 3-4 hours at a time though lately less and awake more which is normal..but my question is when he was on normal formula (and at then end of bfing) he was starting to sleep 6-7 hours.. then we changed him to Neocate(2 weeks and one stretch of 7 hours) and now Pepti Junior and he will do one of 5-6 hours and the rest 3-4 and 45 mins-2 hours daytime.. often with a dummy replacement in the first one..

is that normal for them to regress? i realise 5 hours is considered sleeping through the night..just wondering if i can expect 6-7 hours again anytime soon..3 months of no sleep isnt that great:) hehe though DH has helped this weekend with feeds I'm still awake for them:(! and some days he doesnt want dummy but other days he screams for it:(

I was talking to Plunket nurse about this very thing as we've been finding the same with Rohann particularly with day sleeps (she said it's like they take a step backwards at times) and apparently it can be a developmental thing, especially as they become more aware of things they find it harder to settle backdown between sleep cycles as they are becoming more alert and stimulated etc, but apparently it settles back down.

My question is what are you supposed to do when they are the doing the short nap thing about feeding.
We are (trying) to follow the sleep/eat/play routine and if she only sleeps for 45min - 1 hr it often means it's only been (at most) 2 hours since her last feed which seems too soon to feed her (she is on formula) and if we do feed her she will only have a small amount and we don't really want to encourage snacking. What do you do in this situation???

Sorry for thread jacking KA   

oh emz:) that's fine..and what Jack is doing is what they 'normally' do between 3-6 months according to my book in terms of sleeping.. one nap in morning one at lunch time ish and one late afternoon (4-6ish)

maybe i should have learnt to sleep when he was sleeping i never was good at that:)

Tiff - that works when they're younger but then they start being awake more than in bed during the day. Basically I feed Jack 4-hourly (he only went to 4-hourly about 3-4 weeks ago as I realised he wasn't having the recommended amount of formula) and just play with him if he is up, and put him to bed when he has tired signs or if its been more than 2 1/2 hours (otherwise he gets overtired like just before when DH didn't realise why he was grumpy! ) So I would just put Rohann to bed when she's tired or you think she should be due for a sleep, otherwise try and let her tell you when she's hungry. Snacking can be a very hard cycle to break trust me!

5-6am i can handle.. esp if he slept at 7pm:) !

emz- what was he doing before that in terms of hours?....cause you say you realised he wasnt getting enough?

Tiff - you are not a bad mother... lots of people can ttell..its hard with Ethan sometimes too!(oh hes crying it makes me so sad listening to him making that noise but he wont settle wont take dummy:( he laughs when we go in to put it in after crying for it I don't like CC or CIO but what else can we do:( ) with Ethan he starts sucking the dummy harder..and his fingers and sometimes its only 2 or 2.5 hour gap ..

the sleep feed play thing is a basic guide for a routine.. i still do it mostly.. but i spend some time playing with him and after that i leave him for some chill out time without me while i go do something so he gets at least 15 mins every time learning to hang out with himself:)

so what do you do at the moment that you think will help her to eat more if you change?

so they eat little and often because any more and it hurts? how long between feeds atm?

ah i see thanks:)

yes but its been going on for about 10 days now.. he wanted more in his bottles but is back to 150 every 3 hours or so.. so what did they say about how to get him to sleep longer...if i put dummy back in most times he will go off again but i just figure thats not great sleep:( so it will be either one or two sleep cycles with one sleep of 3 hours or so ...(in daytime) i try to have him up an hour or so but he either goes straight to sleep or takes 30 or so mins to go to sleep.. no pattern really.. mostly he goes straight to sleep when up at night though...

yeah i guess.. at night its hard to get to him before he wakes though i do tend to wake a few mins before he needs me.. like last night he did 7-845(rewrapped and dummied) then slept till 1225(tried to get him to sleep again) fed..then sleep and up at 215 (for dummy ) and then awake 445..eventually got him up at 515 after trying to give him dummy then sleep at 545.. its not normally that bad.. :( one bad day i can handle..its several in a row that does my head in!