Feeding & Sleeping Questions

[gottabecrazy]

Hello lovelly BH Ladies (and the one or two gentlemen)

I have a feeding/sleeping question hoping to get some thoughts

Now some back ground so we are all on the same page

So my girls are 20wks (10wks corrected) formula feed 4hrly feed girls (so 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm, 12am, 4am)

the little one also has really bad reflux still working on the right mixture of solutions will get there evenutally

They have for the last 6 nights slept through the 4am feed (no problems about that from me) they on a couple of morning been restless from 6am but pop a dummy in and they go back to sleep till 8am (usually its cause one or both with elbow the other one)

So now we have dropped the 4am feed thats only 5 feeds a day now tonight it looks like they dont want to wake for their 12am feed and i'm happy to let them sleep but i am worried that if i do this they will wake for the 4am feed and i rather they slept throught that one and woke at 8am then again they might not wake at 4am

so i quess my question is what would you do would you dream feed them at 12am so they sleep until 8am mind you i can only do this with one bubba as the little one needs to be held for 20mins after a feed or wake them up to feed so they sleep till 8am or try your luck and hope they sleep right through

Also if they did go between feeds say 8pm to 8am would you up the other 4 feeds to make up the feeds so going off the xstandard feed measuring for formula feed bubs say on 5 feeds shes getting 120mls and for 4 feeds would be getting 170mls that is based on her current weigh

I hope all this make sense as you can see its after 12am so head has stopped working ..and hope you all can shed so advice for me or even what your routines are for sleeping at night

Thanks Ladies

[trishalishous]

I would definately up the day feeds to help them keep sleeping through. if you find they won't take the whole amount, maybe feed 3 hourly in the day and squeeze in the extra feed that way?
we have a baby led routine, but my sister did use a parent led routine with her twins.
I remember that around 6 months at bedtime one was breastfed, and the small one expressed milk+formula (she had a tongue tie and couldn't attach)
she loosely followed bath, massage, feed, bed within an hour timeframe, with her DHs help.
hth

[blondekelli]

I would give a dreamfeed a go but earlier than 12. Maybearound 10:30ish? My baby also had reflux and I would give her a dreamfeedbut would just hold her upright asleep on my shoulder for 15-20 minutes before I put her down. She would then sleep through the night. Try giving then more during the day if they will take it, but soon they will be supplementing with solids.

[blondekelli]

Oh yes. Like trish mentioned. Once ruby was sleeping through the night I changed her to 3 hourly during the day. 6, 9, 12, 3, 6 and dreamfeed. We dropped the dreamfeed after about 4 weeks

[cobbec]

Emma, I agree with Kelli. I would do 3hrly feeds thru the day and dreamfeed around 10.30pm. See if this helps. Abbi is 20wks and sleeps from 7-8pm thru til 8am and she is formula fed. She no longer has the dream feed and I am starting her on solids now also. I feed when she wants it so I have a baby led routine but this is much harder with twins... all you can do is experiment and if it doesn't work try something else... Good luck.

[gottabecrazy]

trishalishous - Thanks your sister was very lucky to have help ...DH needs to sleep early due to his line of work as its dangerous for him not too so most times i'm solo

blondekelli -Thanks My little refluxer wakes as soon as you move her so if shes not in my arms she screams blue murder your lucky she wont go over my shoulder i basically have to hold her upright againgst my body... shes fighting againsgt me as i type this its taking me about 20mins just to get this far

Cobbec - thanks for sharing what you do

well the slept till 4:30am which was a pain in the butt cause now the little one is have bad reflux when normally this feed she does usually and i can smell her sister needs her butt changed but i havent mastered on handed nappy changing yet lol

unfortunatly 3hrly feeds is not an option im will to go back to 1 cause of the reflux when they were on 3hrly Taylah would scream all through the night every night and vomit alot now that only happens every now and then and with twins feeding solo by the time you feed hold settle wash bottles you have to start again :banghead2:

Solids are still 4mths away for the girls remembering they are 20wks (10wks corrected) i cant wait until they can cause they say that reflux does settle once you start solids

thanks for responding ..i'll see what happens tonight might make their feeds during the day the same and make the one at 8pm the bigger one to help get them through the night

now to change that nappy cause the smell in killing me and i need a :coffee:

[Timestwo]

I wouldnt do 3hourly ff with a reflux bub or a dreamfeed, mine both had reflux and it only made it worse. How are their weights now? If they have cracked the magic 3kg mark and are following a good growth curve then I would continue to feed 4hourly during the day (remembering formula is heavier and takes longer to digest than BM) and let them go at night until they wake up in the hope that they will gradually keep pushing back that feed until morning. If they are dropping night feeds then it sounds like they are getting enough during the day.
With their bottles, a good way to tell how much to give them rather than what the tin says is to offer enough that they just leave a little bit in the bottom. If they are draining bottles then offer more. I used to keep 1 spare bottle made up in the fridge that I could use to top up the other bottles across they day if they needed more so I didnt waste as much formula.
I also had to feed my twins solo because of my husbands work and found it much easier to have them awake when feeding (waking the other one to feed as well). I would wait for the 1st one to wake, change nappy and then pop into the bouncer. Then wake the 2nd one, change nappy (if the first one isnt screaming, otherwise I would do it after the feed) and pop into bouncer and feed them at the same time. You can also use a rolled up towel to help 'prop' the bottle while you are burping one twin to stop the other from crying because the feed as stopped. Once they get a little bit bigger and manageable, it becomes easier to burp them one handed while holding the bottle for the other one! Once they are both fed you can then put the non-reflux twin back to bed while you hold up the other one.

[gottabecrazy]

timetwo _ LOL exactly what i do now .. but they usually have the 12am feed and then sleep until 8am but last night never woke until 4:30am which sucked cause i was sleepy and split the bottle

i dont heat the formula so putting in the fridge is no good for me

i just let the second one scream cause i cvhange nappies before the feed otherwise the lose the feed in vomit

i dont go off the tins either i use go by 150*weight*#of feeds = mls

[Timestwo]

I never heated bottles either, room temp all the way here! The extra bottle made up in the fridge was just to top up the feed if they drained the bottle unexpectedly. Id only make a small one of like 50-100ml

You sound like you have things worked out. Id just let them wake for a feed, they sound like they are doing terrific not waking until 4:30am and they will gradually push that back later and later. I hear you on the half asleepness though, I used to throw so many bottles down the sink because at 4am its hard to count how many scoops go into the formula and id forget how many I had put in!

[gottabecrazy]

ive done the forgetting the scoops LOL ..over kitchen is 4 flights down from the bedrooms i used to go all the way down stairs but now after the 8pm feed i wash all the bottles and have them and the formula on my dresser to have them ready to go and a small bucket like container to put the dirty ones in and then once all dirty i wash again ...i hated doing 3hrly cause i had to wash bottle more often and i never got a chance ..esp when they do that 20min sleep during the day

[blondekelli]

Emma. Reflux babies are such hard work. Ruby wouldn't sleep laying down at all until we got her medication right. She ended up on quite a high dose of 3/4 losec tablet morning and night. But the result was a completely different baby.

[gottabecrazy]

Did you try the oral form?? The girls are on 0.8 of a ml which is the highest they can have for their weight ...ive been debating on if we should try the tablets but the pharmacy said it would be hard work

[blondekelli]

It is hard work. Not much worse than the liquid though and tablets are mire effective. You just need to make sure you dissolve not crush and that they get all the little white balls. Once ruby was on solids I just dissolve and squirt into her food which us really easy. I dissolved in breast or formula so she wouldn't object as much to it

[Timestwo]

The 3hrly feeds x2 babies was terrible! I had 20 bottles in our rotation and it used to take a good hour or more to wash and prepare them. They took forever to get to 3kg too so I felt like it went on forever!
I didnt find the losec tablets hard work at all and they were the most effective.
I used to dissolve the tablets in 2-5ml of water, gave it a stir once dissolved and then sucked it all up in a panadol/nurfoen syringe and squirted it down the back/side of their mouth. After a few months they used to just suck it out as I squirted to get it over and done with!

[gottabecrazy]

i think i might try the tablets next time bugger the pharmacy what would they know they arent at home with a screaming baby

20 bottles good golly we have 6 * 120ml bottles

tell me about the 3kg mark Taylah only hit 3kg last week lucky being premmie they are used to medicines they never complain i just put it down a teat and they suck it back

[Sonja]

Emma - quick question - you say the girls are 4 months away from starting solids - is that because you're going on the 10 weeks age? I ask because the advice of my DD2's paediatrician was to start her early given her reflux was severe. She wasn't a vomitter - it was silent reflux I was treating. I started her a week or 2 before she was 4 months and it seemed to really help.

Sounds like you've got some great advice here - I may need to follow it when #3 arrives!

[gottabecrazy]

Sonja - Hi yes it is i always go from their corrected age ..if their NICU dr said to start solids early i would on his advice i have also heard its does help with reflux however i have also heard starting solids early in general can cause bad food allergies

[Sonja]

Emma - re the allergies - you're correct that was the theory - the age moved to 6 months a few years ago (around the time I had DD1) as there were so many allergies in kids but when I had DD2 a year and a half ago my CHN said it's gone back to 4 to 6 months as they've found delaying starting has made no difference to allergies. no doubt you'll get a lot of views on this but that's just what DD2's paed and CHN advised, and what we followed.

[trishalishous]

re allergies and solids, yes they currently advise 4/5months if your bubs is FORMULA fed.
breastfed its best to wait till 6 months (and we aren't introducing wheat, dairy or egg until 9-12 months- 1 each month with egg last)
the allergy studies were conducted on FF babies, they tend to have higher allergy rates than BF apparently.
(i have a copy of the study somewhere, will check my computer next time I'm on it)

[gottabecrazy]

It's funny pre the girls I always thought I'd be the person who didn't read into things too much but ad they are premmie they had a rough start and I don't want to make things worse I remembered that my mum gave me a book on weaning with a lot of good recipes (not related to my point but worth mentioning) and the small paragraph on premmies says not to delay and wait for corrected age

Thanks for the info it was put into the memory bank :-) for when I see the doc again

Well the girls are asleep again for the 12 feed but I slighty over Taylah at the 8pm feed and woke her a little and she had a small feed and Bridget eats a little they goes back to sleep Mmm all I'll find the right method soon enough hopefully the will sleep 8am again


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[Timestwo]

Solids did help with our reflux but they were also crawling and sitting up at the same time as starting solids so it could have been a combination of things.
Our Paed gave the go ahead for early solids here as well but my 2 wouldnt have a bar of it until they were 6 months old anyway. Have you also tried thickening their formula with Karicare thickener?

Yay for cracking that 3kg mark! Its such a big achievement when you have teeny babies! My 2 were 2kg even and 1.9kg the day we left hospital and it took a good 2 months to get to 3kg.

[gottabecrazy]

The thickener make them constipated ..i just managed to clear the pipes LOL