# Night feeding - how to know when they are hungry?



## Mrs Doddy

During the day is not a problem as I can see her hunger cues but at night if I hear her stir (which is only normally when she is waking up) making little stretchy noises I get up get the bottle ready and go and get her up, I don't let her get to the point of making any real noise otherwise she will wake h. Last night I did just this, got up made bottle came back to get her and she was asleep !!! I sat there for a while and she didn't wake up so I went back to bed !!! She stirred again 3/4 of a hour later at which point I got her up as the bottle could only be used got another hour, should I have done this or waited till she made more of a cry to know she was properly awake and wanting it ??


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## Pepper&Harry

Hi,
I bf so maybe not the best to answer, but something I have been attempting to teach myself to do (!!) is to wait until my lo is truely awake before feeding him - babies wake many times (due to short sleep cycles) and need to learn to go back to sleep so if you respond to all their little wakes then you might inadvertently teach them to wake up more often (I did this as I would respond to his every sigh movement as I was/am so in tune with his waking). Sounds like it might be trickier with ff though as I guess you don't want her to be too distressed......Good luck!!


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## Mrs Doddy

Yeah that's the thing as don't want her to be upset as it takes 5mins or so to sort bottles


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## RandomGirl09

It varies for me. Sometimes she will sleep 11pm till 6am without a feed. (very rarely lol)
Usually up for a feed at 3am aswel though.
If she starts stirring, i'll leave her to see if she goes back to sleep. She stirs a lot in the night. If she starts crying and sucking on her sleeve and then I know for sure she's hungry.


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## sunshine114

I would try settling her back to sleep using whatever methods you use. If she doesn't settle properly then I would give her the bottle.


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## RandomGirl09

When my mum looks after her in the day, she'll feed her when she's not really that hungry. She'll take 2 oz and then is hungry every 2 hours for the rest of the day. Drives me crazy! :wacko: ha, she means well.


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## Gingerspice

I would wait until Lo actually wakes. As others have said, they need to be able to learn how to pass between the different sleep phases, and getting the idea this is done by a being fed will lead to worse problems in the future.
Has OH said that it wakes if they stat to cry? My OH will only wake up if they go into a full on meltdown cry, so I will just have the bottle of cooled boiled water to hand and tip the powder in once they wake and then feed. LO will take, especially at night, the bottle without it being warm. I think men have a remarkable ability to completely switch off at night, so it does take more than a crying baby to wake them.


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## taylor197878

i wait till my little girl gets up she will cry if she is hungry as she does alot of streching at night and groaning, 

she normall feeds at 11pm and on a few occasions hasnt woke up till bewteen 5-6am and we dont wake her up if they are hungry they will wake up.

plus if u make a bottle and she goes bk to sleep its kinda a bottle wasted.


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## OmarsMum

I used to wait until he wake us. then try to settle him with patting & his dummy, if he goes back to sleep I dont offer a feed. He dropped his night feeds at 12 wks & started to go for 12-13 hrs at night with no feeds xx


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## GingerNut

I'd wait for crying to start too, they make a lot of noises at night that are unrelated to wanting to eat. 

I used to have 4 bottles of water beside the bed ready, and a dispenser of formula, so all I had to do was chuck in the powder, swirl it around and put it in her mouth. She never had to wait very long! Thankfully these days we don't have to bother having a bottle ready as she goes from 7 to 7. You won't know yourself when you get to that stage : )


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## Mrs Doddy

When she groans and grunts she does self settle, i will try tonight to wait until she cries out and will get up as soon as she does this, maybe I will get an extra hours sleep or so !!


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