5 month old up at least twice at night to eat

[Natalie17]

My 5 1/2 month old tends to fall asleep while breastfeeding especially his last feed before bed. He wakes once I take him off the breast and is awake when I lay him down. He goes down between 7-7:30 and usually wakes between 1-2:30 I will go in and settle him down with pacifier, but if he falls back asleep it usually only lasts 20 minutes and feeding him is the only thing that gets him back to sleep and then he is up again between 5-7. I’ve given him a couple ounces of expressed bm after his evening nursing session since he dozes off and sometimes it helps him sleep longer and sometimes it doesn’t. Should I give him a bottle before his last nursing session since he stays awake with a bottle? Or should I try sleep training or maybe both?

 

[Bevziibubble]

This is completely normal. I know it's tiring but it's normal baby behavior

 

[Heather.1987]

Very normal behavior.

 

[missielibra]

Dream feeds at this age are absolutely normal and the norm. Hang in there mama

 

[noon_child]

At 5 months my daughter was still waking 3hrly for milk. 7:30 - 1am is a really good amount of sleep (and as it’s more than 5hrs it counts as “sleeping through” in all those ridiculous sleep studies). It shows your baby is eating well, settling well and wakes when he needs something. You are doing a great job by the sounds of it.

If you know the pacifier won’t work for long, just don’t bother, you are adding 20minutes of worrying and hoping when you could just be feeding him and getting back to bed.

 

[blueblue]

Sleep deprivation is hard, especially after a few months. Mine is a couple of months older than yours but still wakes twice a night at the moment (it was once then we had a bad run with rolling and a cold that made twice look amazing). They don't eat much so this may be why. I was hoping they 'd sleep through by now too.

It sounds like they are hungry if they wake after the pacifier?

Maybe try working towards putting them down to sleep awake? Mine does go down awake both first thing at night and slightly drowsy after formula bottle then bf at the night wakings (combi fed baby). They always have but still wake, I do think their sleep is better with it. You could try with the expressed milk one night and see if it does make a difference? You could pump that feed then use it the next night?