When to stretch feeding?

Hi Mommies

Today my girls are 2 weeks old, being single babies they would have been born today at 38 weeks. My question is - When can we start stretching their feeds to 4 hourly? I know it's to soon now but would like to know in advance to keep me motivated when doing the 2 o'clock feed in the mornings

Thank you.

Luv
Zellie

Mine went onto 4 hourly feeds when they reached about 60ml 3 hourly. they first were streatched to 3 and half hours for one day and then 4 hours the next. How much do they weigh now? I don't think you can do 4 hourly before 2kg

Zellie I think we all done it differently but I tried everything and couldn't get it right. I never had to wake my babies, they were on the dot 3 hourly feeded and they would scream the roof of if I don't want to give them food, now like I said the first day they went to daycare they moved to 4 hours at 4,5 months only

I must say I didn't care because I know they need the feeding and need to pick up weight and when they were admitted to hospital again I was so happy I done that because everytime they loose alot of weight while in hospital!!

Hi

Kerry - Abigail weighed just over 2 kg on Monday and Clarice almost 2.1kg. Going for a weigh in on Tuesday next week. They are both drinking 50ml per 3 hourly feed now.

Melanie - I hope I can get them to 4 hourly feeds before then, but if not I'll stick it out. Luckily they don't wake up for their feeds, I still wake them. But I did once snooze to long and Clarice woke up 15 minutes later crying, so I know they will not give up the 3 hourly feeds just yet.

Is there anything one can give them for gas? Seems that they are passing a lot of gas after a feed and I wonder if that could be the reason why they are not settling soon after a feed. I see you can only use Gripe water after they reach 2.5kg?

Thank you

Luv
Zellie

Hi Zellie - shame - I remember I couldn't wait to move onto 4 hourly feeds! You need to ensure your babies are getting enough nutrition in a 24 hour period - so as the others say - it depends on how much they take in in one feed whether you do 6, 7 or 8 feeds per 24 hr period.

To calculate their required intake you take their weight and multiply it by 150 - 180 ml. ie 2kg x 180ml = 360ml.

What I did was 7 feeds per 24 hr period for quite a while. I would feed them at around 10 pm and then leave them to wake up by themselves. It was usually after about 4 hrs. Then during the day I did every 3 hours. It worked quite well. My schedule went something like:

6am
9am
12pm
3pm
6pm
10pm
2am

I used the cripe water about 3 days after they got out of NICU and they were 2.16 and 2.15kg at that stage. Do you use telement drops? That was a lifesaver to me, used it in every bottle. I used to put the dummy in the gripe water but it didn't work that well because they didn't like the dummies at all!!

My clinic sister told me( maybe you must also go to her, she is in Waverley, starkey avenue) that to keep them on 3 hours during the day and then leave them to wake by themselves during the night but they are still a bit small, I think rather wait till over 2,5 kg to start doing that.

You can get Telement drops and you put a few drops in the bottle. They used it at the hospital when Damion was born !

Damion was a big baby so I left him to sleep and fed him when he woke up! But he weighed 3.6 (even though he was born at 36.5 weeks!!) I heard you need to wait unti they're around 3 kg's but I'm not sure

Good luck and it'll happen soon!

Hi

Thanks ladies. Ok so from all the info I have now gathered I'll do the following. I'll wait for their weigh in on Tuesday and then when they reach between 2.5-3kg I'll let them wake up by themselves during the night. Thus only stretching one night feed to 4 hours.

Melanie, thank you, I'll definitely go see that clinic sister.

Thanks a mil ladies.

Luv
Zellie

I stretched mine when they were 6 weeks about - ie at their due date, they were about 3.2kgs then. I also used the Telement drops before feeds, they also got that in the NICU.

Hi Zellie, I also used the Telement drops. The feedings we are still on three hourly feeding during the day. At night I leave them to wake now, it took a bit long for Carmen, she only weighs 3.4kg now. But during the day they just can't make anything longer than 3 hours and 10 minutes!!

Hey Zellie
Mine was on 3hours for at least the first 6-8 weeks. But remember this means 3hours gaps during the day....

i followed the same routine as Paulae from Day 2 at home. Every 3 hours during the day and then their last feed in the evening was at 9:30, and then they woke between 1 and 2 for a night feed, and then they woke again around 5.

When we reached 5/6 weeks they started stretching the night time feed to 3 o'clock and then suddenly they did not wake anymore but woke only at 5.

But another important factor was that i was bottlefeeding (formula) and not breastfeeding exlusively.
If you are exclusively breastfeeding you have to stimulate the milk during the night as well - so that night time feeding is important for breast milk production.


My girls went onto 4 hour routine only after 3 months old... and they are still on a plusminus 4 hour routiine now.