Find out how often to feed baby at night and what night feeding schedule should like when using Babywise. This newborn night feeding schedule for those early weeks will help ensure your baby gets enough feedings each 24 hours and that your milk supply comes in well and is well-established for breastfeeding for as long as you want to.
It is hard to wake a sleeping newborn, and at no time is it harder than in the middle of the night.
Many people warn you to never wake a sleeping baby. Anyone following Babywise knows that we wake a sleeping baby to stay on schedule during the day. We do this so we get enough feedings in the day each day.
But at night…
We all want that sleep. We don’t want to wake to an alarm so we can go wake a sleeping baby in the middle of the night. However, in the first part of your newborn’s life, it is as important to wake a sleeping baby at night as it is during the day.
Nighttime Sleep Schedule for Newborns
If your baby is a sleeper, you will need to wake your baby at night to eat. You will not have to wake your baby at night forever. For the first 5-6 weeks of babies life, you might find yourself waking your baby.
You want to wake infants every 5 hours at night for the first 5 weeks of life.
Babywise
“do not let him sleep more than five hours if you are breastfeeding”.
(page 112)
Now, I am a rule follower by nature, so I have always followed this rule. The purposes of the rule are to
- Ensure baby gets enough feedings in a 24 hour period
- Ensure mom builds an adequate milk supply (applicable for breastfed babies)
But it was not always (or ever) easy. To set my alarm and wake my baby in the middle of the night was no fun.
Get Enough Feedings Per 24 Hours
The first reason listed for waking baby every five hours to make sure your baby gets enough feedings per 24 hours.
Newborn babies starts out life needing 8-10 feedings in a day. So if you feed at the following times for your baby feeding schedule:
7 AM
10 AM
1 PM
4 PM
7 PM
10 PM
That is only 6 feedings. That means you need at least two feedings in the night to get your minimum of 8 feedings in the 24 hour period.
You can easily cut that down to one nighttime feeding by either doing cluster feeding in the evening or feeding every 2.5 hours in the day so you get an extra feeding in there.
>>>Read: How To Use Cluster Feeding to Get Baby Sleeping All Night
Calculate the number of feedings your baby is getting each day so you know how many night feeds are needed. I would recommend you work to get 7 feedings in the day so no more than one is required at night.
Build Adequate Milk Supply
You can definitely be successful with breastfeeding while doing Babywise. I breastfed all four of my babies for at least one year each. It can absolutely be done.
Babywise has some ground rules to help you make sure your breast milk supply is never compromised. One of those rules is to feed every 5 hours at night in the first 5 weeks.
If you want to be successful with nursing for a year (or even less), I encourage you to follow the guidelines in place.
If you are formula feeding, this second reason is obviously not a concern for you. Formula-fed babies do not need to build up milk supply. So if you are bottle feeding, you are just concerned about baby getting enough feedings per 24 hours to get enough calories.
Not Everyone Follows the Rule
Not everyone follows this rule. Many ignore the rule and let baby set the wake up times at night and have great success with no issues breastfeeding. Their baby still nurses for a year with no issues. Some people follow the rule until their baby reaches their birth weight.
Always remember you are the parent and you can decide ultimately what is best for your baby, you, and your family. Some people are more willing to take risks than others.
If you decide to ignore the rule, I would encourage you to carefully be aware of dirty and wet diapers, growth patterns in your baby, and also be aware of your milk supply if breastfeeding.
In a poll on this blog, I asked readers Did you follow the rule to wake a newborn every five hours at night…
Results:
Yes, milk supply good 286 (50%)
Yes, milk supply not good 19 (4%)
No, milk supply good 241 (42%)
No, milk supply not good 22 (4%)
Total of 568 votes
My Own Babywise Babies Newborn Night Feeding Experience
Here is a summary of what I did at night with my Babywise babies.
Brayden: We didn’t start Babywise until 9 weeks old, so no need to follow the rule. I will say, however, that as you might expect, feedings were sporadic at night until we did Babywise, and nursings sometimes went more than 5 hours in the day AND night. We breastfed until a year with no supply issues. He started sleeping through the night (STTN) at 6 months old.
Kaitlyn: I followed the rule. We breastfed until a year with no supply issues. She STTN consistently around 3-4 months old.
McKenna: I followed the rule, and had to wake her at 5 hours every night. We breastfed to a year with no supply issues. She STTN consistently around 2-3 months, but once she reached 5 weeks and I stopped waking her, she woke like clockwork at that 5 hours for a while–which was frustrating. I had to wonder if sleeping would have been better without waking her–but there is no knowing how milk supply would have gone.
Brinley: I followed the rule and had to wake her at night. She didn’t get “stuck” like McKenna did once we hit 6 weeks old. She slept through the night at 8 weeks old. We breastfed to one year old with no supply issues.
Dreamfeed Helps Night Sleep
In addition to waking every 5 hours until 5 weeks old, a Dreamfeed can really help with your night sleep. This is a feeding you do around 10-11 PM. This helps you not need as many night feedings between the Dreamfeed and your first feeding of the day.
>>>Read: The Basics of a Dreamfeed
Have a Consistent Morning Wake Up Time and Bedtime
Another important schedule rule for you to follow for great night sleep is to have a consistent morning wake up time and a consistent bedtime each day.
There will be variations–especially with bedtime. In those early months, you are getting to know baby and baby is getting to know life. Plus growth spurts happen and other disruptions–things will not look perfect every day.
Just do your best.
You can largely control that first feeding of the day.
>>>Read: How to Have a Consistent Schedule: Start Your Day At the Same Time
Always Follow Hunger Cues
Even though you have a feeding schedule and an eat wake sleep routine, if you see a sign of hunger, address it. Read Hunger Cues: How To Know if Baby Is Hungry for help in this area.
Do not assume that your baby needs to eat every time they wake up in the night. Not all night wakes are from hunger. You want to know if those night wakings are from hunger or not so you know if you should feed or not. If you have a young newborn and it has been a normal length of time to need to eat, it is good to feed your baby. But if it has been only 2 hours, be sure your baby is really hungry. They might be awake because they need comfort, diaper changes, or they have stomach issues.
You want the bulk of feedings to be daytime feeds, so you just don’t want to move into having lots of night feeds and not as many feedings in the daytime. This is greatly helped when you put in the effort to feed every 2.5-3 hours during the daytime. You do not want the habit to be eating at night instead of the day.
Conclusion
Do your best to get those night feedings in every 5 hours for the first 5 weeks. It is hard to get up in the night. It isn’t always easy to wake up a sleepy baby to take a feeding. But doing that night-time feeding in the early weeks helps ensure your baby will get enough feedings in a 24-hour period and that your milk supply will establish well. If you get your 7 feedings in between your first feed of the day and the Dreamfeed, you can just od one night feed. The longer stretches of sleep are just around the corner! 5 weeks feels long when you are in the thick of it, but it is a short period of time compared to the entire first year of life.
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This post originally appeared on this blog February 2011