Sleep through the night at 4 1/2 months

My twins are now 4 1/2 months old and the pediatrician told us they don't need the night feedings and so we should just let them cry it out. I don't have the heart to do it nor the nerves to listen to them scream for who knows how long at night so I need to try something different. They are also in the same room and so I am affraid they will feed of eachother in crying and it will end us a crying fest for longes than it needs to. My son wakes up every 3-4 hours to feed but has gone 5-6 hours at times. My daughter does the same but she has gone as long as 7 hours before too. So HELP! I have no idea what to do.

 

If you don't want to do CIO then you don't have to do it. If you want to continue the night feedings then continue the night feedings.

 

Do they take a pacifier? If so, when they wake, try giving the paci before feeding them. You may find that they will put themselves back to sleep.

 

You could always try offering a bottle of water at night and hopefully over the course of several nights they'll realize it's not worth waking up for just water. Also I agree with pp's, if you feel it's too early to cut out their night feedings, don't. DS was always the smaller baby and he didn't sleep through the night until 4 1/2 months. I let him cut them out on his own and he did once he started taking 6 ounces at each feeding during the day. I'm not a big fan of CIO at that young of age. Just do what you think is best for your babies.

 

I agree, if you don't think they(or you!) are ready for CIO, I wouldn't do it. It requires consistency, so you really have to make your mind up and stay strong! I would offer a paci if they take one.

 

I couldn't bring myself to let them full blown cio so young so what I did was go to them when they woke up but spent about 15 min trying to settle them back to sleep without feeding them. If nothing was working I'd feed them but then it was 15 min longer. I also never went backwards in the time between feedings. If they had consistently gone 4 hours between the dream feed and the next feeding and then they woke at three hours, I didn't feed them til 4 hrs (I used a paci, soothing, whatever it took). This helped them slowly increase their daytime calories to make up for what they didn't get the night before. Eventually they fill up enough during the day that the night feedings aren't necessary. (I hope that makes sense, I have five distractions running around me! :gah: )

 

My peds told me the same thing, so I tried the CIO. Last night was night 5. They slept from 7:30 until 5a.m.

I seperated them, checked up on them evey five minutes. I let them know I was there and gave them binkey's. They took turns sleeping through this week, but last night they both did.

I have two other children and work full time so I really was willing to do this. I was desperate.

My boys were also 5 weeks early and the peds still encouraged me.

You could try it and if after a few days they don't seem ready try again next month.

 

We would go in twice to replace a pacifier, but never fed them. If they did it more then twice we let them cry.