STTN advice needed

the advice i heard most frequently while pregnant was, "keep them on the same schedule and feed them at the same time, or you'll go nuts!" we've followed this advice and fortunately the boys always seem to get hungry at the same time so we've never had to force the schedule on them. it's pretty much like synchronized feeding on-demand.

suddenly it's not so easy. jacob, who at last weigh-in two weeks ago was 10 lbs on the nose, seems ready to go longer stretches at night. owen, who weighed in at 9 lbs 5 oz, isn't quite there yet. they are still asking for food every 3 hours during the day. we put them down for the night between 6 and 7 o'clock, depending on when their last feeding is. these days they pretty regularly go 4 to 4.5 hours before asking for their next bottle. after that they may do another 4 hour stretch but more likely they'll go back to wanting to eat every 3 hours. they've still been pretty in-sync with each other, so when one wakes up after a 4 hour stretch, the other one wakes up with him and is eager to eat.

all of a sudden their needs are diverging. owen still can't go longer than 4.5 hours (he's done a 5 hour stretch only once or twice). jacob, on the other hand, seemed to be ready to go nearly 6 hours last night. so when owen woke up after 4 hours last night jacob totally wasn't ready to consider eating. owen had to eat, so we fed him. we offered jacob the bottle but he was so sleepy that he barely managed to down half an ounce before zonking out again.

but then an hour and a half later jacob woke up ready for a full meal. we fed him but of course owen was still sleeping off his last bottle and wouldn't budge. an hour and a half later (making 3 hours from owen's last feeding) owen woke up ready to eat. but since it had only been an hour and a half for jacob, he wasn't interested. we basically spent the entire night cycling the boys through feedings on separate schedules. it was one of the most sleepless nights we've had in weeks.

so i'm wondering what our expectations should be here. my initial gut reaction was, we've got to get them back to eating at the same time! but i'm wondering if that's unrealistic and not in their best interest. should we just expect to be on separate schedules at night until owen catches up and can go longer stretches? or does anyone have any suggestion for how to get through this phase? have we just been spoiled by the way they've slept and eaten like it's synchronized swimming? i'm also wondering if we're too dedicated to the "on-demand" philosophy and should consider getting them on a schedule, even if it means one has to wait out his hunger for a bit while the other one catches up. i don't personally like the idea of making a hungry baby wait but i know plenty of people rely on a schedule and i'm wondering if it's time to bite the bullet and do less on-demand and more scheduling.

it feels like we either need to figure out how to get them back in-sync or we need to devise a new strategy. i'm looking for advice for either tactic.

 

I always woke the other one up to eat. Now I have one that sleeps through and one that wakes once. Since I know DS will sleep through I no longer bother to wake him. When they were only off by an hour or so I definitely woke the other one up though.

 

I kept them on the same schedule during the day, but didn't worry about it at night. One of my girls slept through the night at 10 weeks, the other followed a few weeks later.

 

QUOTE(piccologirl @ Jan 2 2009, 03:28 PM) [snapback]1129908[/snapback]
it feels like we either need to figure out how to get them back in-sync or we need to devise a new strategy. i'm looking for advice for either tactic.


We went to a new strategy when this started happening. We each took a baby at night and we were responsible for "that" baby all night. So then only one of us was getting up each time with one baby and we were letting the them wake on their own. Worked well for us. GL!

 

QUOTE
We went to a new strategy when this started happening. We each took a baby at night and we were responsible for "that" baby all night. So then only one of us was getting up each time with one baby and we were letting the them wake on their own. Worked well for us. GL!

This is what we did also. We didn't alternate babies, but instead always had the same one. DH cared for Jacob and I cared for Aaron. Thankfully they both woke 1x/night to eat. And thankfully they started STTN within a week of each other.

 

For me, I would keep them on schedule (every three hours whether they wanted it or not) through the day time, but at night I'd feed on demand. basically when I felt it was time to wake up, usually one would wake up, I'd wake the other so they'd be on schedule through the day, but once it was night time I'd encourage them to sleep through their wake periods, but if one insisted, that one would be fed. Eventually I didn't have to feed either of them adn they both would sleep through the night. Didn't take long at all! They were about 2 1/2 months when they started sleeping through the night (well about 7-8 hours a night uninterrupted) And then they'd just sleep longer to about 12 hours uninterrupted a night.

 

I do the synchronized on demand, too, but once they started stretching out their nighttime sleep, I went totally on demand for nights only. I resynch them (LOL) in the morning with the first feed at around 6:30/7! I stoped waking them to eat together when they first started going longer stretches (5-6 hours at about 2 months) and pretty soon DD was STTN (10 hours) and DS followed soon after. Now the night wakings are so rare I wouldn't even dream about waking the other!

 

thanks for the advice, i feel pretty good about what i'm reading and i think we can find something that works for our family.

you know, it never occurred to me to try to soothe them back to sleep instead of immediately shoving the bottle at them. if it's 3 hours or more i assume any nighttime restlessness is hunger. i've never tried to soothe them back to sleep if it's past the 3 hour mark. i wonder if we could encourage them to sleep longer by giving that a try and seeing if they'll fall back asleep.

i've got little preemie guys so i'm always trying to cram more calories into their days. i worry that we'll fall behind in weight gain if i let them go longer without eating. so it's against my instinct to let them go back to sleep without taking the opportunity to nourish them!