My baby gave me a little bit of false hope a week and a half ago – he slept through the night. I was so excited the next morning, but of course didn’t want to count my chickens. The next night it was only one feed and again the following. The night after that he slept through again. I thought I had it made! Bub was sleeping through at eight weeks. But it seems this is not to be. He has reverted to 2.5 – 3 hourly feeds. I know growth spurt is the initial reaction but I have my doubts. About the only routine we have is that he falls asleep at about 6-6:30 pm. I have tried to keep him awake, but this is impossible. I have bounced him in the bouncy chair as I cook dinner, and talked to him as his eyes closed. I have stripped him off and changed nappies, I have even taken him for a bath. Now you have to be pretty determined to fall asleep in the tub but he did.

I have tried topping him up with dream feeds later at night before I put him to bed, but it seems (as I have suspected all along) it is near on impossible to convince him to do anything not on Harley time. He will sleep with pursed lips or gooey smile and eyes closed as I tempt with the boob, not having a bar of it. Perhaps I’m not persuasive enough but what do they say about never waking a sleeping baby…

The only thing I can think of is that we were visiting rellies when he slept through. He was having pretty big days with lots of cuddles and visits. So maybe that is the key – keep him awake during the day. It sounds easier than it is. We are pretty active during the day and often out and about. IF he is ready he will just sleep through whatever we are doing. I was running with him the other day and as I bounced over potholes in the jogging pram I looked down to check he wasn’t falling lopsided and there he was sound asleep little head bouncing along happily.

The other thing that was different on those magic nights was that he slept in the port-a –cot beside our bed instead of in his cot jutted up against our bed as he normally does. He was a tiny bit further away. Perhaps I just slept thorough his nightly stirrings and he settled himself more.

Who knows? All I know is at the moment we live in random house and each night I wake with excitement looking to see what time he has slept till. Ususally that is met with a ‘oh crap it’s only been two hours’ before I drag myself up and out of bed. Cuddling his wiggling body to me the weariness disappears and I marvel at the feeling of closeness as I am able to comfort my child.

Routine smootine, I guess we are just going to ride it out. And besides we are visiting again soon so I can test the theories.