Should I put my baby on a nursing schedule to help him sleep at night?

Should I put my baby on a nursing schedule to help him sleep at night?

Gary Feldman (Medical Director, Stramski Disorders Center, Miller Children's Hospital ) gives expert video advice on: Should I nurse my baby whenever he cries at night?; How do I know if my baby is waking up at night because he's hungry?; Should I put my baby on a nursing schedule to help him sleep at night? and more...

So if you want to begin to stretch the intervals between feeds for the child and getting them used to enduring longer times at night where they don't wake up for full feeding, you can work on 15 minute increments, half night increments. You start in 15 minutes a little bit later and then stretch it to, let's say, half an hour. But also bear in mind that if you're introducing solid foods, automatically, the baby is going to be more associated. And so they are not going to want to feed when you expected them before they were introduced on solids. So the whole thing is a continuim. It's very hard to say there are fixed rules or there's a difference in gridlock strategy, or a strict set schedule that you have to stick to because A) every child is different and B) things change. As you introduce, you start with solid feeds once a day- Then you do it twice a day- Then it's three meals. The quantity that they take is different and it increaes as you make those changes so the child is able to tolerate and increases lengths of time before they need to have a bottle.