| if he's happily babbling away, why are you going to pat him to sleep? leave him alone, he may go back to sleep himself.
personally, i have always fed my child if they wake up in the middle of the night. it's a pain in the neck and it lasted until my son was 2 (and now happening with my daughter) but really it isn't that much of a problem (except i get tired, but i have an awesome husband who helps A LOT!). I expect that my daughter will be the same, but i'm not stressed about it. my son has slept through almost every single night since he was 2 (now 3yr3m). well, that's not technically right, he wakes up has a sip of juice and goes back to sleep on his own.
my figuring is... i sleep with a bottle of water by my bed and i get thirsty and drink from it throughout the night. my husband has the same thing and now my son wakes up to drink some juice, so isn't it possible that baby wakes for a feed, not because she is hungry, but because she is thirsty?
if this is the case, then she doesn't need the same full on feed as when she was smaller and it was out of hunger. when my girl is a little older, i will try giving her a no spill cup to see if she'll drink from that instead of a bottle.  |