Brenda Phipps wrote:
I saw a mom today who is worried that her 2-week old baby "may not be getting
enough".  When I asked why, she says that her baby nurses "constantly",
sometimes 4 hours at a time during the day, and then every hour on the hour
during the rest of the day.  THEN, baby sleeps through the night - from
midnight to 9 or 10 am!  She says the baby sometimes will awake at around 6
a.m., nurses for 15 minutes, and easily falls asleep again until later in the
morning....

I'd like to know if any other LCs have heard of this type of sleep pattern in
such a young infant, and what YOU tell the mom.  THANKS!

Brenda, I once had a call from the mom of a 3-week old (and the mom was a
medical student!).  Baby woke to nurse about 9 AM, slept until 1 PM, woke and
nursed, slept until 5 pm, woke to nurse, slept until 7 PM, woke and nursed
pretty much straight through to 1 AM, then slept until 10 AM.  All other
signs---output, mom's breast comfort, weight gain, were fine.  After talking,
we just had to conclude that he was doing fine and that this pattern of feeds
worked well for her, since her husband was around to keep her company for the
evening marathon.  She had the hospital's booklet (which I had written) that
talked about "8-12 nursings per 24 hours," and this had her confused.  It just
goes to show that we can't expect each individual baby to fit into some
foreordained pattern that the grownups have thought up!

A few years ago I gave a talk with the title "Breastfeeding in Procrustes'
Bed."  You may remember that Procrustes was the giant who welcomed overnight
guests to sleep in his cave.  If they were too short for his bed, he stretched
them to fit.  And if they were too long, he lopped off their heads or feet.
That's how people seem to want to treat babies.