What's up with a 5.5 month old nursing so much at night?

[twins+1]

Probably dumb question, but my 5 1/2 month old has been nursing at 10:00, 12:00, 2:00, 4:00, 7:00 at night the last few nights. It's killer. He co-slept with us for about 5 months, but he we transitioned him to his crib and he has been doing really well, but all of a sudden it feels like I just fall asleep and he is waking to nurse again. He goes to sleep at about 6pm nicely.
Should I try nursing him more during the day? He wakes ravenous and tries to nurse my face while I carry him to my bed to side-lying nurse him. Then after he nurses, I take him back to his crib which is about 7 steps from my bed.

Common?

[Comtessa]

My 5.5 month old is doing the same thing! I'm hoping it's just a stage. I'm trying to offer to nurse more often during the day, but she won't nurse unless she's actually hungry. I wonder if it's just because she's more mobile and engaged with the world now; everything is so interesting and new that she can't focus much on nursing during the day. Cosleeping is helping; I just haul her out of the cosleeper, put her to the breast, and go back to sleep. At some point later I usually wake up and put her back in the cosleeper, or not. *shrug* Have you tried sidecarring the crib to the bed so you don't have to get up to get him?

[earth-mama]

My DD did the same thing when she was about 5.5 months old. She cut her first two teeth at this time and went through a growth spurt. As she is my only child currently and I am a SAHM I simply went with the flow and let her nurse as she needed (we co-sleep so I did not have to get up). I was of course very tired some mornings, but it worked for us.

....and the phase passed.

However, she is now 9 months old and as cut 4 more teeth since then. I have found that she night wake significantly more when she is cutting teeth and after a vaccination. So, we have had several months of periodic night wakings. She also sometimes likes to sleep nurse and wakes anytime I try to remove my nipple.

I think that it helped when I started feeding her food around 6-6.5 months, prior to that she was exclusively breastfed.

I don't know if that helps, but I do know that my DD goes through phases of night waking/nursing frequently and then shifts back to long stretches of sleeping. I believe it is developmental.

Partner to (7 years) Mother to (9 months) 2 and 1

[amnda527]

My son is 5months today and he's been doing this lately too. Like the pp said, he's just too busy during the day to bother with eating, so he just eats all night. I don't mind because I pretty much just sleep through it. If you want to get him back on track I would try my best to keep his belly full during the day so he doesn't need as much at night.

[Super~Single~Mama]

If you are at home most days, you could try to go into a quiet room every few hours to nurse (lights off). Most likely there is just too much interesting stuff going on for him to want to eat all day - if you can minimize the distractions enough so that he realizes he's hungry it might help! Thats what I did, and it worked for the most part.

[naturalmummy]

my 6 month old has been doing the same thing for the last few weeks, after having stopped nursing during the night altogether (or maybe once, once in a while). he cut 2 teeth so i think that explained it for a while, now we are thinking another one must be on it's way. i don't think he really needs the calories, i think it's just for comfort and pain relief. we were co sleeping until he was 4.5 months but he has been happily in his crib for the last 1.5 months...however with the amount of waking he is doing i am thinking of bringing him back to bed with us so we can attempt to get more sleep. i was attributing this to teething, but could be a bit of a growth spurt too, though the lactation consultant says the 6 mo growth spurt shouldn't mean night waking. it's good to hear that others have experienced the same thing...and i sort of expected that it would come with ebbs and flows for the next several months as teeth continue to emerge...

[twins+1]

Originally Posted by naturalmummy

my 6 month old has been doing the same thing for the last few weeks, after having stopped nursing during the night altogether (or maybe once, once in a while). he cut 2 teeth so i think that explained it for a while, now we are thinking another one must be on it's way. i don't think he really needs the calories, i think it's just for comfort and pain relief. we were co sleeping until he was 4.5 months but he has been happily in his crib for the last 1.5 months...however with the amount of waking he is doing i am thinking of bringing him back to bed with us so we can attempt to get more sleep. i was attributing this to teething, but could be a bit of a growth spurt too, though the lactation consultant says the 6 mo growth spurt shouldn't mean night waking. it's good to hear that others have experienced the same thing...and i sort of expected that it would come with ebbs and flows for the next several months as teeth continue to emerge...

I had my baby sleep with me again once he woke up for his 1st feeding at night last night. He went to bed at 7pm and woke up at 11:00pm and then I just kept him in bed with me thru the night. I feel SO much more rested than I have the last week. I don't mind sleeping with him at all, but our bed is getting smaller and smaller as he is getting bigger. So when my husband left for work at 2am, I was happy to have room with him