Baby Spain Blog

Yay, we’ve reached the 3 month milestone!

There’s something about the 3 month stage that marks it out as an unofficial turning point when your precious newborn starts coming in to his own and is no longer such a helpless newborn. He has started to show an increase in concentration levels as he spends longer hitting things in his activity gym, takes more of an avid interest in your facial expressions as you bounce around in front of him and wants to be upright as much as he can to take in everything around him. And then there’s the sleeping…

Sleeping & Feeding

How is he sleeping? This seems to be a popular question to ask of a mother of a 13 week old and it’s only really now, at almost the 3 month stage that I feel we are settling in to a more stable pattern. Feeding and sleeping and sleeping and feeding is something that pretty much takes over the first 3 months as you get used to how much your baby needs and when he/she needs it so the question of how he is sleeping is almost always something discussed alongside feeding patterns.



While we were in the hospital still James didn’t seem to be fussed at all about wanting to feed immediately. Perhaps being born weighing 4.02kg (8lb 13oz) he felt he had enough to keep him going for a while, I don’t know, but the midwives were urging me to try feeding him as much as possible to establish the latching on and to get him feeding as soon as possible. If not, they had told me that there was a risk of his blood sugar levels dropping to the point he would need to go on a drip to push them back up as they had told me that they were already slightly low. A baby’s blood sugar levels would usually be regulated through feeding so I kept trying and even though I don’t think he was getting much initially he didn’t need to go on to a drip. In the end I think it took about 5 days for milk to really come through and another week or so for it to be comfortably flowing through so if you do want to try breastfeeding then give it a few days!

Medically speaking…

Medically speaking, if your baby is having 5 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night then he is “sleeping through the night”. Babies should apparently weigh at least 5kg / 11lb before they are able to go for 5 hours sleep and not eat so if your little on is “sleeping through the night” at 3 weeks old, unless he was an 11lb-er rather than give yourself a pat on the back, you may want to be waking him up for feeding as there is potential for blood sugar levels to drop.

Medically speaking, James has been sleeping through the night from 7 weeks old but “parentally” speaking, I view sleeping through the night as including a few more than 5 hours! We’re yet to achieve the magical 8 hours but we can reach 7 though so not long to go…hopefully!

70% of 3 month old babies should sleep at least 5 hours per night and if your baby is a healthy weight then you are that little bit nearer to enjoying a decent night’s sleep again! Once a baby hits around 7.3kg they are physically able to go for 8 hours sleep apparently. All of this is some of that infamous “read-it-somewhere” information and everyone has a different opinion and view and will undoubtedly have a baby that is the exception to the rule so all of this is purely a guideline of info!

Alana x