Dream feeding is a practice of feeding a sleeping infant, with the aim of encouraging the baby to sleep longer. It involves rousing your baby without fully waking them up to feed them one more time before you turn in for the night. The ultimate purpose of dream feeding is to provide parents with longer stretches of time to sleep, uninterrupted by night wakings. Here are some key points about dream feeding:
- Dream feeding is a planned feeding where you intentionally get your baby out of the crib or bassinet and offer a full feeding.
- The goal is to offer your baby a dream feed about 2-3 hours after their bedtime feeding, usually between 9:00-10:30 pm.
- Dream feeding can help eliminate or delay one of the top reasons babies wake through the night, which is a rumbling tummy.
- Dream feeds can lead to longer sleep bouts for both babies and caregivers, but they probably play only a modest role in infant sleep development.
- To promote mature sleep patterns, the most promising approach is to combine dream feeds with other sleep-friendly practices.
- Dream feeding can be helpful for babies who are waking to feed more than a few times a night.
- Dream feeding can be done through breastfeeding or bottle feeding.
- Dream feeding involves a sleepy nursing or bottle feeding session given to your baby in the late evening, usually just before you go to sleep yourself.
It is important to note that dream feeding may not work for all babies, and parents should consult with their pediatrician before trying it.
