Episode 157: What is a Dream Feed?

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Welcome to the kids sleep Show podcast where we dive into the magical world of sleep, and all things parenting. Join us as we embark on a journey filled with expert advice, practical tips and heartwarming stories that will transform your little ones into sleep superheroes, and empower you to navigate the beautiful chaos of parenting. I’m your host, Courtney Zentz. And I’m on a mission to change how the world view sleep and provide accessible sleep coaching resources for all families to build healthy sleep habits in their home for children, and adults of all ages. As an award winning speaker, author and pediatric sleep expert, myself and my team of consultants work intimately with families around the world to teach healthy sleep habits to children and adults. I believe wholeheartedly that sleep is the foundation for which a happy home is built. So let’s sleep together. Hi, everyone, Courtney Zentz. Here, the founder of tiny transitions and the creator of the sleep Steps program. This week, we’re talking all about dream feeds. What is it? When do you use them? How long do you use them? And can it help your baby to sleep through the night? So we’re gonna dive in on this week’s episode, and talk all about them. Because I think for new parents especially, it’s really overwhelming. You bring a baby home from the hospital, and you’re not sure what they need when they open their mouth? Are they hungry? Did they poop? Does their belly hurt? What is it and how can we make sure as parents that we’re responding to a child’s needs, but also balancing the right amount of sleep and the right amount of intake so that they are feeling really good as they grow so rapidly, those first weeks of life. So let me start for those of you that are new here with what a dream feed is and who’s right for Dream feeds. So a dream feed refers to feeding a baby in the middle of the night when they’re essentially dreaming or sleeping. I like to refer to dream feeds as something where we go in as parents and consciously wake the child up. Now, we’re not turning on disco balls and loud music and being like, Hey, get up baby, but we are pulling them out of the crib or bassinet, we are going to sit perhaps in the feeding chair in the bedroom or my husband who always went out to the living room. And we are arousing them enough that they’re awake and they are eating. Now some sleep consultants might say well, you kind of just feed them while they’re still sleeping. And yes, there is the ability to just pick a baby up and to latch them while they’re still sleeping. I consciously don’t do this, because I want to be careful of dreaming and eating associations. But know that if a baby’s really, really little, and you go pick them up out of the crib and you and swaddle them, and you change their diaper, and then you put them on to feed that is aroused enough. Okay, we’re not talking about disco ball level arousal, we’re talking about just awake enough to eat right, I want them to actively be eating, not sucking on the bottle or the breast for comfort, because that means they’re not really going to get that nice full feed and we want them to be awake enough to get a nice full feed. Okay, so dream feeds are typically where you’re going in, you’re waking baby, you’re putting them on the boob or bottle, you’re giving them a nice full feeding, nice verb, and then you’re laying them back down to sleep for a bit more time. Hopefully you can get another three or four hours, let them then wake up naturally on their own in the back half of the night. I love to institute schedules with babies. I think parents kind of looked at me a little bit twisted when I say hey, put your newborn baby on a schedule. And I don’t mean it as rigid and stiff as it sounds. But babies who sleep better eat better. And babies who eat better sleep better. So I try to be conscious as a lactation counselor as a postpartum doula. And as a sleep Coach, what that looks like and what the reality of new parenting also looks like. So first and foremost, the dream feeds kind of starting the day when you wake your baby in the morning, they should be taking a nice full feed if you’re breastfeeding, offer both breasts, usually about 1015 minutes on each side. And then a nice full burp, that’ll be a nice full feeding, their belly will be satisfied. And you will have no discomfort from having milk leftover. Okay, then if you’re feeding from a bottle, you’re gonna offer a nice full bottle based on their age and their size right on our website, tiny transitions.com We do have a great, great guide that shows you how old the baby is, how big their belly is, and how much intake they can take. Because I know as a new parent, I always struggled with how much milk is kind of good enough and I was always asking the pediatrician. What if I stretch their stomach and what if I feed them too much and aren’t they gonna puke? And you know, the pediatrician said kind of go up at a half an ounce of time. And if they spin up a little bit, then dial it back the next time right but make sure that To split up isn’t trapped air, which is why you should be burping frequently, but more so that it is the fact that there was a little bit too much milk. So maybe instead of a four ounce bottle, you try three and a half, just as an example. Now, what you want to do is look at getting full feedings in the day, if you have a baby who’s eating roughly every three hours, right, and they start the day around seven, they’re going to kind of be eating five times, maybe around 710, one o’clock, four o’clock, and then roughly around seven o’clock for bedtime, I always encourage putting a baby down around seven o’clock, even as a newborn. And I say that one because kids will sleep better when it’s dark, cool and calm to it gives you as a new parent a chance to take a shower, maybe you’re pumping. So you have to do that. You might want to get some things done or clean some pump parts or just sit and stare at a wall as bringing a newborn home can be pretty overwhelming. There’s a lot that you can do. If you can set baby up for that seven o’clock bedtime, you Burpo them, you put them down, again quiet cool bassinet or crib, and you get them down for the night. Okay, now this is where I talk about dream feed. So dream feeds typically happen the first eight to 12 weeks of life. After that I no longer like to do them. And here’s why. After eight to 12 weeks, your body’s circadian rhythm is actually shifting. So around three months of age, children go from stage based sleep to cycle based sleep, it’s a huge developmental leap where their circadian rhythm is actually forming. When they’re born, they don’t have that they sleep 50% of the time in REM sleep 50% of the time and non REM sleep. So what you don’t want to do is create a situation where your child is, unfortunately, you know, waking up 50,000 times and expecting to eat because after 12 weeks, every time you hear a peep from them, you’re offering food right? Generally not food, there’s probably something else going on. But typically between eight and 12 weeks, I stop doing the dream feeds because I don’t want to falsely create a habit, right, because if I’m going in at 10 o’clock and falsely waking them up every night after that eight to 12 weeks, they’re going to start to have a natural disruption in their sleep cycle. And unfortunately, the first six hours is the deepest and most restorative sleep. So I don’t want to disrupt that I will let a baby wake naturally. And if they are hungry, they will wake naturally. And you can offer that full feeding. And as they grow, it’s probably going to be somewhere around like 1am or 2am that they wait for that first time after they hit 12 weeks. So with a dream feed, I often encourage parents to put baby down around seven o’clock, which would typically mean that baby has been awake for roughly 45 to 60 minutes, meaning they took a nap around six, they’re up and they’re going to bed for the night around seven. Okay, if that is the schedule that you’re trying to get your newborn into, then I would encourage you or your spouse or partner to go in at 10 o’clock and offer the dream feed and I’ll explain what it looks like. You’re going to go in at 10 o’clock, and you’re going to wake baby, and you’re going to put them in maybe the chair inside of the nursery or my husband used to always bring our kids out into the living room. And he would do the dream feeds. Now I was nursing but I was also pumping. So I would put maybe down at seven, I would pump and I actually used to do a power pump, which is a 60 Minute pumping session. So you do 10 minutes on 10 minutes off 10 minutes on 10 minutes off 10 minutes on and after a couple days, it can stimulate milk production. And I was allowed to then able to I shouldn’t say allowed able to create or milk at that last kind of bedtime that I could put in the fridge. I could freeze it for daycare and I could make a bottle for him to offer the dream feed, I would take a shower and I would go to bed at eight o’clock. My husband knew he was kind of up for that first feeding, right. So he would go in at 10 o’clock. We always happen to have kids during March Madness. So he was more than elated to stay up and watch basketball right? Or the Phillies because it was usually you know, their spring season kicking off. And so he would go in at 10 and wake up both our son and our daughter bring her living room and offer a full feeding from a bottle of breast milk. Okay, breast milk formula for feeding 10 o’clock, okay. Now if you’re exclusively nursing, not pumping, not bottles, then it is going to have to be you at 10 o’clock that wakes up and does that or stays up. It’s your choice to offer that full feeding. And then in hopes of doing that what we’re trying to do is say Alright, you’ve now got a nice full belly at 10 o’clock. And you want one long stretch asleep in a child, typically overnight. Now, most newborns will have one long stretch of sleep in a 24 hour period. What you don’t want it to do is sleep for five hours during the day and you’re like wow, that’s really great. But that’s their long stretch of sleep. You kind of want that to happen overnight. I don’t want to keep missing a feeding during the day. You know what I mean? So in the moment I would always wait Kids are up when they were supposed to feed, right? If my kids were sleeping, or my clients have newborns and they’re sleeping, and they’ve been asleep for a bit of time, and it’s already restorative, and they are a newborn, I actually have them wake them up to get that maximum intake in the daytime hours, they need 24 to 32 ounces of milk in a 24 hour period. Okay, so when you get it in the day is when a baby sleeps through the night. Now, it’s not expected that a newborn sleeps through the night. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m simply saying it’s an ounce game, right? So breast milk, or formula, 24 hour 24 to 32 ounces of milk in a 24 hour period for optimal growth. Okay, so I would go in, or my husband would go in, most of the time, it was my husband, and we would wake baby at 10. That was three hours after they went to bed. So they were probably going to wake up soon to eat. And even if they weren’t awake, we would wake them full feeding verb diaper back down. And then we would try to get that first long chunk of sleep. So that you know, baby slept like four hours, and I went to bed at eight o’clock, I was then getting like six or seven hours. So as a new parent, I wasn’t totally strung out and exhausted, my partner could help. I could get a chunk asleep, he was sleeping the rest of the night because nursing, I had to get up and express or nurse at some point because my boobs were getting gorged. So that is how I recommend to clients as well that you try to structure it. So you can get a good chunk of sleep, maybe from eight to one or two. And then you wake up your feet again, around two o’clock, you know, again, it’s one baby wakes up. And then you can get another chunk of sleep, maybe till about five, wake up, feed again, let them go back to bed, maybe you’re up, maybe you’re not you go back to bed. And then everybody starts the day somewhere around seven o’clock in the morning. So that is a dream feed, it’s waking the baby up or feeding them in a dreamy but drowsy state, offering a full feeding and then putting them back down. Again, it’s ounces, right? So milk as milk, and we need to get it in the day. And that’s how babies grow. And it’s totally expected that they’re going to wake overnight. So you always want to try to structure it so that they’re getting the right intake. But at the same time, you’re also getting some sleep chronic sleep deprivation for new parents is something that is very common, and can be very dangerous. So it’s really trying to balance managing a newborns, heavy needs, which they absolutely have working in conjunction with a spouse or partner or helper. If you’re lucky enough to have one. I know there’s so many families that have to do this alone. And it’s so hard. And so it’s really just trying to structure things. So it’s best so everybody can get some sleep, everybody can get good amount of intake and really feel their best. It is definitely a balance. But we love dream feeds. Again, I do like to get rid of them between eight and 12 weeks because I think they can falsely interrupt the patterns based on what I’ve seen. And I’ve been doing pediatrics and coaching for about 10 years now. So just some things to keep in mind. We have a lot of amazing freebies, on our website, tons of free information, if you just go out to tiny transitions.com And you click in the resources section, there is a poop chart that shows you different types of poop and how to identify potential problems. There is a stomach size chart shows you exactly how much milk baby’s belly can take at that age, how long they should be feeding what type of kind of food product is associated as babies belly a walnut or the size of an orange. So you kind of have a gauge of what you know, baby’s belly looks like we have a dressing guide seasons are changing, it’s going to be 85 here in Philly, I’ll tell you it was 42 days ago. So that weather is crazy. All our windows are open today. So you might be hearing the birds chirping in the background. But it is just so beautiful. But how you dress baby is going to change based on where you live and what time of year. It is great dressing guide out on the website for that. We also have an amazing newborn ebook. I mean, there’s just so many resources. We have tips for infants, tips for toddlers tips for new parents, we’re here to help. And as always, you can set up a free sleep evaluation with myself or anyone on my team. We are all amazing certified sleep consultants. And we also have our amazing sleep Steps program, which is our $47 a month DIY self paced sleep training program. But it includes coaching with me every single Wednesday. And we’re live so you can ask your questions as you’re going through the program and you’re actually going to get a response. It’s me, and we’re chatting through it till I get all those questions answered. And we also have a community where you can ask questions at any time and myself. Remember the team responds 47 bucks, and it is meant to be different and change the way that families get sleep. So I appreciate you tuning in and look for all of the information in the notes and I hope you have a beautiful rest of the week. Bye for now.

One more thing before you go. Did you know that we offer the industry’s first affordable and effective, self paced sleep coaching program that includes time with a pediatric sleep expert here on the tiny transitions team. It’s the industry’s first and only membership program like this, that you can cancel anytime. Time and the best part. It’s cheaper than a cup of coffee every single day. So say goodbye to the ebooks and courses that are not helping your child sleep better. And join sleep steps today. The most comprehensive sleep education you need to get everyone sleeping through the night. Learn more by visiting tiny transitions doc