This is one of those things that you read in books but have to learn for yourself. Everett has been on a very predictable schedule since birth - wake him every 3 hours to eat. It wasn't that we set it strictly that way, it was that I literally had to wake him up every 3 hours to nurse because he'd never wake up before. That said, hunger cues were never present. So, I thought naively, the 3 hour routine would just continue, and it'd always be as easy as that.
Enter, Everett awakes at only 1.5 hours after his last feeding, and he's appearing to be quite hungry. He's turning his head and opening his mouth wide, all the while fussy as can be. At first, I questioned whether or not he really could be hungry. He'd just eaten a little over an house before! "Surely he couldn't be hungry," I thought. We'd done everything perfectly by the book and he shouldn't be hungry yet. So, we tried other things. Nothing worked. Eventually, I caved, feeling defeated, and he nursed for a solid 14 minutes. "Great," I thought, "now his entire routing is going to be ruined. He's only going to want to eat for a few minutes the next time, and we're going to get into a habit of small snacks frequently instead of full meals every 3 hours."
Boy was I wrong (again). An hour and a half later, he took an entire meal, as though he'd never eaten at all in between feedings. And, as it turns out, babies have growth spurts where they become more hungry. Lesson learned: I need to rely first on my baby's hunger cues and leave the clock as my secondary focus. If he's hungry, he needs to eat!
(Side note: at 10 days old, he's gained almost an entire pound! He's 7 lbs and was born at 6 lbs 1 oz. My champ eater!!)
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