Cara Dumaplin says babies shouldn't be fed on a strict three-hour schedule. Watch for hunger cues instead. Aim for roughly three hours between daytime feeds, measured from the start of one feeding to the next, but feed earlier if your baby is hungry.
Stop telling moms to feed their babies every 3 hours. Wait, what? Yes, most babies do need to eat about every 3 hours, but we have to remember they're babies, not robots. So what we should be saying is feed your baby according to their hunger cues, and during the day, don't go longer than about 3 hours between feedings. As they get older, it can be a little bit longer, let's say 3.5 hours. Also, we time feedings from the start of one feeding to the start of the next feeding. We need enough time between feedings so that they can get a nice full effective feeding at each and every feeding. But if your baby is hungry and it's been less than 3 hours, it's okay to feed them. If you can never get, let's say, longer than 2 hours between daytime feedings, see the caption.
