You do not need to awaken healthy, growing babies to breastfeed or bottle-fed them. You need to check with your pediatrician about night time feeding if your baby is not doing the following :

• growing and gaining weight steadily
• urinating normally with at least 4 wet diapers a day
• feeding well  8 to 12 times a day for breast-feeding babies and 5 to 8 times a day for bottle fed babies or older infants
• have at least  3 normal bowel movements daily . Most breast fed babies have more frequent  bowel movement that are soft and seedy

How to help your baby learn how to sleep at night

• help him fall asleep with a sooting sensation such as rocking , nonnutritive sucking of breast or sucking thumb or hand. Never put the baby in a crib with a bottle for comfort. This can result in serious dental decay  known as  nursing bottle caries.
• give the baby lots of attention when he is awake especially if the baby needs to feel calm and secure.  You have to know that holding your baby  and being sensitive to his signals  and needs will not spoil him
• pay attention to the baby’s signs of being sleepy or overly tired. Knowing  these  cues will give you the opportunity to help the baby fall asleep before he is overly tired

It is important to meet your baby’s needs early on so that he will be better able to regulate his sleep cycles and emotions.

NOTE

It is important to understand that at this age, a good sleeper is a child who wakes up frequently but is able to get himself back to sleep. It is not a child who sleep  without waking for 10 hours through the night. Sleeping undisturbed for prolonged period at this age is not healthy. Frequent  waking is developmentally good . It allows the baby to wake up when he is in a situation in which he is not getting enough oxygen or is having problems breathing.