Please help a new mum - baby will not sleep!

jinky67

skintchick wrote: »

OH is just drained from looking after me I think. Maybe will be better once he is back at work. He never did cooking before so it's been a shock to him to have to do it all while I look after Lilia.

I do try and get outside, even ifonly to lull her to sleep in her sling!

I'm holding onto the 5 months now MFD - hope she soon likes to sleep alone!!! Only four more months to go...

Now thats what you get for spoiling him:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

i also used to make sure I got out everyday, even if it was a walk to the shops, saved my sanity I think;):D

My_Fathers_Daughter

skintchick wrote: »

OH is just drained from looking after me I think. Maybe will be better once he is back at work. He never did cooking before so it's been a shock to him to have to do it all while I look after Lilia.

I do try and get outside, even ifonly to lull her to sleep in her sling!

I'm holding onto the 5 months now MFD - hope she soon likes to sleep alone!!! Only four more months to go...

Honestly chick we have all been through it. I know it doesn't help much but we all come out the other side


Try to relax as much as possible - the more you worry the harder it will be.


Have you managed to get out to a Booby Club? It is really reassuring to sit with a load of other mums and hear that they all went through the same thing - you can't beat some RL interraction too!!!

Nicki

I tried to post last night Skinty but my computer crashed.

I'm sorry you feel rubbish, and am sorry the swaddling didn't help.

I know that you are (in the nicest way) something of a perfectionist, and my only piece of advice would be to try your hardest not to be for a few weeks. It sounds like getting the feeding and sleeping cracked would be the thing which would most improve your quality of life, so pack away the reusable nappies for a few weeks, get your OH to do all essential household chores and ignore the rest, and just concentrate on sleeping when baby sleeps and feeding her when she needs you. Once you get your sleep stores up, you'll feel a lot better, and you can start dealing with each aspect of the childcare one by one. You'll be surprised how quickly you are at the point when you are doing all the things you wanted to be doing at the outset, but the fastest way to PND (from one who has been there) is to try to do it all from the outset and not listen to your body shouting Nooooooooo.

The other thing to bear in mind, as I know you were keen to have a large family close together, is that this will be the only chance you will probably ever get to have a midday nap with a newborn baby, as when the others come along, you'll have at least one older child to be looking after, so make the most of it when you can! Things will be easier with the next ones along as you'll have learned a lot of the skills you need by trial and error with Lilia anyway.

Good luck, and hope you get more sleep today.

redmel1621

Hi Skinty

I haven't read the whole thread so a lot of this has probably been mentioned;)...

...but I just want to add, that your baby is sooo young to expect her to sleep through the night. There are basically two options
1 - Let her scream herself silly every night, completely ignoring her till she gets the message that it is not time for cuddles/feeding etc... (I do know one person who did this with their baby from a week old:eek:)
2 - Do whatever necessary to get some sleep:) Ds1 was a great sleeper, but only from about 3/4mths old, before that I often found myself asleep on the sofa with him in my arms, same with ds2, although unfortunately ds2 took a lot longer to start sleeping 'completely'(term used loosely;)) through the night (about 9/10mths) So if she wants to be in your arms, let her....also I found swaddling helped mine to go 'a bit longer' so might be worth a try and definitely a dummy...sometimes it is easy to confuse being hungry with baby just want a comfort suck:)

I will say the first 12wks are definitely the hardest, between 3-6mths they start to gain some independence and will be happy on their own for short periods of time after 6mths you will have forgotten that you were ever so sleep dprived and will be ready and willing to do it all over again:rotfl:

You really just need to let it run it's course, just have her in your bed IF SHE WANTS......don't do it straight off as a matter of course, and little by little she will manage to stay in her own cot for longer periods. It can be a slow process, but it happens in the end:D

Mel x

pinky8

Hi,

Completely understand how you are feeling. With my 3 children I swaddled them in a blanket and then put them in their moses basket. My ds was in special care and they swaddled all the babies in there too, they said it was like they were still in the womb. Also just before I went to bed I would dreamfeed them therefore hoping I would get 3 ish hours. With the girls it worked a treat and I got 6 hours and with Oscar I got 3-4.

Hope this helps,

Good Luck

Love B xxx

RoxieW

I found mine naturally stopped wanting to lie/sleep on chests after a few months anyway so I wouldnt worry too much about it becoming a bad habit.

I agree with the poster who mentioned cluster feeding means baby gets too much foremilk and is hungry shortly after - its a vicious cycle and I had the same problem. Not much you can do about it though unless you have the strength to make them go longer between feeds so that they take more and get the hind milk. I didnt

clairec79

If you cluster feed just off one side they should get the hind milk still

Fritha_2

RoxieW wrote: »

I agree with the poster who mentioned cluster feeding means baby gets too much foremilk and is hungry shortly after - its a vicious cycle and I had the same problem. Not much you can do about it though unless you have the strength to make them go longer between feeds so that they take more and get the hind milk. I didnt

Just to let you know that's not completely true. Fore/hind milk is actually more like a hot tap, when the baby starts sucking the milk graually gets creamier as the sucking action draws the fat ubles through the milk ducts. But like a hot tap when you return to it again shortly afterwards it'll still be creamier, it gradually goes back to the watery milk. In the evenings your milk is naturally creamier anyway which is part of the reason babies like it so much! (I recently read about this and found it very interesting!)

JBD

Skintchick , glad to hear baby settled last night, I hope you managed to relax and get some sleep too. I can remember how difficult it was to sleep as I would be expecting the baby to wake up all the time. It is important to take care of yourself as well as baby. Anyway hope you have another good night. All the best.

Nerth

I'm normally a lurker but your experience struck such a chord with me I had to post a reply (had to get my password reset because I'd forgotten it!:rolleyes:

Anyway, my 1st daughter was exactly how you describe yours - she would fight against sleep even though I knew that that was what she needed! She would comfort suck and seemed to spend ages at the breast. She soon grew out of it and is a great sleeper now, I can hardly believe that she was ever difficult!:A

My second daughter was less demanding but still exhausting and I had to look after a toddler, so I needed to get sleep no matter what! The midwife taught me how to co-sleep more safely. I used to feed her to sleep making sure that she was wrapped in a blanket/sleeping bag ON TOP of the duvet and that there was no way she could fall off the bed. I could feed her lying on my side with my head resting on my arm so that there was no way I could roll on to her. As soon as she was deep enough asleep I would transfer her to her moses basket. The reason I did the safety checks mentioned above was because invariably I would fall asleep straight away! I used to transfer her when I woke up. During the day I would quite often do this and leave her asleep in the middle of the bed so I could have some time to do other things. (Can only do this with tiny babies who won't roll!)

I only needed to do this in the early days, it was a matter of survival. There is light at the end of the tunnel, I promise! You'll also find as she grows that she won't poo as often in the night so you won't need to change her and that will help a great deal from what you say.

Good luck and take care of yourself! Just keep reminding yourself that it will be over so quickly, and focus on the positives of having a gorgeous little baby that you can cuddle all the time - once she starts crawling you won't be able to catch her!:rotfl: