MSE Newborn to 1 year Baby Club 1

Kira000

Had an ok night- no screaming and crying and two blocks of sleep.
However bad day. Still no screaming and distress which is great but not alot of sleep - only 7 hours in the past 24!!

SmlSave

Chris, will your lo sleep if you walk around? If so id suggest some long night walks while your oh catches up on sleep. Or someone to take baby for a walk during the day so your oh can have a nap.

Co-sleeping, lots of skin to skin, pint of guiness might help your oh to produce just that bit more milk to fill baby up.

I had my mum over every day for three weeks so i could sleep while jacob was feeding every hour at night. At six months we started letting him cry it out which has helped a great deal.

jenjade

not sure if it was Gilly but someone other than me was hooked on underage and pregnant type programmes. Tuesday 9pm on really there are 3 of those type programmes

Gillyx

Aw thanks Jen I'm currently working my way through season 2 of Teen Mom 2.

My lovely boy has just cried and cried for more feed, and took double what he normally would and then proceeded to barf all over me (first time he's ever been sick) what a waste of breast milk Wish it had been formula :mad:

thetope

crispy_chris wrote: »

We have an 8 week old who is turning into a nightmare. She hasn't slept more than 90 minutes at a time at night since 6 weeks. OH is coming to the end of her tether.
...

So before we give up all hope, is there any advice any of you can give?

p.s. don't mention growth spurts :P

Poor you, it must be very tough for you and your OH to deal with

I read that baby sleep cycles are in the order of 45 minutes, and at that point the baby shifts from deep sleep to light sleep and is more susceptible to waking. So it looks like something is causing your LO to wake up after only 2 sleep cycles every time - have you considered all other possibilities for things that could be waking the baby up other than hunger? Perhaps have the room a little warmer/cooler? What does she sleep in - we found the baby sleeping bags (grobags) worked very well for us - much better than blankets. Has she any trouble with wind or anything?

A friend recently gave me some advice along the lines of "if it's not working, try changing your routine - you've nothing to lose." I wish I'd been given this advice sooner! With hindsight I realise that many of the sleep problems I had at various times with my LO sorted themselves out if I changed something inadvertently.

That said, I began using the baby whisperer "routine" of Eat, Activity, Sleep from about 6 weeks and I found that this loose structure has really worked for us. We had a big change in how much she would sleep at night at about 10 weeks so try and hang in there for another couple of weeks if you can and you will hopefully get past this awful time. For what it's worth I'm not sure switching to bottles would necessarily make a big difference to sleep but at least it would share the burden I suppose. I did find BF difficult in terms of the sleep deprivation at times but am v glad i persevered.

Do you do a "winding down" bed time routine with a bath or anything? We do this and I think it lets my LO know that it is time for "proper sleep" and not just a nap. I started doing the "bed routine" at 7 weeks, we'd dim the lights and turn down the tv, give her a bath at around 8pm then a feed and into the moses basket for a sleep. Initially she took a long time to settle so we kept her downstairs with us til she fell asleep but by 10 weeks she was going to sleep for a good length of time reasonably reliably up in the bedroom before 9pm, which gradually reduced to 8pm, then 7pm.

Do you have her day naps in the same place as night time sleep or not? If you do, she is maybe getting confused between day and night?

It is hard, though, when you are breastfeeding to not "feed to sleep" when baby cries at night. I suspect that after only 90 mins from a feed that your LO is not truly hungry, she has maybe just developed a habit. I hope you can find the magic thing to change to break the habit, have a think about what seems a possible culprit and maybe try changing it for a couple of days and see what happens?

mary_hinge

crispy_chris wrote: »

We have an 8 week old who is turning into a nightmare. She hasn't slept more than 90 minutes at a time at night since 6 weeks. OH is coming to the end of her tether.

Everytime we ask anyone we get the same answer 'growth spurt', which is such a cop out answer. The net is filled with people complaining their 8 week old won't sleep more than 3 hours....that would be heaven!

OH is breastfeeding so she's up literally all night and things are reaching breaking point. There's no problem with OHs milk, little one just wants to be nursed to sleep all the time!

We're considering just switching to formula so that we can stuff her full before bedtime, but we don't WANT to have to do that.

So before we give up all hope, is there any advice any of you can give?

p.s. don't mention growth spurts :P

Ok a few things that come to mind when reading your post...

LO is 8 weeks old, still very young and "in the fourth trimester" the world is a big, noisy and scary place for such a tiny baby. She spent 9 months inside her mummy, feeling tightly held, listening to her heartbeat and rocked to sleep with every movement your wife made, It is normal for a baby to want to sleep in it's parents arms or suckling at the breast.

BF'ing works through hormone release and stimulation, lactation is most productive in the twilight hours and babies are programmed to work with mums body to make milk at these times, feeding frequently is known as cluster feeding.

Practically I know it is very hard surviving on little sleep, I have 3 children all of whom BF and 2 of which fed alnight every night for the first 6 months of their lives! Have you discussed co-sleeping? done safely this can work miracles for some babies. I used to sleep whilst feeding LO and let them "help themselves"

How is LO during the day? sleeping longer between feeds? I would suggest feeding every 2 hours during the day for a few days even if it means waking LO this is attempting to turn her body clock around, does LO cluster feed in the evening? I called 7-9pm the witching hour and used to camp on the sofa with a chick flick or a good book.

I really hope you find a solution, a bottle of formula before bed may help but it may not, LO is used to breastmilk and may find formula harder to digest and get tummyache or constipation, please be aware this is a posibility.

I would get little one stripped off and have lots of skin to skin with mum, plenty of fluids and snacks for your OH and sleeps when she can.

Does LO have a dummy? babies suckle for comfort even if not hungry. Also babies can smell mums milk and get fussy when tired, will LO settle for you if away from mum for a little while? My DH would take DS down stairs for a hour to let me sleep and he would often fall asleep in his arms walking up and down the room.

Hth alittle

Mrs H x

eyelinerprincess

Up at half 7 watching bloomin Postman Pat! I guess I'm gonna have to get used to this. He normally got up at around 6.30, had something to eat, then straight back down, but the past few days it's been up at half 6 then yap for half an hour, then sleeping in his "ring".

He's 11 weeks now and has discovered his hands and mouth. EVERYTHING goes in the mouth, from the blanket to Pooh bear's ears, to dad's fingers (because, let's face it, why suck your own when dad is right there?).

eyelinerprincess

Gillyx wrote: »

I must say, we had 5 changes of clothes yesterday due to leakages of wee, and today we've had none. Daddy done all the nappies yesterday, what does that tell you

Lol, we had two changes of vests yesterday, apparently these new nappies are "crap for holding in poo". I blame the one that put it on...

They are useful for stopping leaks during the night when he sleeps for 8 hours solid, mind you...

Gillyx

Well just been weighed and he weighs 8lbs now! Only on 25th percentile for height and weight so quite a littly compared to what they thought.

Kira000

Gillyx wrote: »

Well just been weighed and he weighs 8lbs now! Only on 25th percentile for height and weight so quite a littly compared to what they thought.

Gosh, remember when you were bricking it on the PG thread about him being a whopper !. Sounds like he is gaining nicely now.

We've been on Huggies size 2 for about 2 weeks now, and they are already getting a bit snug on the tum. Have had to get some size 3's, and some superdry's for night time as a normal one wont hold enough to go through beyond 4 hours.