I really hope some of you expert Mum?s can help me, a clueless new mother, as I am getting desperate about my sons sleeping and my sanity. Before my son was born out of all the challenges that come with a newborn I hadn?t even considered not being able to get him to sleep on his own would be one of them. I?d not even heard any of my many friends with children mention ever having problems getting their LOs to sleep in their moses basket or an equivalent. I am desperate as my DH and I are currently co-sleeping with our son who is now 7 weeks (I know he is still very young), although I have no qualms about co-sleeping and have since read about all the benefits it can bring I am desperate for some sleep and some time without my son attached to me, I also desperately miss my DH even though we are still in the same bed. I really want to resolve this as I am starting to feel slightly resentful towards my beautiful, lovely son.
To give some background about how we came to accidently co-sleeping my son came by emergency C-Section which meant I couldn?t get up in the night to pick him up right away. The midwives in the hospital recommended I breastfeed my baby lying down while I healed, I should mention that although I am from the UK I am currently living abroad and they do not have the same reservations about co-sleeping as they do in the UK, therefore I started sharing my hospital bed with my new son. As I am from the UK, and have long heard about the dangers of sleeping in the same bed as your infant, I didn?t get any sleep as I was terrified I would roll on him so my DH and I tried to get him to sleep in the basinet provided by the hospital. As soon as we put him in he would just cry and cry, I have always been against letting babies cry so we would pick him up and eventual exhaustion would win out and he would be back in bed with me. I spoke to the midwives about co-sleeping and they reassured me that he would grow out of it after a couple of weeks.
He is still sleeping in our bed and he won?t be put down for naps during the day. I have tried everything, we have a co-sleeping crib attached to our bed, he won?t go in that, a moses basket, a sleephead and a car seat. While he has a few time slept for short periods of time in all of these the most seems to be 45 mins, and this seems to be luck of the draw that he decides that he will sleep, and then he just cries until one of us pick him up to soothe him, he?ll then go back to sleep but on one of us, if we try to put him back down he just cries again. I have also tried warming the basket or sleep head, putting him down when he?s sleepy, putting him down when he?s asleep, putting a t-shirt in that smells like me, white noise and Ewan the dream sheep. The one thing I don?t want to do is let him cry but it seems like if I don?t let him cry a bit I?ll never get anywhere but the very idea of this makes me feel sick with guilt. I should also mention he is mainly breastfed but we have started giving him one FF at night so I get a break and my DH gets some time with his son.
In terms of his sleep he sleeps fine during the day (obviously if he is on one of us) he has a morning nap of two hours, then again in the afternoon, then again early evening. All of these last between 2-3 hours. His night time sleep is more erratic and as the night goes on he sleeps less!
I am at my wits end as he seems to be getting worse not better. Any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated. Sorry for the epic me me post can you tell I?m desperate??
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Accidental co-sleeper desperate for help
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Missmummypenny · 20/01/2013 10:05
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