I miss my evenings :-(

[Mississippilessly]

We have a 10 week old DS. Currently he is napping in his sling, we are in the bedroom in the dark.

Up until this week we have been following the rule of no longer than 90 mins awake between naps and then letting him nap for as long as he likes. This has dictated bedtime and we have had a couple.of evenings where he has napped until 9pm or so. He will usually nap for about 2.5 hrs at a time (only ever in the sling) This hasn't always worked and he still doesnt usually get the 15.5 hrs he apparently should get. I try so hard to get him that.

This week we are trying to get him to bed earlier to try and stretch his nighttime sleep.It has been 9pm for the past 2 nights. This has meant dinner on the bed on the dark then straight to sleep for DH and I.

Today he has napped for about 6hrs. He is asleep now, has been for an hr. This is longer than they say he should be asleep for in the day.

Do I wake him up? If i let him sleep i could watch a tv programme in peace but i wonder if he would go longer at night if he had fewer naps.

My head hurts. I so want to be able to put him to bed and then just have a tiny bit of baby free time. But I am also scared of waking him - it seems wrong.

Help! I have no instinct here!

TLDR: Would you wake a baby up?!

I just feel like everyone else got a manual and I am still completely at sea.

He woke up at 5.20 and has had a big feed. Going to get him into a bath and try and get him down for about 7 - it takes so long to get him to sleep because he will just start crying for no reason!

I might try and put him in the.bassinet. alternatively i will just try and go to bed. It will prob be hours before we get him down anyway.

Sorry. Pity party over.

Everyone is at sea with a new baby!
I may have missed it but did you mention how he’s fed? Mine would basically be attached to my boob from 7-11ish (downstairs) while I watched TV etc, then I’d take them up to bed when I went up and hopefully get a few hours in a block as they’d ‘tanked up’. They’d never settle in the Moses basket downstairs in the evening.

soy he is EBF. He fed for about 40 mins when he woke up, he did a big 2 hr cluster feed earlier. What we tend to do.is feed him then bathe and change and then offer him more boob. I wish he would feed like that in the eve - it would solve the prob of what to do with him.and as you say hopefully tank him up! He went 7 hrs without food on saturday (I did offer frequently!) So he can do it. Just wish he would do it at night!

oh my goodness, you need to get a break! It's also so important for your DP to learn how to settle him too. Which means there will be some adjustment time, where you'll hear the baby crying and know that if you went in and did it yourself, you'd be able to fix it so much faster. That's why you need to get out the house and leave them to it. He needs to have time to figure out how he interacts with the baby too, and you need
a break. Presumably he has weekends off work? That's a great time for him to enjoy an hour of 'bonding' on his own. If the milk is the problem, then expressing a couple of bottles or if you're comfortable with it using the occasional formula, will give all three of you peace of mind. There's no need for you and you alone to be physically tied to the baby every single moment of the day! It's not good for your mental health, but your DP also needs to gain confidence in his own skills looking after the baby too.

If it makes you feel any better, I found about week 10 was probably one of the hardest stages, my baby fought sleep like mad at that age and hardly anything seemed to work to get him to go to sleep and stay asleep - but it did get better!

Thank you both so much
Ella you are of course right. I just hate hearing him cry. Going to try expresing asap.
darcey yes it does- heaps!
Jabs tomorrow. Wish me luck!