Cannot stay awake for night feeds and the worry is really getting to me

[Kayleigh2323]

Hi, my little girl is 9 weeks old and EBF and as the title says, I physically cannot stay awake for the night feeds.

She normally wakes up twice/three times a night for a feed and sleeps in a next to me Snuzpod. She usually feeds for just 5/10 minutes, falls asleep and then will go back into her Snuzpod no problem at all however most nights we don't get to that point as I've fallen asleep during her feed.

There has only been 1 night in her 9 weeks since we got home from the hospital that I haven't fallen asleep with her and the panic when I wake up and realise I am holding her is horrible - I literally check she is breathing as I'm so scared of SIDS

There has been 2 occasions in the 9 weeks that she has moved from the position I fell asleep with her in. The first time I was winding her and fell asleep 😩 and she began to slip buy the second she did, I woke up. And the second was last night when she was in my arms and I woke up to her writhing around in between mine and my husband's pillows 😢 she was absolutely fine and must have only been there seconds but I'm really struggling knowing that was my fault because I fell asleep and was potentially dangerous for her.

Its like I'm completely blanking out when I fall asleep. If she was in her Snuzpod half an hour ago and you were to ask me how many times she's been up for a feed, I would have told you that was the first time since she was last fed at 11.30pm. Except that can't be right as I was cradling her. I don't even remember in the slightest getting her out of her Snuzpod! Other times I wake up with her on me and my boob is out so she has clearly had a feed but I have no idea when or how she even got there .... It's a complete blank in my memory.

It's not like I can even feel myself falling asleep. My eyes don't go heavy and I don't "drop off". I must literally go from awake to asleep as I have no chance to even stop myself falling asleep.

The fact that I am wedged in with pillows and that she doesn't usually move when I'm holding her gives me a tiny bit of comfort but what about if she suffocates under my boob when I'm feeding her?! 😭😭

I don't like the idea of co sleeping despite reading the official safe sleep advice on the lullaby trust. Besides, as long as I can stay awake long enough, she goes back into her Snuzpod perfectly after a feed with no issue.

People have also told me to get out of bed and feed her somewhere else but I've read that falling asleep with a baby on the sofa/nursing chair is much worse than in bed anyway as it's worse if you drop them.

I just don't know what to do from here? I don't feel tired in the day with the fact she's only up twice/three times and only feeds for 5/10 minutes so it's not like I'm up a lot and doing long feeds 😕. So although the sudden fling asleep seems due to exhaustion, I feel fine 😔

I have read that between oxytocin and prolactin, these hormones relax you so much they can make you fall asleep but that's not an option, I need to stay awake until she's finished feeding. It's only 5/10 minutes for god's sake!

What do I do? In case you haven't guessed already, this is my first baby so naturally I'm a bit more panicky. I've also has a miscarriage before I had my little girl which I don't think is helping with my anxiety as I seemed to become very anxious following that.

I guess I'm asking for advice as to what I can do to not slept through her feeds? I've tried watching TV, reading and going on my phone. I also turn on the lamp and have even set alarms on my phone in case I do fall asleep but I must just turn them off 😩

Please help me and thank you so much if you've got this far! Xxx

This was why I moved to co sleeping...i woke up and he was in amongst my duvet and I freaked out. I felt it was safer to follow the safer cosleeping guidelines that do it accidentally. I feel like you have 3 options.

1. Get out of bed to a feeding chair, maybe in another room. This will wake you up but will definitely wake her up further too.
2. Co sleep. Get rid of duvet and pillows and take her in. Can totally understand why you wouldnt want to go down that route when she is settling so well in her snuz pod.
3. If you have her father beside you could he wake up and make sure you get her safely back to bed? This wouldnt have worked for me as I'm a light sleeper but my husband is a very very deep sleeper.

Congrats on your little one. Sounds like she is doing pretty well on the sleeping side, hopefully she will start to stretch out those feeds a little for her sleepy mummy!

It's awful isn't it. I was just like you when ebf DD. I'd suddenly wake up and realise I'd been asleep. The crux came for me when I woke up sitting up and realised she was still on me and could have fallen from where we were sitting. It was so scary that I started co-sleeping following the safety advice and things improved from there.

You are going to have to get up and go and sit in another room with the lights and the tv in. That’s what I did. Sorry but what you’re describing does sound dangerous.

I didn’t co-sleep but if you don’t want to get up then following the advice for that what be better than what you’re doing.

I was very scared of falling asleep when end my lo. I'd switch my side light on and play a game on my phone to keep me alert or if I was super tired I'd go down stairs and put all the lights on and the TV to stay awake. Also physically getting up to change lo in another room helped wake me. I'd personally never risk cosleeping however, if this continues to be an issue for you and you can't find a way to stay awake I would adopt all the safe cosleeping methods as I'm thinking that would be safer than what's currently happening. I know it's hard but sleeping safely is so important.

I also set the bed up for co sleeping when this happened. As pp better to be set up to do it safely than accidentally. I would still move DC back into the next to me if I woke up and they were asleep so not full on cosleeping but just that extra bit of safety of we both fell asleep during a feed.

You need to get out your comfy warm bed and sit in the cold and feed her. Or your partner needs to be awake for the duration of the feed too to ensure this doesn’t happen.

I also switched to co-sleeping when this happened. DH went into the spare room for a month or so, I removed all pillows etc from the bed and just wore warm pyjamas with bed socks to keep warm.

Also make sure you're well rested during the day, as far as possible. Take all the help that's offered and use the time to nap or go for a walk/get some exercise.

Could you wake your DH at feed times for a few nights, and get him to keep you awake? He could also watch what's happening when you fall asleep - it may be that you're literally dozing for a second and then waking thinking it's been an hour.

I second getting your DH involved to keep you awake.

I used to get up, go in the lounge and watch Sex and The City (though my baby took ages to feed). I weirdly looked forward to it!

I used to read part of a really gripping book on my kindle or play a game on my phone to keep me awake. Often it worked too well and I struggled to get back to sleep though!