To feel completely suffocated?

[alisunshine29]

My baby is almost 7 months, DD1 is 5 and OH works away. DD2 is EBF and attached to me literally about 23 hours a day, maybe more. I can't have a shower without her crying the entire time, everything else I do one handed. She'll go in her Jumperoo for 5 mins at best, she'll play with toys but only with me right there. I thought it'd get better once she could sit unaided, but it hasn't. She cries with anyone but me. I am desperate to spend some time with DD1/OH but it's impossible. If OH is home, I still do everything for the kids as otherwise DD2 screams the house down making DD1 feel guilty for spending time with me. Once DD1 is in bed, DD2 will only sleep on me so OH and I feel nervous to talk/have TV too loud in case we wake her. It's ridiculous. We long to be able to cuddle/have sex but the longest DD2 will go down for before realising I'm not there is 10 mins. I co-slept with DD1 and loved it but DD2 wants to feed literally all night, I cannot move without her stirring and latching on again. In the day she'll only sleep on me or if walking in carrier/pushchair - the second I stop she wakes. I just want to be able to have time with DD1/OH, have a bath, read, just have a wee bit of time away from DD2 without her being utterly miserable. AIBU?

I ignored the nasty comment made to me by op as i think she is really struggling.sadly she does not seem to want to help....

OP, my son cried for 1 hour 40 minutes and then slept every single night/session without complaint. I did it out of love for him, not because I didn't care for him.

You seem to be complaining but not wanting a solution. You seem to believe every solution involves not caring for your child.

You are clearly unhappy with the situation as it is but unwilling to listen to any advice.

Good luck.

OP, just out of interest, what are you planning to do with DC2 when you return to work? As I'm assuming that you won't be able to have her attached to you there.

If you will be putting her into some kind of childcare, how are you planning to get milk into her, if she refuses a bottle? How will she sleep, if you're not there? Do you expect any childcare you choose to carry your DD about with them in case she squeaks, or are you going to be reasonable about it?

You don't listen to advice, so I'll ask you for your explanations instead

What a waste of time. What's the bloody point of asking for advice and then wittering on about dummies and refusing to stop breastfeeding.

Stop letting the baby use you as a lolly pop. That's where you've gone wrong. When she was a newborn, you should have got into a habit of breaking the latch once you knew she wasnt gulping down milk anymore. Instead you've got her into a habit of drinking and then snoozing on the boob unable to let go.

I don't know if this will work at 7 months, but you can still try it, once she's had her milk feed, and you know she's stopped and is sucking for pleasure, break her latch and push her jaw upwards with your index finger horizontal across her jaw. Hold down for about 30 secs to a minute until her sucking reflex stops. Do this after every feed and see if it makes a difference. It did with DS at 5 months, but then he found his thumb, which has been a life saver.

You also need to start solids now. She should be having 3 small meals a day by now.

You've made your bed OP.

She hasn't actually done it, though, and the child is asleep, will get his presents in the morning, and all will be fine.
She finally relented, but to even make the threat to the child was bad enough.

Ignore, wrong thread.

OP if you're going back to work in February, then you really do need to start doing something to change the situation.

You asked people to spell things out for you so let me explain controlled crying a bit more because it does not mean letting your child cry all night. When we resorted to CC, after two years of DS not sleeping properly, the longest he ever cried was 12 minutes, and that was once.

We went in to see him at 2 minutes, then 4 minutes, then 8 minutes... then it would have been 16 but he never got there. After three nights he was sleeping all night for the first time ever.

Do you really think it would be so impossible to go 8 minutes? Do you really think it would bother your DD for life?

You need to think long term instead of short term. Yes, it is not nice to leave her to cry even for one minute BUT you need to do what is best for her, not simply what she wants at that minute. She will be a much happier baby if she gets a proper sleep all night, and when you go back to work she will need to be okay with other people.

You may think what you are doing now is best but you are doing her no favours by not doing anything about the fact she will only take nutrition from the breast not if you are going back to work soon. I suggest starting a new thread in Feeding for advice on weaning a high needs baby it's not good enough to say 'she won't do it', you need to keep trying.

I agree, and the thing that jumps out at me is that if you're going back to work soon, and she can't be left without crying, then you don't have a choice over whether you 'leave her to cry' or not. The only choice is whether you start doing it now, when you can do it in a controlled and gradual way, or leave it until you suddenly disappear off to work for a full day.

I also wonder what you wanted from this thread. If you don't want to change things and are happy to just ride it out...what was the point of the thread, other than to feel superior and make nasty comments about other people's parenting? But in your title and earlier posts you talk about feeling suffocated, desperate, worried that your relationships with your husband and other child are suffering...which doesn't sound like you think everything is fine.

OP - what's your childcare planned for Feburary? If it's nursery, can you afford to pay for a couple of mornings a week now? give them bottles of expressed milk (it could be she refuses as she can smell milk on you and eventually yo'ull give in and let her breast feed, if there's no option, you might find she'll take expressed or formula from someone else). Best to do it now.

She might not be reseptive to a dummy now, but you could try. What's the worst that could happen? You've wasted a couple of quid ? Grand scheme of things, worth a go.

re co-sleeping/controlled crying, something needs to be done there too, you won't be able to do your job when you return to work. And it's not fair on DD2 to not teach her to sleep, she needs her sleep too! You need to teach her.

BTW - co-sleeping with a non-sleeping DC, and long term breastfeeding, aren't really options for working parents without making your DC suffer and you being in no fit state to do your job well. I've seen it from both sides, a friend childminding a little girl who cried from mummy leaving until mummy returning because she was used to feeding on demand for comfort, not just food (best that habit is broken before you have to leave for full days, mornings now would be enough time to start getting her used to not having to feed all the time/have mummy there all the time) - and a colleague who quite frankly did a crap job for the first 12 months after returning to work because she was always too tired to think straight and we all had to pick up the slack from her mistakes.

I think that you can probably get plenty of advice from people who have done more stereotypical 'attachment parenting' with a baby that's very attached and haven't gone for controlled crying options. But you probably need to post a new post in a different section of mumsnet saying that you specifically want that rather than AIBU.

Are you happy for DD2 to be comforted by other people if it isn't distressing DD1 too much for her to enjoy the time you get from it? I still think from your other posts that the first step needs to be your husband learning to comfort her without you/her learning to accept comfort from him. I wouldn't want to go for anything that wasn't gentle and involved a baby being left alone to cry (controlled crying or crying it out) rather than with someone else there to soothe them, or stopping breastfeeding on cue when I was with them, so I completely understand why you might be rejecting options like that. I might go for something like short periods with an attentive child carer though if a partner wasn't there enough to get her used to having her needs met by others, would be happy with it being paid for childcare if I was confident that they would respond to her the way I wanted (and was paying them to).

PeaceandLoveBunny wins the award for the most ridiculous post ever on MN.

The OP isn't "meeting her needs", she's being a martyr, and raising a spoilt, pampered child.

Lord, I just re read that first reply by peaceandlovebunny. i wanted to be sick my mouth. What a load of sentimental bollocks.

Me too bigbuttons

It's no wonder that there are so many spoilt, entitled children ruling the roost in their homes if parents have the attitude that Peaceandlovebunny has.

Also, what about the needs of the other daughter. Maybe Peaceandlovebunny's philosophy is OK for an only child, but in this case there's another child whose relationship with her mum risks being damaged (OP's own words) unless this situation is sorted out.

Nah, the op changed her mind if you remember. No one is being affected by anything.

What kind of childcare do you intend to use when you return to work? Perhaps you could approach nursery/child minder/relative (whoever your work child care will be) and start her now doing an hour or two on a very regular basis.

It sounds like a phased introduction to wherever and whoever she will be cared for will benefit her, and in the time she is doing her long phased settling in you will be able to have a shower in peace/ have some quality time with your DD1.

Hi only 1 ds, but if you look at sleep you'll see I'm a frequent poster in there...
I had a dc with a very similar temperament and one night I was literally on my knees, was having nosebleeds etc and went to rest in spare room rather than our room so not to disturb dh who had to work next day
Dc was screaming, I'd fed him (also ebf) chaned him and cuddled him, so knew nothing was wrong
I lay down in spare room at 330am... And woke at 630an with dh over me looking puzzled as to where dc was... In him cot.
It seems in my shattered state I'd fallen asleep soundly, he'd dropped off and actually slept till 7am
That was the first time hed done a 3.5hr stretch!!! It taught me he didn't need feeding in same way Nd have me confidene to percivere next night... And so that actually became the 1 'gauranteed' stretch I'd get I'm no expert, currently in sleep hell

OP, if you haven't already read it, the book No Cry Sleep Solution is explicitly designed to help co =sleeping breastfeeding mothers. The author co sleeps and feeds all night - and she very gently talks you through ways to stop the baby disturbing you in the night and encourage them off the breast.

It is okay to want to sleep. It is okay to stop your baby chewing on your boob all night - in the NCSS she describes how to co sleep while moving the baby away from you and your breast.

I actually thiknk you are right about the dummy - it's just a new bad habit - you can feed, then pull her off just before she settles, shut her mouth and close it then move further away from her in bed.

I was doing the co-sleep/ feed thing - and I have slept so, so much better since putting DS in his own cot. Why not put her in a cot, sleep next to her and resettle with a feed when she wakes - perhaps she will get used to the cot - and you can gradually replace some feeds with patting/ shhhing.....

You dont have to actually leave a baby to cry to stop them feeding so much at night.....have a look at the Dr Sears website and read NCSS.

But I agree with a lot of the posters - you can tackle this, it's okay to want to - and you can find a way of meeting your childs needs while being happier yourself.

can you send DH out with baby in pram?

Also take her in the bath with you. Have your feet very very hot and your top end warm. Read in the bath. Spend an hour in there twice a day if you need the break.

Just remember it's a phase and will end. I never used dummies or bottles either.

I co-slept and BF mine and they were all very different in how much they needed me during the day/night. My most demanding baby has turned into a wonderful 4 year old who is asleep in bed at 6.45pm each night and wakes at 7am these days. He is also the brightest, most sensitive and most imaginative of my children - new friends often take a little while to fully 'get' him - after a while they find him great fun. The other two lovely boys are calm and warm, being more instantly likable with new people.

also can you help your baby find it's thumb?

My second boy was a high needs baby because he was born that way. Same rearing but looks totally different to the other two. Different genes