To ask how much sleep you had when your babies were tiny?

[missmargot]

I have to start by saying that I am probably BU a little as my baby isn't a big crier (so far) and I know others have it worse than me.... But I am exhausted.

DS is six weeks old and mixed fed. I am averaging five hours sleep a night, broken into two stints. Last night I slept from 10:30 until 1:30 then from 3:00 until 5:30. DS and I went back to bed at 6:30 but only dozed. I struggle to nap during the day as I am doing a few freelance hours every day plus helping DH with our business, which isn't ideal but unfortunately essential at the moment.

I was managing ok but this last week I feel exhausted in a way I didn't know was possible and six weeks of limited sleep has finally caught up on me.

Is five hours at night normal/good/bad? Any tips on how to stay sane?

Bad news is I am having sleep like that and dd is 5.5 months! She was like that as newborn, then around 10 weeks I had a glorious couple of weeks where she was going 8pm untill 3am..then bang, 12 weeks happened and ever since then it has been a maximum of 2 hours between feeds at night, with the recent added bonus of an hour or twos wide awake period somewhere around 3am..
Arrrrgh!
It does pass but it's bloody hard.

That sounds pretty good for 6 weeks. You have to go with it - for quite a while our 'couple time' was watching TV in bed together from 8pm after toddler DS was asleep and while baby DD snoozed on one of us. That way you feel relaxed but you've had a chance to catch up with your OH. We would have tea (then wine!) and snacks and make an evening of it.

DS and DD slept like a dream up until about 3/4 months and then slept in only 2 hour chunks only until about 18 months. DD in particular spent a good 2 years of her life crying and could only fall into a contented sleep on me. I was very, very tired and found it all a bit of a shock.
DstS slept like a dream 9-7 90% of the time.

I'm due with our 3rd joint biological baby in May and I almost wish DH had got DstS's mother pregnant instead of me because apparently they sleep far better than the ones I produce.

DD2 is 5 weeks and mixed fed. Sleeping patterns very similar to yours OP and I think that is normal, even slightly good for this age.

So I have 5-6 hours of sleep a night in 2-3 stints. I don't nap in the day because we have a toddler DD1 who no longer naps. She is in nursery 3 days a week but on those days I tend to be busy trying to keep on top of the chores I can't get done when I have both of them around.

I am tired, some days shattered! But DD1 was very similar and got better quite quickly, so I expect it to improve. Fingers crossed!

I have a 6 week old too :)

I reckon I get about 6 -6.5 hours sleep a night, 5 on a bad night.

DS usually wakes up twice in the night to feed but I often fall asleep feeding him. I have a bedside cot and often have DS in bed next to me and I find this is helping massively on the sleep front.

I usually get one short nap in the day, either in the afternoon or early evening. It's not an intentional nap, I go for a nice sit down on the sofa and wake up 30 mins later with drool on my chin and a crick in my neck

I'm not feeling too tired at the moment, but I know from DD that it's cumulative - with her the exhaustion hit me about 4 months I think.

I don't want to mess up your supply, and know its a risk of doing this, but from 6 weeks we introduced a bottle of formula at 10.30pm. I would bf at 7.30-8pm ish, DH would give the formula bottle at 10.30pm (usually DD wouldn't wake for this & we'd dreamfeed her) then she'd wake around 3am where I'd bf her. She'd then sleep til 6.30am approx.

It worked well for us - my supply didn't seem to be affected & meant that I could go to sleep at 8pm and not have to get up to feed til 3am. Made a big difference!

I got quite a bit of sleep but I just slept when the baby went down whenever that was.

Also I didn't really bother with housework beyond the things needed to keep the place hygienic and sanitary.

Can I ask about the birth- dd was emcs and I'd been on morphene drip for 2 days. That spaced me out for weeks afterwards and dp would watch the baby while I slept like the dead for hours on end. Getting fresh air helped- and the mega early nights that are being spoken of.

citrusyone I had an epidural and was on a drip due to failure to progress, but it was fairly straightforward apart from that.

I just wanted to update and say thanks for all the advice. We went to bed much earlier last night and were both asleep by 21:30. He slept until 01:45, was back asleep by 02:30 then slept again until 5:45 when we both got up for the day. I feel lots better for that first stretch of sleep especially, I could feel the difference when I got up to feed him.

He's always been swaddled in a Swaddlepod and I've bought a second so I can re-swaddle him just in case he wets through. I was also careful to wait until he was properly awake and demanding to be fed, rather than just stirring.

When dd settled down she started to do long stretches at the start of the night.

Glad you're feeling a bit better.

Thank you! I don't know whether last night was a fluke but after a busy day yesterday and DS blissed out at baby massage he slept from 9:45 PM until 4:15am then went back to sleep until 8am. I realise this won't be how he sleeps every night but I feel so much better for a decent night.

For 1st six weeks, I had to feed DS every 2 hours (BF). It was hard work as by the time I'd woken him up, latched him on, changed his nappy and got him back to sleep that was at least an hour gone. So I was only sleeping for 40 mins at a time at night and then couldn't sleep during the day. I was relieved when he reached a satisfactory weight and I could leave him to wake up of his own accord!
It does get better and there is light at the end of the tunnel!

DS fed every 2 hours for the first 5 months (when he mixed it up a bit and went to every 1.5 hours. Just for fun.)
So sleepwise, very little for either of us!
'Lucky' DH had an op when DS was 4 weeks old which effectively left him bed ridden for a few weeks/months. He got LOADS of sleep.