Tell me your honest to god experiences with your newborn

[Mitsufishi]

I am going through hell for the third time around with a newborn.

Everyone says 'sleep when they skeep'. But how? Mine would never sleep, in bed, on me, maybe in a buggy or sling if in constant motion. They all went on to be horrific sleepers so 'this too' did not pass.

My mother says 'all newborns are like that, people who say otherwise are lying'. So it's just me who can't cope then?

Honestly tell me, what was your experience with a newborn. Because I have friends who seem to have had it easy and have seen evidence of it. My mother insists people are lying to show off. But I don't think there's such a fashion for that any more and that actually if anything people often tend to make things sound worse than they are these days rather than the other way around. In any case I've seen friends newborns and babies that effortlessly doze off and wonder a thousand times over what I'm doing wrong.

You're not doing anything wrong. Some babies sleep, some don't. It's just the way of the world and there is very little you can do about it for a long, long time.

Have you tried swaddling? I know it's annoying when people say that but my newborn barely slept at all for the first few weeks until we put her in one of those swaddlepod thingies, and then it was miraculous (well, for a newborn)

Never understood the 'nap when they nap' thing, mine only slept on me or in the buggy.

With hindsight I bloody hated the newborn stage.

Can't help as both my babies slept (sorry), but just wanted to say I'm sure it's nothing you're doing wrong! Some babies just are that way!

Congratulations

I've had one nightmare baby and one textbook baby... The textbook one can't fall asleep on her own yet (9 weeks) but she falls asleep being rocked or patted/ssshd and stays asleep for 6/7hrs at night and an hr at a time during the day. Easy babies do exist...

Don't think it's anything to do with my parenting, she's just made that way.

My first didn't sleep at night for 6 months. It was a living Hell. But she's 2.7 now and sleeps through so it did pass for us.

Mine only slept on me or in a moving buggy for a long time. Being prem and having tongue tie didn't help matters but to a large extent it's just that she didn't like sleeping . And she's still a crap sleeper.

I too have gawped in amazement at these babies who just go to sleep.

I'm expecting DC2 and praying he/she is different. But I know there's not much I can do about it.

Seriously tell me exactly what you did. When you say they slept do you mean one day you just put them in their Moses basket and they happily slept there?

Yeah, "sleep when they sleep" tends to assume that what they are doing is sleeping in a cot. No sleeping when you are pushing them around in a pram. No sleeping when they fall asleep on you on the sofa. And query whether sensible to sleep if they do happen to drop off lying on the floor. Mine certainly didn't sleep in a cot. My reality was that I spent a lot of time walking around with a pram. Not great if you have other children, though.

Maybe I should get a swing? Or a vibrating chair? I have spent all my time as a mum being terrified of creating a rod for my own back etc etc.

I have DS3, 4 weeks old.

3 times out of 4, after he feeds (breastfed, every 2-3 hrs) he falls asleep. I can then out him down in cot, on bed, in bouncy chair, in pushchair and get on with things or sleep.

Same day and night. My DTs now 5, never slept at the same time. I was on my knees. It does seem easy this time. I know I am lucky.

With DD she would just fall asleep. We would be at a baby group, I'd lie her down on the mat and she would look at a toy for a bit then just doze off. Even now at 2.3 we just put her in her cot and she will happily play/sing with her teddies for a bit then fall asleep.

DS needs boobs or cuddles/rocking but will go into his cot once asleep. I can sometimes get him to fall asleep in his cot but I can't leave him. Have to stay rubbing his back until he's asleep.

Oh goodness, where do I start? Horrendous pregnancy, crap delivery and immediate aftercare, tongue-tie, weight loss, re admittance to hospital, colic, pnd. It was sheer bloody hell.

The two things that saved me were: moving in with my Mum at the other end of the country for three months as husband worked away during the week and (I shall probably be flamed for saying this) letting firstborn sleep on his front as it was the only position in which he would (eventually) go to sleep and say asleep. That said, I minimised all the other cot death risk factors as much as I could. I seriously considered leaving the baby at the local supermarket some days. Luckily second one was so much better.

I am always amazed when I see mums with very new babies out and about and looking so with it. But none of us knows what goes on for them when not in the public eye, or how bad they may be feeling.

I had one of those babies who never fucking slept. And got all the comments insinuating I was doing something wrong. He would only ever sleep while feeding, but the moment I unlatched him he'd ping back awake again. Putting him down "drowsy but awake" was like opening the gates of hell. He hated the pram. He hated his carseat. He would sleep in a bouncer but only if I bounced it which I did for the entire duration of his naps just to make him sleep more than five minutes.

He sleeps really well now in his cot - he's 16 months old and does 12 hour stretches at night and 2 hour naps in the day, but he still feeds to sleep. Something sort of clicked for him at about 10 months, which was a good job really because I was certifiable by that point due to extreme sleep deprivation. I have seen babies who get put down into their cot, or bouncer, and go to sleep all by themselves. I believe them to have been drugged, because I cannot imagine that world. Dr Sears has something about "high needs babies" - google it. It helped me understand that I wasn't a terrible mother, but just that my baby was a bit more hardcore than the norm in terms of shit sleeping.

You're not doing anything wrong. Some babies are easy, some aren't. It's the luck of the draw, although getting three high needs babies in a row seems massively unfair.

DS was incredibly easy as a newborn, only ever woke once at night and would sleep anywhere (although I couldn't move him without waking him, so if he fell asleep on me I would be stuck)

That was nothing special I was doing/not doing. Just the type of baby he was.

Now he's 5 and hates going to sleep for fear of missing something me slobbing in front of the telly and wakes up full or energy at 5am so I'm dealing with crappy sleep now

mine both slept fine - but not long enough for me to nap - so I did all the housework/laundry when they slept - then handed them over to DH after I had my tea, and went to bed for a couple of hours.

so I recharged my own batteries that way and did not seem like a crazed sleepless zombie to the world at large..

I did tummy sleeping too! Got caught by the HV the other day. Who said 'it isn't recommended' and then essentially said 'but ive got children so I know how it really is, wink wink'

Latest has a terrible cold so tummy sleeping makes it worse so am trying on side and getting even less sleep.

Your Mum is talking rubbish. I don't suppose for one minute you are doing anything wrong. I feel guilty saying this, but I had one of those easy babies who just slept a lot. It was definitely nothing I did, as he was like that right from day one. He jut liked sleeping, and didn't have colic or anything that interfered with that. I used to worry about him as he would literally sleep 20 hours a day, and just wake to be fed and changed. I hope your little one decides to start sleeping soon!

First baby was trial and error

I had problems the first few days trying to establish bf. I was also comletely un prepared for the LACK OF SLEEP. People told me, but I honestly felt like I was being tortured! At around 6 weeks, things were noticeably better - funnily enough in hindsight this co-incided with me gaining my confidence as a mum and following my instincts more.

Second baby, I was expecting those first few weeks of torment and fully set myself up for it (ready meals in the freezer, new no-messing haircut etc), but it just didn't happen. I put it down to completely diregarding all of the rules from first time round. I didn't worry about cuddling him too much (apparently risky in case he got used to it!), I ignored all of the so many feeds per hour rules and fed on demand - if you're FF you can still feed on demand. I think the general noise from already having one child meant that poor No2 just had to learn to live with it! I couldput him down anywhere and he would fall asleep rather than needing to be rocked like DC1 did for the first few weeks.

But to an extent, I think I got lucky.

First 6 weeks with DC1 though...everyone I grabbed and shrieked hysterically at while searching for answers spoke to seemed to say their babies either slept 8 hours a night from day one or didn't sleep until 5 years old. I'm sure a lot of it is rose tinted glasses or exaggeration. My SIL had a baby same time as I had DC1 and told of them sleeping all night from a month old. It transpired under interrogation that she meant from 11pm to 4am. Great yeah, but not "all night" IMHO!

We accidentally fell into a routine too - up, feed, walk to shops and around park, home, feed, sleep, wake, play, feed, bath, feed, story.

You don't sound like you're doing anything wrong to me.

PS Mine slept through from about 4mths but they refused point blank to sleep during the day - a whole other source of torment!!!

I've only had baby one so far.

I remember crying because he was screaming blue murder for hours and there was nothing we could do to console him, DH and I would take turns walking around the house, tiger in the tree, rocking him, and just as he seemed like he was calming he'd start again.

He'd fall asleep after being fed for 5 minutes, making me worry that he wasn't getting enough, then almost as soon as I put him down he woke again and would be hungry again.

I think we slept in 2-4h stretches, for the first 10 weeks or so.

He was whingy and grumpy and wanted to be held constantly until about 4-5 months when one morning he woke up really happy and has been that way ever since- it was almost that sudden! Some kind of developmental leap I guess. At the same time he stopped sleeping and there was a fortnight where he woke hourly. It improved.

I could only get him to sleep by breastfeeding until he was about 10 months old.

Lucky for me, he's finally a pretty good sleeper as a toddler.

But to be honest, the bad bits aren't the bits I remember. I think we have rose tinted glasses. So when people tell you their kids were easy, they're not lying, they've just forgotten. Like when we remember our childhood summers as warm and sunny, we forget the grey rainy days.

I don't know why I'm on this thread. I've got it all to come again next spring.

DD is 8 months old and has never been a good sleeper. For the first 3 months she screamed or fed all day and night (colic + reflux). Very rarely slept at all, and when she did it was due to being fed and/or rocked to sleep. She slept for really short periods of time, just as I nodded off she'd wake up again.

Now, during the day, she's relatively happy, although she still needs to be fed/rocked for naps. Last night she slept for 2 hours, 12-2. I spent 4.5 hours trying to get her to go down in her cot 7.30-midnight, then another 2.5 when she woke up, until I gave up and my husband took her downstairs at 4.30am so I could sleep.

I've asked for help a few times on here and had some good suggestions, but also lots of "all baby's are like that". Really? because none of the other mums I know look like they've been awake for 20 hours, and crying for half of that! I've seen three babies at groups fall asleep on the floor, without any fuss, so it's definitely not all babies!

I've spent so many hours sat in tears trying to work out what I've done wrong, but I think it is just how my DD is. Her dad was apparently the same, but his younger brother slept all the time and my MIL says she didn't do anything differently.

As per pp - babies just naturally fell asleep after feeding, would sleep on my chest, in sling, or later in Moses basket.

Has your baby been investigated for any conditions that might be interfering with sleep eg reflux?

For the first couple of months or so, babies cannot self soothe and aren't massively aware of their surroundings, so don't worry at all about rods and backs - they just need your help, to get to sleep by whatever means necessary! Leave it until slightly later before worrying about routines and sleep hygiene etc.

If you have the appetite for it, the best book I've ever known about baby sleep is Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Dr Marc Weissbluth. Tells you what to expect, what's normal at each age, what strategies are advisable and which ones less so. Three and a half years into parenthood and I refer to it constantly.

One thing that I suggest but with VERY careful qualification, is seeing if your baby is happier sleeping on his tummy. It was the only way my DS2 would ever sleep alone. But be aware that it's not recommended from a SIDS point of view - but read up about it and make your own decision!

Just smiled reading AudTheDeepMinded 's at the "considered leaving at the supermarket" bit.

I remember one night when DH came home from work, I handed him DC1 and said "your turn" - got my keys and drove away. I actually just drove to the seafront and parked up for half an hour but felt like the weight of the world had been lifted from me - although when I got home husband said he was debating whether to call the police

I also have had a good and bad sleeper. DS was a dream which I totally deserved after DD. She slept in 10min bursts, mainly on me for months and months. I mainly slept between 6 and 11pm when DH took over as baby holder.

And yes, DC1 slept on his side propped up by blankets.

Oh just remembered something actually. Neither of mine liked Moses baskets - HV mentioned this is actually fairly common and she thought it might be because the sides are enclosed or the baby doesn't feel as secure - probably rubbish, but maybe try going straight to cot?