to think slings don't really let you "get on with stuff" while the baby sleeps

[Effiethemonster]

My sling has been a godsend, it really has, dd is 12 weeks and basically won't nap without it. But I'm a bit tired of it now, I love sitting on the sofa with her cuddled up snoozing but I need to do other stuff too and everything just wakes her up. I just settled her in there to cook dinner and remembered I need to use the blender ffs.

I'm aware of my every movement in it, i can't eve flush the friccin loo in case it wakes her.

I think it would be okay if it was just a few hours a day but she's tired constantly and can't seem to be awake for more than 45 mins.

Anyway, it's just a rant, I feel guilty for wanting her to sleep separate from me but also I was pregnant for 9 months I would like my body back!
Oh and I'd love to nap while she's napping! God, the things I'd do for a decent nap.

(I've had good advice on her sleeping from fatedestiny btw which was helpful and she can nap elsewhere sometimes if I time it right but I'm basically shit at reading her cues and even if she does nap elsewhere it's only for 30- 45 minutes)

I totally agree, you can do some stuff but not all the stuff you want to. I second what someone recommended earlier, try a co sleeping nap - feed to sleep but stay in bed with the baby and try to nap too,

She's stopped feeding to sleep! It's completely thrown me! I used to do this and think of the time wistfully now.

I used the blender! She flinched but stayed asleep! I think it's when she's just drifted off that stuff wakes her up.

Thanks everyone, like I said I'm totally thankful for the sling, and i think if she wasn't needing to sleep so much I'd enjoy it much more, it just feels constant at the moment!!

Can they sleep when they're on your back too?

I think you've got a classic high needs baby - sling for naps, hard to settle, noise sensitive. The Sears High Needs Baby book has lots of do-able suggestions plus reassurance that you're not crap and that some babies just can't self-settle etc, no matter what you do.

because it's really hard.

Sleeping in a back carry is fine, although I found it easier using a ssc rather than a wrap because there was a hood to stop head flops.

OP YANBU, my DD is now 9 months and she still only naps in her carrier. I tried putting her down to sleep but she'd wake up and then refuse to go back to sleep. Do whatever is easiest for you! As she gets older she'll nap less and then you have more of the day to get things done. My DD loves the hoover now and holds on to it when I wheel it around (we've got a henry). She also doesn't mind sitting on the floor when I prepare food (never the high chair though!) but would have yelled at 12 weeks.

She sounds like DS1 - kid didn't really sleep through until he was nearly 3, and even then, that's with me going to bed with him and sneaking out after 30mins.... I look back and I have no idea how I survived.

Now though, he's awesome - goes to bed like a dream every night, sleeps through, just say the magic words ('roll over') and he's out like a light until morning. I wish I had some secret recipe, but it just happened. He did it on his own.

His little brother was a dream from the start - completely unexpected after DS1 - slept through from 6 months (weaned himself at 8 months), moved in with DS1 at 18 months and has never been a problem (bar about 3 nights in 2 years) - I think DS1 steadies him though. I find them snuggled together quite often.

I guess what I'm doing is just sympathising, and at least you've remembered that the baby is there in front of you before you try to squeeze between trollies at the supermarket, or take hot trays out of the oven (sorry DS1.. no damage in either case thank goodness) with him in the sling!

A sling worked for me. I could hoover and ds3 wouldn't stir. Mind you, despite his stubbornness about going to sleep when we would like hin to, when ds3 does decide to sleep it takes a lot to wake him :)

Lolly you could be me

3/4 months is a shit time for sleep. Newborn milk sleepiness is gone, self settling is a distant dream. Bad times. We had almost exactly the same situation. What stopped me going insane was doing a few naps in the pram (it took a lot of pushing up and down but worked eventually, if only for 45 minutes) and cracking the cosleeping nap. This is a gamechanger in many ways (it gets them sleeping stationary, on their backs, and lets you have a snooze too) so it's worth persevering with. Try some white noise on in the background. Nice low light. Cwtch up close and pat his tummy hold down his flailing arms, stroke his forehead, sing or whatever you think might work. Remember it might have taken 5/10 minutes for him to drop off in the sling (but you don't notice so much because you're pottering around) so don't give up too soon even though it seems like it's taking ages. Once we had that sussed, it was just baby steps towards the sheer bliss that was lobbing DS in the cot twice a day and at bedtime and leaving him to it. He sleeps like a dream now, most of the time. Strength and honour!

Sorry, meant her not him. Sorry OP's DD!

Mine had more or less all naps on my back for years, they slept really well.

The only thing I could ever really "get on with" when mine were in slings was sitting on the sofa watching day time TV

But then they were huge heavy lumps as babies whereas I am tiny. I am also naturally quite very lazy

Thanks MrsMoggins, I will reattempt a co sleeping nap, although dd woke up at 4am still tired this morning and no amount of feeding or stroking would get her to go back off, I eventually put the sling on and once she was asleep crawled back into bed with if on.

I'M SO TIRED

Throwingpebbles that makes me feel better thanks!

Totally know what you mean. You can't bend down to stack the dishwasher and your back gets tired. She's at the end of the fourth trimester now though so might start napping elsewhere soon. We started with the pram and by 6 months she'd nap in the cot

Oh yes read DrSears he so sounds like my DD was as a baby anything would wake her. I could do nothing while she napped, I did get her to nap in her from six months but I couldn't even flush the loo or it would wake her.

Reading DrSears at least made me feel that she was normal and I wasn't doing anything wrong. Once she started sleeping through at 3 years (sorry you probably don't need to hear that) though she'll sleep through anything. Nothing will wake her now. Lucky her little brother turned out to be a much better sleeper.

I don't know if she's necessarily high needs, people have commented on how "alert" she is since she was born though, she's incredibly nosy and easily distracted, when I try and get her off to sleep anywhere else she tries to pull her toy rabbit or a blanket over her eyes as if to block everything out but then gets frustrated by the thing being over her eyes.

I think part of the reason she loves the sling is that she's cocooned in there and can't move or see much, she does cry for a bit when I first put her in there sometimes before drifting off. I seem to have more tolerance for the crying than when I swaddle her or try and cuddle her to sleep, I don't know why.

I've tried a dark room and white noise too, white noise used to work but not anymore.

To all the posters saying 'they just sleep through noise'. No. They don't all do that. They really don't.

I remember trying to 'make' dd get used to noise when she was a baby. The result? A screaming, exhausted baby who was awake for the better part of 12 hours a day. So instead I did nothing while wearing the sling but rock gently in a dark, quiet room.

I have a friend who has had an exhausting year coping with her second baby, who doesn't nap easily and wakes at the slightest noise, complete opposite to her first child. Yes she's getting on with it, because she has to, but she's pretty miserable and exhausted. Its very different to her first mat leave.

OP: huge sympathies. Some babies (and children) just wake more easily (just like adults). If its any consolation most get better with age. Dd still wakes easily but gets herself back to sleep. So hang in there.

I was like stepaway with DS - sling for when he was awake (if I needed to do stuff, not all the time!) and put down when he went to sleep. At 4/5 months ish he was rolling and a front sleeper which made a big difference, I.e. he would go down.

I also worried about burning him if cooking.

With DD I had a very small back carrier (ancient, from 70s) which she liked and I could then cook etc. It gave up the ghost before DS though.

I am mums netting whilst dd sleeps in a sling, so maybe I am biased!

TBH I take it all pretty easy and don't try to do much while she is asleep. I need rest too.

Millionpran totally agree to this day I just feel that I was lucky that is was my first DD who wouldn't sleep through any noise at all. And my second who was fine with any noise and slept rather a lot as a baby.

And yes I'd class that as high needs you'll find a lot in DSears that matchs, but like everything else there are degrees. Not all babies are the same including high needs one's.

Boy do I also remember the days of walking for miles just to keep DD asleep in the pushchair because as soon as I spotted she'd wake up.

If he's got good head control you could try a back carry they will sleep on your back. But maybe just go out and get some fresh air or rest while he's sleeping.

Can I bump this to ask- did any of your slung babies cry when you put them in the sling to sleep? Dd seems to have learnt that it means sleep now and will wriggle and resist being put in and it's really upsetting me, but she'll still always sleep within a few minutes.