DP and I have a 1 week old DD together, my DP also has two children from previous relationship. This is my first baby and I’ll admit I’m an anxious parent. We have a Moses basket in our bedroom for DD to sleep in, she sleeps in it absolutely fine through the day but at night struggles to settle. She often will only settle by lying on DP’s chest and she can sleep like this for hours. When she’s in her Moses basket she wakes up frequently and I think she misses the close contact.
DP has said he wants to sleep in bed with her on his chest and says he did it with his other children and they were fine. I am really against this because throughout my pregnancy I was always told my midwives and other healthcare staff (support workers, health visitors) to never fall asleep holding a baby as it isn’t safe. DP gets frustrated with me saying this as he did it with his other children but the thought of him doing it and something happening to DD gives me horrendous anxiety, he slept with her in the spare room the other night to give me a break and when he said he’d slept with her on his chest I had a breakdown and couldn’t stop crying.
I’ve been told by my midwife to not let DD sleep longer than 3 or 4 hours maximum, and to wake her to feed, which I have been doing and setting alarms just in case she/we sleep longer than that (not that it happens often!) DP also disagrees with this and said that DD will wake us when she’s hungry and we should just let her sleep.
I don’t know what to do. DP is an amazing father and he is wonderful with his kids and DD, but I really disagree with him on these two points and it’s causing a lot of tension. I think I’m also suffering from a bit of the baby blues and feel very sensitive and emotional, whenever we disagree about these things I’m ending up in floods of tears and just feel like I’m causing problems when he is doing what he thinks is best but I’m terrified of something bad happening, especially re the sleeping.