Routine for 5 week old?

[darlingred]

I am a first time Mum with a 5 week old baby. Before I even had the baby people were telling me routine was the answer and I needed to establish a routine from day 1. I haven't and am now looking for advice. Can you have a routine and if so how?

I am sleep deprived and breast feeding.
Help????

My honest opinion? I wouldn't bother. They change so so quickly in the early days that any routine you establish you'll only have to change again within days. I also think it puts you under huge pressure to 'achieve' your daily routine...... Especially if you are breastfeeding. I found it far easier to go with the flow and I'm normally a bit of a routine fiend so totally understand the desire to know where you are with things. My DS is now 7 months and has happily established a little routine for himself. Nothing too rigid but at least I now have a clue about what he might be doing at certain times of day and can make plans accordingly. Unfortunately I just don't think you can rush these things. Sorry if this isn't what you want to hear but I condemned myself to hours sat in a darkened nursery because DS 'should've' been sleeping when I could have just been enjoying my new baby. HTH xxx

Agree with hodgie. My ds3 is 5 weeks old today and v different from the other 2. Trying to establish a routine this early can be just one more thing to beat yourself up about. Instead, there are things I try to do once each day, not necessarily at the same time each day, eg bathe the baby, get out of the house for a walk with sling, have a shower myself . Just see how your lo develops and you'll probably notice preferences you can go with, eg a longer nap mid-morning or a very big feed around lunchtime. Ignore other people trying to push you in a fixed direction.

Are you BF on demand?

Most routines for babies that young will involve feeding every 3 hours, a period of activity after a feed (singing to them or something), then asleep again around 1.5-2 hours after they last woke up...

I think it compleatly depends on you and what your happy with.
Some people live by a routine, so people just go with the flo. some people settle for in-between.

Do what is best for you and stuff what every one else says

I don't think that routine, a 5 week old baby and breastfeeding on demand should belong in the same sentence.

Your baby is far too young to settle to a routine. Just go with the flow. If you stop worrying about a routine you will feel less stressed.

Ignore those who tell you you should be forming a routine - it's not actually possible for the baby to be in a routine at this age because a) they can't form memories and b) their needs are changing from day to day (hour to hour sometimes). So any routine you impose may be ignoring the baby's needs at any given time. Go with the flow - it's really so much easier and much more beneficial for you and the baby at this point! You'll find that the baby falls into a more predictable rhythm in a few weeks (around about three months) - probably awake for an hour or two, then asleep for an hour or so - three main naps per day.

I just wanted to chip in for the other side. I started DD on a very, very rough routine at about 5 weeks old based on the Supernanny cornerstone routine. She enjoyed it and it helped me feel more in control - happy mum, happy baby!

If you would like to try some sort of routine, start taking notes of what your baby does themself throughout the day. When we looked at it, DD was basically doing a 3-hour routine naturally: eat, activity, sleep. She woke at roughly the same time in the mornings too. So we went with this vague routine which meant we had bottles ready on time (rather than panicking when she was screaming, she's never been one for the 'hunger cues') and, now she is 16w, we can estimate when she will want to sleep and generally get her down for a nap before a meltdown. For us, I feel having a routine during the day has really helped her have enough milk and naps during the day to settle well at night.

The one thing I think people misunderstand about the term 'routine' is that it really doesn't have to be a rigid Gina Ford-type routine. It can be quite lax and you can still be responsive to your baby's needs. If DD screams for food after just 2 hours rather than her usual 3, I'll feed her. If she is really tired at 6.30 rather than her usual 7.30, I'll put her to bed.

Routines aren't for everyone. Personally I struggled without one and am not naturally the kind of person who could just completely go with the flow all day. If you are happy with everything now then great, go with it! But if you aren't happy and want a little more structure then maybe try a routine.

Of course baby hasn't read the books and won't have a clue. I don't think a routine will work if you are drastically changing their natural behaviour, and also some babies just won't take to one. I reckon that for the first month or so of following our routine DD didn't realise that she was in a routine, but after a few weeks it settled down and she is much happier with regular feeds and naps (I don't think she is the kind of baby who realises what she wants until it is almost too late - she was a SCBU baby and I wonder whether that makes a difference, as they are fed to a routine from day 1)

If it helps, our routine is:

7.30/8.00 - wake, bottle
10.00 - nap
11.00 - bottle
13.00 - nap
14.00 - bottle
16.00 - nap
16.30 - bottle
18.00 - 15 min 'power nap'
19.00 - 1/2 a bottle
19.30 - bath
19.45 - other 1/2 a bottle, bed

But above all, do what you are comfortable with! If you don't want to follow a routine then don't, and don't let people tell you you 'have' to have one. If you do want to have one, then have one.

Good luck with whatever you decide!

I always understood 'routine' for babies this small to be routine things rather than set times. e.g when my dd was that age, every evening we would do wash/bath then change into pyjamas then have quiet time - not to force a routine on her, just to distinguish times of the day (and to separate the day to some sort of normality for me!!). But I still fed on demand.

Don't waste your time-it's way too early. Concentrate on building a close bond that makes your baby feel relaxed and settled. Get a good sling (recommend Ergo) and feed on demand. Slowly a pattern should emerge of sleeping and eating times, which you can build a routine around. I stressed for a few days with building a routine for twins two days after they were born. Then realised it was pointless and threw the routiney books out without ever looking back ( except The baby book by Dr. Sears - that worked for me).

Sorry OP, I know you are desperate to be a great mother etc. but that is just the silliest advice you've been given, particularly if you are bfing.

Lexie The OP is breastfeeding, not bottle feeding. I think this makes it harder to impose a routine.

Im bottle feeding and my daughter is five weeks too, I havent even thought about routine, but I notice that she is starting to delevop her own, she goes to sleep at bang on 1am, its been funny the last few nights that she has started doing it, she can be crying up until 12.58 and then boom shes asleep, she has also started to sleep 1am - 7am other than that everything changes day to day and I just let her get on with it, MY only routine is that the pair of us get and bath/shower at some point in the morning and we try and get out every afternoon, more for my sanity than anything else

Routine is brilliant for older babies but at this stage I think trying for one will just stress you out unnecessarily

I've done a 'routine' of sorts from day dot. However, it's only for people who want to do it and for babies that are happy to be in it. Had DD shown that she wasn't following a routine, I would have stopped.

She is now 5 months, but I am trying to remember what we did at 5 weeks, and think it went roughly: swaddled for sleeps; fed every three hours; put back down for a sleep roughly 45mins/1 hour after she last woke.

As she got older, the amount of milk in her bottles has increased, as has the length of time between sleeps (at 5mo she is now awake 2 hours at a time).

I also dream-fed, whereby I woke DD at 10.30pm, fed her and changed her bum, and put her back down where she would sleep til 3.30am then fed again then slept til 6.30am/7am.

I have stuck to (religiously) bath/bottle/bed and also have a 7am-7pm is daytime, 7pm-7am is nighttime. Anything she needs in daytime is done in bright light, with noise etc and anything she needs in nighttime is done in the bedroom, quietly with very little light.

As I say, it's not for everyone, and as long as you and your LO are happy, then don't fret. Also, I FF'd and as you are BFing, I think our routine wouldnt neccesarily fit your lifestyle.

Starlight, it's not the 'silliest advice' ever.

Now from the sounds of it the OP is unsure whether to start a routine or not and is possibly only thinking about it because people are saying she should, so she is looking for some advice.

Plenty of people don't have a routine for months and months and that is absolutely great if it works for them. There is no need for a routine unless you think it might suit you or your baby - but there are plenty of reasons why a routine will be the absolute opposite of 'silly', like...

• Mums who find they are personally struggling with no structure to do their day, or who can't cope without knowing what might be happening (as I said, happy mum can help mean happy baby)

• Babies who will go for hours and hours without feeding and who need to be reminded to eat

• Babies who don't understand their own needs and so need help (as my baby is, so she is much happier being slightly preempted for food/sleep otherwise she has complete meltdowns)

I think what I'm trying to say (and I really am not criticising anyone's choices as each baby and each mum is different and no one thing works for everyone) is that if anyone feels they might like to do things a little differently, there are plenty of avenues to explore - whether it is going from feeding on demand to a routine, or starting a routine, hating it and going back to feeding on demand. So, for example, 2to3, I tried two weeks of carrying DD around and feeding on demand but it was a disaster for both of us. We then tried a vague routine and it worked a treat.

There is so simple answer, and no 'right' or 'wrong' or 'silly' advice (bar the stuff that's actively discouraged - sleeping on the front etc) - just different ways of raising your baby that mum's can explore, and different advice that can be given to help mum's make decisions about how they want to raise their baby.

Bunbaker - I don't have any experience of bf but I'm sure you're right, ff babies possibly do take easier to a routine than bf babies.

I think some babies are easier to get into a routine than others. All this rubbish about ff babies taking feeds when they are given it is nonsense in my experience and tends to come from the mouths of only those who have bf (or had a very easy baby). You can't force a ff baby to feed when you fancy it if they don't either.

Mine were both ff and were not in a routine until about 4 months. The routine then, other than bedtime was set by them not me.

about 6 weeks i started noting down when ds was eating and sleeping after a week could see a clear pattern so started a routine from there, i mostly go by what ds wants i just premeditate what he wants, he's always ready to sleep by 11 and shattered by 11.30 so i put him in his buggy at 11 with his dummy and blanket to snuggle. I find it easier than trying to get him to sleep at say 10 to suit me he'd only cry for an hour anyway.

Do you want to have a routine OP? Do you like routine? If not, then avoid it and go with the flow, do whatever your baby seems to need. From experience, both my DS and I were infinitely happier when i ditched attempting to force a routine on him (because, similar to you, that was what i was hearing/ reading about everywhere!) I often think the happiest babies are the ones that have their needs met when they need them, and that doesn't necessarily mean you have to become a slave to them. But as someone else has said, other babies will thrive on routine - my DS wasn't one of them, although he fell into one when he was older. He's a happy, healthy, very active, socially able 18 mo who eats, sleeps (12-13 hours a night unbroken, plus two during the day) and plays exceptionally well. Go with your instinct

As Lexiesgirl pointed out, there are different types of routine and having one doesn't necessarily mean being inflexible or only feeding your baby at fixed intervals.

My DS was bf on demand but from about 7/8 weeks he started going for longer intervals between feeds at night. To try to encourage a proper night time routine I started giving him a bath and changing him into a sleepsuit and night nappy around 6pm and putting him down for a sort of "bedtime" to try to differentiate from day time. That really worked for us - DS slept through for the first time (7pm to 6ish) at around 10 weeks and we still do the same bedtime routine now at 17mo. He was hard work during the day though - fed around every 2 hours up until he was 6mo.

Good luck with whatever you decide - the main thing is to do what feels right to you, and not to worry too much about what other people say.