10 days old and doesn't sleep

[Inthesky42]

Hi I'm hoping you can help me. My DS was born on Christmas day. Since bringing him home we are really struggling to get him to sleep somewhere that isn't on us!

He is breastfed and has plenty of long feeds all day and lots of wet and dirty nappies. In the daytime he has short naps after he's fed and then will be pretty calm for a bit before he demands more food. Currently I go about 1hr and a half between feeds and each feed is 45mins so a lot of time is spent eating!

The main problem is at night. He'll fall asleep after a feed, ill wind him, hold him until he's definitely asleep and then transfer him to the snuzpod where he will stay sleeping for a couple of minutes then wake up making grisly and sometimes choking sounds. I am wondering if he may have reflux? I currently am up all night without any chance of sleep and with the constant feeding in the day am super sleep deprived and starting to feel quite unwell given this has been going on for 10 days!

Does anyone have any tips? Do I take him to the gp? I know that lots of people struggle to convince the Dr there is actually a problem..

Thanks

Congratulations OP.

All of this does sound like pretty normal baby behaviour unfortunately.

When you put him down, have you tried things like using one of DH's T-shirt's in the pod to give it a reassuring smell/warming it slightly with a hot water bottle/white noise/swaddling?

What happens if you lay him next to you in bed?

Tried the hot water bottle / white noise / muslin smelling of me in the crib but none of that has worked!

We have been too fearful to lay him down next to me in bed due to sids risk but this morning we were desperate so we tried it and he slept two hours! Whether that was exhaustion from being awake 11pm to 8am we'll never know!

I bed shared with mine and he was a dream, there is info out there on safe bed sharing I.e the protective C, not using pillows or blankets, having them on outside, not smoking/drinking etc. Follow the rules and the risk of sids is reduced to safe.

Breastfeeding is very difficult. I did mixed feeding for a while and also pumped. I found my daughter fed faster and better when we gave her a bottle. She fell asleep on my breast after 10 mins and would stop feeding and then wake up as soon as I put her down. However she didn't do that with her bottle. She finished her bottle and slept better when she had taken enough milk. Try pumping your milk and giving him a bottle. I also gave my daughter a pacifier which helped sometimes. For reflux I made sure she burped after her feeds and kept her upright for half an hour at least. My daughter is 4 months and we still swaddle her at night time and she definitely sleeps better when swaddled.

It's actually safer due then to sleep with you as long as you follow the safe bed sharing guidelines