cant wake my newborn up to nurse

[tiggz]

My newborn is 1week and 1day old, and im waking he every 2 hours during the day to nurse as iv been told to by m/w.
But when i go to wake her up, its so hard, she so sleepy,
I try tickiling her feet, nudging her cheek, winding her, chating to her, calling her name, rocking her from side to side, nudging her gently...and nothing, she barely opens her eyes for a few seconds, then dozes straight back of, when i eventually wake her up she feeds fine, except from falling asleep a few times on the breast, shes not ill, and as i said does feed fine when she is awake.
I just wanted to know if anyone else has had this problem and what they done, and wanted to know if it was normal? any help would be great please.

One baby I know had jaundice and was very sleepy and hard to wake for feeds... Not trying to alarm but it is so hard to know if there is anything wrong with a normal looking, sleepy newborn.

dominique07 yh i know, it can be worrying, but genrally not worried as she is awake sometimes throughout the day and very alert, shes not jaundice and hasnt got any tempature other then having a bit of colic she ok, and she feeds fine if she awake and when i can eventually wake her she feeds good. I think shes just a sleepy baby, and a heavy sleeper going by how hard it is to wake her...she must take after me...lazy lol

Personally I would demand feed if shes healthy, not jaundiced, not low birthweight. But not leave her to go more than every 3/4hrs without a feed.

Once went to see a woman pn with a sfd baby-4lb15, they had had a full nights sleep and not woken up to wake and feed her, then were a bit that we quite concerned. Babys blood sugars had dropped and she was starting to get jittery. we had to explain explicitly that they just couldnt do this and needed to get up/set an alarm and make sure she was fed.

I would also demand feed tbh. I have a 7 wk old DD2 and that's what I do.....she feeds approx every 3 hours for around 40 mins, but will go between 7 and 8 hours overnight. I wouldn't consider waking her to feed as long as she was gaining weight. I would however be waking to feed if she was only 4lb 15 . She was born at 9lb 6 and now weighs 11lb 7 so there is obviously no problem with her weight gain!

I think maybe you are having trouble waking your lo to feed because she's tired from waking up every 2 hours to feed. If you left her to sleep, I'm sure she wouldn't go as long as 4 hours anyway (I don't think I've ever met a bf baby that did!)

Most importantly RELAX

I won't give you any advice but I have been waiting for you to come back, tiggz!
Congratulations, and these first few (exhausting) days will soon whizz by...
You should still be visited daily by the MW (?) and your Health Visitor should take over soon. Make sure you see them as often as you feel you need to (daily?).
Depending on the area you live in there will certainly be a well-baby clinic (good place to make RL friends too and share birth stories) and there will probably be a BF drop in session somewhere near you.
You were probably given loads of leaflets in the hospital. Have another look at them for drop in sessions/phone numbers etc...
Glad you've got a healthy baby and are home safe and sound.

All being well, babies will wake up in time to feed when they need to. They are designed to do so, so worrying about low blood sugar is a bit daft (the advice is I mean, not you). Do 6 year olds sleep through breakfast time and get low blood sugar from not eating? Do you? Unless your baby is underweight/jaundiced then trust her to wake up when she needs to. And feed both breasts, even going back to the first if she wants it.

Tiggz, post here with your question. There are a lot of breastfeeding counsellors, peer supporters etc who post on there (TikTok is a breastfeeding counsellor and she is very good).

Limiting the time of feeds is old advice (about 20 years old!) - and waking to feed is usually only recommended if the baby is particularly slow to gain weight. Every 2 hours sounds a bit excessive, and because this midwife has also advised you to limit the time of feeds it makes me think that she might not be very well informed about BFing.

Yahoo answers is not a great source of information by the way Stick to mumsnet!

If you want to find a local group, try naming your nearest town in your message and see if anyone knows where your local groups are.

I would like to warn that feeding on demand is a good idea in theory, but with a newborn it is necessary to make sure that they feed at least every 3 to 4 hours. My ds was 9lb at birth so not low birth weight, but at a week old he started spacing his feeding to 4 hours and then started getting sleepy. I just carried on feeding on demand, he got breastfeeding jaundice and then I got mastitis as his feeding had reduced. We both landed in hospital as a result. The danger time for breastfeeding jaundice is between 7 to 14 days apparently, and during this time, even if the baby is sleepy, waking to feed regularly is vital. The breastfeeding counsellor I saw said that the baby should be woken every two hours during the day, and at least 3 hourly at night. Once they are passed the jaundice and gaining weight, then demand feeding is the way to go. Hope this helps.

I haven't read all replies, but really - waking and feeding every two hours is definitely overkill. DD2 was small (6lb 1oz) and quite heavily jaundiced and even so I was only told to feed her every 2.5 hrs. With all my three I basically demand fed them. I would however wake them during the day if they went beyond about 3.5 hrs, as I always wanted to get a fair few feeds in during the day so they slept better at night. I never ever woke them at night. I would also suggest that you offer both breasts at each feed. I think the amount of time they feed can be very variable. An efficient feeder might only do 10 mins each side and still be absolutely fine. Other babies might need much longer.

In the first couple of weeks you are best to be guided by what the baby seems to want, then bit by bit as you see a pattern emerging you can work it into some sort of routine. Good luck with it all and try not to worry too much.

I agree with all the others - every 2 hours is just totally unnecessary in a healthy, unjaundiced baby. She isn't waking up easily because she needs to be left to sleep for a bit longer. Wake her up if she sleeps over 3 or 4 hours, not after only 2, and see how that goes. And from what you've said, didn't your midwife in any event suggest approx 40 minutes every four hours, not waking your baby up every 2 hours??? And even then I'm sure she meant that sort of amount evened up over a whole day (ie some feeds may be close together and others quite a bit further apart, as tends to be the case if you demand feed). I would certainly find it most peculiar if anyone claimed a baby needs to have milk every two hours to thrive. Sleep is actually extremely important in a new baby's life, too, which is why they do so much of it in the early weeks.

Tiggz
Congratulations!

I did timed feeding rather than pure demand feeding as I am a bit of a worrier too (demand fed if DS wanted food before the 'time' of course). I found I didn't need to feed as often as that. DS was 9lb at birth.

I was doing about every 3 hours during the day and then feeding once (or twice in the first few weeks) at night.

I was aiming for about 40 minutes initially too but sometimes it would be more and sometimes less (generally shorter than that at 1.5 weeks).

Good luck

tiggz have you posted your birth story? Did you end up having the homebirth? If not, did you get to leave quite quickly afterward? I know you were worried about being without dp after.

How's it going, tiggz. Been thinking of you and your little DD.