November 2017 #5. You wait ages for a baby, then 3 come along at once. Ante/post-natal chat ...

[Zampa]

No specific post-natal category so I've added it to the normal ante-natal category ...

To all the new mums struggling with emotions, it does get better. Really, I promise! The early days can be so hard. Just take it one day at a time & you'll soon start to feel slightly more sane!

Totally thought I was going into labour this evening. It all seems to have calmed down again now though. I surprised myself with quite how anxious it made me - I suddenly felt completely unprepared! Hopefully by the time I get to the real thing I'll feel a little more ready!

Get well soon Treasure.

I'm labour symptom spotting too AGnu and very paranoid I'll end up in labour before my ELCS which is at 39+4.

DH managed 2 hours on his own before he had to come and wake me as baby couldn’t stop screaming. So now I’m awake whilst he and baby Liliana are fast asleep and I still feel fluey and exhausted from mastitis :(

@lydiangel83 oh dear, best laid plans! He’ll have to make it up to you later. I think you should nick the tele remote and veg out. Hope you feel better soon x

(Send him out for cabbage leaves!)

@izzibee29 do cabbage leaves work? How do you use them?

Savoy cabbage leaves are amazing. Any feeling of ridiculousness at shoving giant leaves into your bra will disappear pretty much as soon as the leaf makes contact! It's on my list of things to send DH out for within 24 hours of baby arriving!

@lydiangel83 this is my first baby but google it. I’ve heard you literally pop a cabbage leaf in each bra cup and it sort of draws out the bad stuff.

Apparently it can get a bit wiffy, I means it is a cabbage leaf next to a warm body, but lots of mums swear by it.... anything’s worth a go right?

My milk came in today... OUCH. I've been expressing and have a good few 100ml in the fridge already.

Freddie has been an angel in the day but an absolute nightmare at night, he just hasn't been settling at all. I've had less than 3 hours of sleep a night for the past 3 nights. We've set up a bed in the spare room so DH and I are going to sleep in shifts tonight if he won't be put down again. Wish us luck! I am sooo tired!

I had the hormone crash on Tuesday (6 days after he arrived). I did the school run in the morning with Jasper in tow. On our way he was sick and it went on my daughter’s shirt sleeve, then she flapped and it went all over the car. I just started crying and felt completely like I couldn’t do it and totally out of my depth.

Then I had a talk to myself and reminded myself that this is what the first few weeks are for, adjusting.

That sounds tough @butterybollocks. Hope Freddie lets you get more sleep tonight.

Iris has found her appetite over the last 24 hours & it’s a big one! She has a big feed in the morning then sleeps for four hours & then another big feed and a long sleep & then in the evening she’s grazing, it’s almost like cluster feeding, not sure how that works when she’s formula fed, maybe it’s a natural response. I’m having an early night while DP & Iris watch the rugby on tv. Not sure she’s too impressed with the rugby but she’s loving the cuddle with daddy & he’s busy explaining the rules to her.

How’s the mastitis now @lydiangel83 ?

Thanks all mastitis still there but antibiotics kicking in so less feverish and got a friend bringing cabbage round tomorrow!

@butterybollocks we also have an angelic sleeper during the day and screamed all night. I tried to sleep in spare room last night but after an hr of screaming DH came and woke me and I settled her almost immediately. Not sure if this has knocked his confidence but he is less patient with her now and this upsets me, she’s 11 days old! Babies cry!

@DuRezidal I’m sure you’re doing amazingly I keep thinking how much harder this would all be with a toddler in tow! I’m surprised more people don’t just have one kid to be honest!!!

@Topsyloulou I have found that Bea likes to “cluster feed” with her formula on the evening too. The midwives at the hospital were quite rude to me about this and said I should only feed at 3 hour intervals. After 5 days in hospital and a couple of days at home I thought I was going to lose my mind from lack of sleep as I was setting an alarm for every 3 hours. Then I had a visit from the wonderful health visitor who told me to feed on baby’s demand, since then we have been much happier. I occasionally sleep (or how it feels).

Anyone else exhausted? It’s the strangest type of exhaustion I have ever felt as I’m actually sleeping a lot more than when I was pregnant.

@theotherendofthesockportal yes to exhaustion and yes different to pre-baby tiredness! I don’t think we ever had cluster feeding but we were also told to feed every 3-4 hrs. Feels so wrong to wake a sleeping baby especially as had a few rough nights recently. When you say you’re feeding on demand how long is the max you have / would leave it? We dream of going 6 hrs but seems unrealistic for a less than 2-wk old?!

@lydiangel83 the most Bea has gone is 8 hours, prior to this epic sleep she had two feeds back to back over 4 hours. It’s entirely upto you how you feed your baby, she is YOUR baby, do what you feel is right. This also advice from my health visitor :)

I’m praying for a good night of sleep, Bea has had a bath and a good feed and is now snuggled in her crib.

When DD was in NICU she was fed every 4 hours when she was the equivalent of 33-37 weeks gestation. However, during her last couple of weeks in hospital, she became demand fed and this was a sign of her "growing up".

I doubt there's a right and wrong way of doing it but my feelings are don't ignore a crying baby and don't wake a sleeping one!

@Zampa that is good advice right there from you :)

@Zampa @theotherendofthesockportal it fees so wrong to wake a sleeping baby yet everyone insists we should so that they get enough food at night! Last few nights have been much less settled and a bit hard work and part of me wonders if it is linked to not having breast fed her for a few days. Last night she literally pushed bottle out the way and latched on to my nipple. I let her as wasn’t in agony and she settled down immediately afterwards :-/ I really don’t enjoy breast feeding but want her to have the milk and am expressing a lot so think I will do that again today and see how it goes

@lydiangel83 could you do a trial during the day whilst you are awake? See how long Liliana goes between feeds? If you start to get worried you’ve got the option of waking her up.

I was very anxious about not waking Bea up in the beginning. At the moment Bea seems to have settled in a natural 4 hour rhythm of sleeping/ eating. She is my boss, I just do as she tells me lol!

Loving hearing about all of new babies!

I’m 36+5 today and think i’m starting to pass the mucus plug which feels a bit early to me. Anyone else have any experience of it passing early? With my daughter it happened about a day before I went into labour but by then I was 41 weeks.

Freddie is bottle fed (expressed breast milk or formula) and is definitely cluster feeding. We were aiming for every 2-3 hours but after a rough few nights we're just feeding him whenever he is rooting and unsettled. He slept a little better last night so we'll keep going like this I think. DD was breastfed so it's taking me a bit of time to get my head around bottle feeding. I've sent DH out shopping for a perfect prep machine

Hope everyone is having a nice weekend and taking it easy with new babies/late pregnancy.

I’ve had to wake Joseph up every three hours as he just wasn’t going to eat enough otherwise. Biggest problem I’m having now is that he isn’t waking properly for a lot of his feeds so not getting enough down him during the day which causes shorter naps at night.

Going to start playing about with schedule now as he has hit 3kg today and is putting it on really well with lots of wet and dirty nappies. Also waking every three hours during the night is killing Jack and I, especially as we still have to top him up with espressed milk which means I have to pump after every single feed which is hard work. Hoping to start moving on from that soon.

Had our newborn photoshoot today. Having a very sleepy baby comes in useful sometimes - he was angelic and slept through the whole thing! Looking forward to the end results.

@butterybollocks I love my perfect prep machine. I hope you like yours as much!

@GingerHanna I thought I was going to lose my mind doing feeds every 3 hours. I started to get terrible headaches. Good luck with changing your schedule! Let us know how you get on.

Can I ask you all for your opinions on dummys? Do any of you use one?

I’m finding that I am feeding Bea, then she is awake and about half an hour later she acts hungry. I end up making a fresh bottle and Bea has a couple of sips then goes to sleep. Would a dummy be better?

DS lost a lot of weight after birth & we narrowly avoided being readmitted to hospital. We’d already started on formula as I’d realised my milk hadn’t come in & he was so hungry. Even once we’d switched to formula he wasn’t waking for feeds often enough, often going 5 hours before he’d wake so we started feeding him every 3 hours & setting alarms during the night. Although tiring at first I soon got used to it. It allowed me to get up & get his milk ready before he was too hungry & crying. I could do a feed change & have him back to sleep in 30 minutes. He put on weight quickly & was soon waking to feed regularly & we could spread the gap between feeds & get longer blocks of sleep at night. To start with I was expressing after each feed to get my milk to come in but I only lasted 2 weeks. I was only getting 10ml a time & I was exhausted as I was only getting 2 hours sleep at a time. It just wasn’t working for us. I had a friend who expressed after every feed for nearly 6 months & she got on great with it.

Iris has cracked waking for feeds, i don’t even need to check the time when she wakes, I know it will be 3 hours & she’s not happy if her milk isn’t available instantly! Her 5 day check coincided with feed time today. It was a challenge keeping a wriggling, hungry, screaming newborn still while they did the heel prick test!

@theotherendofthesockportal we used a dummy with DS. Think we started with it about 4 weeks as he was struggling to settle to sleep. He did try thumb sucking for a while but the health visitor suggested a dummy instead as easier to wean them off it & you have more control over when they have it. Does sounds like Bea may be wanting more milk in each feed if she’s showing signs of hunger again after 90 minutes. How much is she taking at each feed?