getting upset by constant feeding

[fernie3]

my daughter is now 9 days old and I am really feeling down already. She CONSTANTLY wants feeding, she finished one feed and will stay asleep if I hold her for half an hour but thats it she wakes up for another huge feed. If i out her down she wakes up straight away for a feed. I am feeling totally stuck with her, feeding is fine not painful but the sheer amount of time is its taking up is really having an impact on everything.

I have three older children and they are being constantly ignored or distracted and yesterday I heard my 5 year old say to my 3 year old "i wish there were only three kids still".:(.

as an example this morning she woke up at 7 for a feed and I have been constanyly holding her and feeding her since then and its now nearly midday. If I put her down she screams and starts looking for food straight away.

I had a lady from the homestart breadstfeeding thing come yesterday and she watched her feeding and said that she was latched on perfectly and loooked like she was doing fine and she is having loads of wet and dirty nappies so I dont understand why she is NEVER full.

The homestart lady told me to make sure she stays feeding rather than on off on off but she can lie there sucking away for an hour fall asleep for 10 mins then want more which is just taking over the entire day (and night)

Everyone else has gone on a day trip today but im stuck here feeding and just feeling trapped by the whole thing.I have tried a sling (she cried until i fed her) I have tried a dummy (she spat it out repeatedly).

how long does this last because i feel like I am neglecting my older children to the point of not being able to cook properly for them and my husband is having to take time off to help with them unfortunatley he is self employed so if he is not working her is not earning so that cant go on much longer.

how can i just try to satisfy her even for an hour so i can actually do something else but feed?

My other children were bottlefed and I was just so much happier and more settled even after the first week than i feel now and Im starting to wonder if its really worth it.

sorry to hear you feel that way. your baby sounds perfectly normal to me.
at that age both mine were suckling constantly. with both this phase lasted until they were about 4 weeks old.
my tip would be to use the time baby sleeps to do things with your older ones, but even when feeding it is possible to read books with the older ones.
oh, cbeebees is your best friend :)
hope you will feel better soon!

fernie - :( :( This sounds hard work....but it is normal and healthy in the first days, it really is. Babies need to be held a lot when they are new, and it's good your baby can already communicate her needs so effectively. Carrying her in a sling helps keep your hands free while you do something else when you have to - no new mother with three older children, themselves still quite young, should be worrying about cooking properly for them and it's a real shame you are not able to get the help you need and deserve (though I understand the reasons for it - self-employed people don't get paternity leave :( )

Having said that, lowering expectations will help a bit, even so, and being aware that this will not go on forever.

Bottle feeding can sometimes mean a new baby settles for longer between feeds (not always - your baby may have been just the same if you were ff her) but there are other factors involved, not least the time involved in buying, preparing, cleaning, and the health impact, too.

The homestart lady saying to keep her feeding instead of 'on and off' might like to think how a mother ensures this happens

That sounds like hard work. Caring for a new baby and 3 older child is very hard. I was lucky that DS2 born during term time as don't think i could have managed during school holidays with new baby and older DC.

I am not sure feeding literally constantly round the clock is normal, as babies need to sleep for something like 16 hours out of 24.

But babies need to be fed a lot, at that stage I was probably during the day feeding for an hour, then he'd sleep for an hour, then feed for an hour etc. Some babies prefer more frequent shorter feeds, and thats normal too.

Watched a lot of TV. Managed to put him down as when I saw him getting sleepy would tightly swaddle and generally could put him swaddled into bouncy chair but some babies (even FF ones) prefer to be held all the time.

fernie - it will settle down I promise - the baby is just building your supply up - that is different to ff a newborn but it will stop and the baby will start to sleep for longer and longer.

Can you get lots of food delivered that only requires chucking in the oven?

Congrats btw

Hi.

I can sympathise with the constant feeding, although when my now 10 month old was feeding constantly I had no other kids to look after at the same time! My daughter fed constantly first week or two, and NEVER went longer than 1-2 hours between feeds til she was 2 months at least. You say a sling didn't work. Have you tried using a comfortalbe sling that allows you to breastfeed while baby is in it? A kari-me sling lets you latch baby on, and walk around a bit while he/she feeds away. Maybe that might help a bit. I didn't discover this sling til 3 months, and really wished I had had it since birth.

good luck!

It is hard in the first few weeks especially if you don't have much help.

Really your older DCs won't suffer from a few weeks of TV/sandwiches for tea.

I only have the one older DS but he had some very substandard parenting for a bit and has come through just fine.

And yes a kari-me/hugabub might mean you can feed while doing other stuff, takes a bit of practice.

i sympathise completely with you.I've been going through the same with my DD (now 4 weeks old). There have been days when I haven't been able to do anything other than sit on the sofa and feed her.

This has been hugely frustrating and in the early days I sobbed on the sofa every afternoon because it was so relentless.

However now she is 4 weeks old we seem to have turned a corner and she only cluster feeds in the evening between 5-9 instead of all day. I've also found that I might have been misreading her feeding cues and I've sometimes confused windy with hungry.

Originally I would put her to the breast everytime she cried now I wind her or hold her in the "tiger in the tree" hold first and only feed her if nothing else comforts her. This has allowed feeds to be stretched to every 2-4 hours (except for evening cluster feeds) and has also meant she is sick less frequently because shes not being stuffed with milk when she actually just wanted to burp.

I sympathise too.

My DD1 was like this. It was terrible, I kept getting told on here it would calm down at 6 weeks, then 12 but it didn't stop until I switched to formula at 6 months. Then she was much more happy and settled.

My DD2 has (sadly) been much the same. I went with it while I had DH and my Mum here to help (until week 4) but she's been topped up with formula - I can't commit to months and months of constant feeding and an unhappy baby who is never full.

She's 6 weeks now and still mixed fed but this time round I know formula feeding is not the end of the world, and if she becomes exclusively ff then so be it.

well we gave her a bottle last night. My husband came home and I burst into tears all over him about not liking my baby so we just decided I needed a break from constantly holding and feeding her. She drank around 90ml even though she had been feeding constantly for an hour and a half before that then had a lovely hug with her dad (first time he has been able to hold her without screaming),she aslo woke up and looked around for the fiuand fell asleep for 3 hours.I had a bath and a relax.

We had her weighed today and she is still under birthweight and has only gone from 7 pounds 3 to 7 pounds 5 in 7 days (was 7 pounds 13 born). The midwife is coming to weight her again on monday.

does anyone know if this is weight gain you would expect? after last night i am really starting to wonder whether she is actually hungry rather than just fussy?

both of mine were nearly back at their birthweight at 8 days. so she seems to be doing well.
glad to hear you could relax a bit yesterday.
has your milk come in, eg do your boobs feel heavy after not feeding for a bit?
if yes I would not worry about her not getting enough. and she is gaining weight, which is important.

it could be that she just likes sucking? have you (horror of horrors!) let her have a dummy for a bit to let her suck, it might calm her down and allow you to stretch the time between feeds gradually so she is slightly more hungry and takes a good feed, has some awake time then a good sleep. my dd3 is 12 days old and is generally now going about 2.5 to 3 hours between the start times of each feed which is copable with. hang in there, it will get better!

Glad you had a break last night, fernie.

It's impossible to tell for sure if all is well just from that weight - it is good she appears to have stopped losing weight and is gaining, so that's a good sign. The assessment of a baby's well-being includes weight, certainly, but also nappies and behaviour, but from what you say, everything is normal, but very demanding for your energy and your time, esp when you have other children :(

Babies of this age need to be close to someone who loves them - physically, intimately close. This doesn't have to be mum all the time, and it's great your DH was able to do a bit of this :)

You are, I think, assessing her 'satisfaction' with feeding on how long she will sleep without feeding again or otherwise needing contact. This is just not a good benchmark, sorry. Plenty of well-fed,thriving babies with mothers making gallons of milk behave in exactly the way your baby is behaving during these early days.

Sounds like you need a boost in confidence, some further practical help with your other kids and other stuff-to-do, and a chance to get some guarenteed time when you can have a break.....how does that sound?

Fernie, I know EXACTLY how you feel!! My daughter is 5 weeks old, and she has been constantly 'cluster feeding' since she was 4 days old.

Reading the advice above, I think giving her a cuddle/ burp instead of an immediate feed is starting to have an impact, although I think that is also because by 5 weeks, she has learned the 'I cry-you cuddle' game, which I don't think was the prolem in the early days.

My latching and milk are fine, although she does seem to sleep more after I've had a sleep/ break from breastfeeding and I'm fuller.

Un/fortunately on formula, she drinks heaps straight away, and sleeps for four hours. Some days it is so tempting to walk away from the whole process, but Winter and the threat of her having inherited my allergies keeps me and my anti-body-rich breast feeding going.

I have tried expressing, and that did probably go down better, but I can never express as well as she can suck, its time consuming when I may as well feed, and she hates drinking it when the real thing is available.

It is disheartening, as you say, when you breastfeed and feed and feed.... and she still takes a full feed of formula afterwards.

I'm at my wit's end, with a partner who is only partially supportive. I've tried burping/ nappy changing/ entertaining/ sunshine walking in between to keep her awake and having one constant feed, but every time, she feeds until she is full (and so she should be, with so much milk its dribblin from her mouth, microsleeps, then she is ready for more! adn more. and more. and more. And then she sleeps..... 1.5hours... whereas on formula - up to 4.5 hours. Help!

Is it possible your milk ahs taken longer to come in fully, so she was constantly sucking to stimulate more milk? If so, shouldn't that settle down? I haven't got to bfing yet so am working off what I've read!

Also, I've heard great things about using a sling to leave your hands free.

Mmm. I heard great things about slings for handsfree feeding, too...

I guess like everything, there'll be women who find that a breeze and those who don't, but with hindsight, I was wildly optimistic about how, as a 1st time mum with a newborn, that might work. Maybe it will work with an older baby who has some control over their head, and some stronger back muscles, but my DS is 7 weeks, and no way could I manage anything like 'handsfree' feeding (and can't actually see how anyone does, tbh).

[of course, if you can work a sling for everything apart from feeding, that would still be a godsend with a newborn! I haven't managed it yet - can't handle those soft wrap slings at all, and I really wanted to. Ah well.)

Another problem with cluster feeding I didn't understand beforehand was that it's not just the amount of time baby is latched on at the breast feeding that's demanding -

It's the fussing on and off the breast, the 5 minute nap that ends when you try and put them down, the fretful crying between short feeds that means they need soothing, the burping and winding if they seem colicky....that's partly what makes it so draining. It's not just the actual feeding, although that can be epic, it's the way they feed. It just goes on for HOURS. It also gets in the way of all that lovely DVD watching we are supposed to embrace while they do it, IME.

And yes, it all falls in the realm of 'normal' BF feeding behaviour, as tiktok points out. And it seems to be really really common and totally understandable that (a) mums worry that it means they don't have enough milk, when they do, it's just being 'ordered in' by the cluster feeding, and (b)they find it so downright demanding that they start mix feeding or stop BF-ing altogether.

At 7 weeks, BF-ing is easier than it was at 1, 2 and 3 weeks. A lot easier, thinking back. That said, I am much more 'bound' to my baby and my life is much more dominated by his feeding needs atm than my formula feeding friends are (I can express and let someone else do a feed, but it takes a lot of organisation and planning. I can't just leave him with Granny and some formula for half the day, for example. And then I need to think about when to express when I'm away from him, etc, to keep up supply and stop boobs engorging). And he still only sleeps in bursts of a couple of hours (although we got four - four! - hours solid last night), whereas their formula fed babies sleep for longer at a time.

I anticipate a flood of posters now rebuking me for not simply saying how Wonderful and MAHvellously convenient BF-ing is, etc (and telling me that not ALL FF babies sleep better, which I know, and that's not what I've said, anyway) - but personally I feel that the early days of BF-ing are very hard, and we aren't warned enough about what they are like. (of course, I don't know what the later stages are like, but apparently it all gets a lot easier... right?)

Good luck and sympathetic thoughts, Fernie and andante73.

barkfox I couldn't feed in the moby at all (do like it for getting him to sleep, walking the dog, etc) but have managed it in a maya wrap ring sling. It's far from handsfree (DS has intermittent neck control, wriggles like a mad thing, and I have enormous flapping norks that are - well, NOT perky little pegs to hang a baby on...) but I can do it ONE handed, and I can do it walking (with some concentration) - and that's kind of great. I've walked my dog to the park, got him latched on in the sling (still a bit of a wrestle) and then sat on a bench / wandered around with the dog a bit. That improved quality of life for me.

These kinds of work-arounds are only necessary, however, because DS wants to feed a lot. a LOT. A lot less than he did 2 or even 1 week ago (5 weeks now) - but still a LOT. I was warned in advance not to expect I'd get up off the sofa for the first 6 weeks, and even with that knowledge, a supportive dh who had 3 weeks off, my mum staying for the first week.... even THEN there've been days when I've had tearful and longing thoughts of formula and 4 straight hours' sleep.

I'm holding out for that moment at 12 weeks (16 weeks? God, don't make me wait that long) when BFing is convenient and breezy. I already like that I can take him everywhere and feed him there, but there have been days where I'd trade THAT convenience for the convenience of, say, having the time for a poo...

I too have been tempted by formula - it's like fighting an addiction, staring what you WANT (sleep) in the face and resisting the formula because you know BF is "the right thing"....
In my head I have a pros and cons list. The pros list is that my half hour walk this morning took three hours and wasn't an issue because I was able to wop out the boobs half way rather than dash back to make formula. The cons list is the sense that maybe furmula would mean more sleep...and i could give him to a trusted sitter for an afternoon, could get a haircut etc.
It gets better - mine is now 7 weeks and at two weeks, three, all the way to five weeks I was desperate. But you get better Reading the signs, being able to tell whether he is eating or sucking for fun. And I feel vaguely satisfied looking at his fat knees sndthinking "I made that".

Fernie pls don't be upset. You are re living what I had with DS2. It was constant feeding and with a 4y and 2 y DC's and a DH who worked crazy hours I was pulling my hair out. I never managed to fully EBF the other 2 for long so my confidence wasn't great either. I even doubted my supply (which I was actually very very abundant ... )

I am assuming the older DC's will be at school soon so you can get a bit of peace then?

I would recommend taking your 3y old to a BF support group. I went twice a week to build my confidence and double triple check the latch. In the meantime the group felt like a playgroup for the older DC's as they had a room with TONS of toys etc. That way it feels like a family outing as opposed to a baby outing?

Re the food I would give the main dinner at lunch when I had more time and just easy an easy tea in the evening when I was more shattered and the baby needed me more. Also did some batch cooking when DH was home at the weekends and made simple meals for a few weeks.

Also try investing in a double pump? I bought one off ebay (Ameda Lactline or something like that) and I did a quick ten minutes twice a day and built a HUGE freeze supply. When things got really tough and I was desperate for a few hours peace I would give the baby EBM by bottle. Every now and then I just needed the break.

Hope this info helps.