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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

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Original poster

first time mum, couple of Qs I'd really like help on

31 replies

EmmieA · 20/12/2010 20:23

My MW is truly awful and so any advice would be VERY welcome. Baby boy is 4 days old and I have a few questions:

My milk is in and he will feed but only ever for 5-10 minutes and then he isn't interested in any more. I try to rouse him and try him again but he doesn't want it. Do you think this is ok and I should just try him more often? Any suggestions.

He is very very sleepy in the day but less so in the night. I know this is fine and to be expected and it is but should it concern me?

For those of you who have babies who don't sleep at night, what do you actually do with them? i.e walk round house with them? Let them scream? Hold them in bed?

THANK YOU

OP posts:

mjinsparklystockings · 20/12/2010 20:29

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mjinsparklystockings · 20/12/2010 20:31

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MoonUnitAlpha · 20/12/2010 20:32

I would feed him as often as possible, at every little hunger cue.

Most babies start off with day and night confused - the things I found helped with my ds was to keep day time bright and noisy, had him nap in the moses basket in the living room with TV on/people chatting around him, and fed him every 2-3 hours minimum in the day. Night time we stayed in the bedroom and kept everything as quiet, dark and low key as possible. I watch movies on my laptop with headphones in while I fed and cuddled him.

JoinTheDots · 20/12/2010 20:32

Hello

Firstly, congratulations on the new arrival!

The day and night thing - they don't always know the difference in the beginning, but they get the hang of which one is which quite quickly usually. Wait it out, and do what you find most relaxing. I used to hold my DD in bed, offering plenty of feeds.

It's also not very unusual for babies to feed little and often. Is he falling asleep after the 5 or 10 minutes? As long as you are feeding when he is hungry you should be fine. Make sure there are plenty of wet and dirty nappies in a day, and that he is a good colour and bright and alert when he is awake.

Enjoy the little one!

PeanutButter99 · 20/12/2010 20:32

First of all congratulations on your baby boy. .
I'm not an expert on these things as I'm a first time mum myself and my DS is 5 months old. The first few days are hard and I found the best thing to concentrate on was getting through them any way you can! It'll take your DS a few weeks to work out day and night. Just try and keep night time feeds quiet and dark and keep it noisey and bright during the day. Me and DH took it in turns to rock DS os walk with him during the night. A lot of the nights DH just had him with him watching TV in the living room and brought him to me for feeding. Then DH would sleep til lunch time!
I don't have any advice on the feeding for 5 minutes. My DS used to feed for 45 minutes or so! He did get quicker as he got older :)
Good luck

GiraffesMum · 20/12/2010 20:33

Congratulations on the birth of your DS. Don't worry about time, if your ds has had enough you can't make him feed! Do you try offering the other breast when he 'finishes' on the first side? Keep offering when ever you think he might by hungry, it is really early days.

As for being awake at night, I found that i kept it bright and noisy during the day and darker and quieter at night so my DDs started to work out the difference. When she wouldn't sleep I sat in bed with her so that I could rest, tv or radio on down low if I wanted company. I couldn't leave a tiny baby to cry!

Good luck

GiraffesMum · 20/12/2010 20:34

X post and repeated what everyone else said - must learn to type faster!

IAmReallyFabNow · 20/12/2010 20:37

All mine would mostly feed for 10 minutes at a time. Their tummies are so small they can't take a lot at each feed.

We had one memorable night with our dc2 when she didn't want to sleep or feed so we gave up trying and ate chocolate and crisps while she chilled out on the bed .

PeanutButter99 · 20/12/2010 20:38

I second the not leaving tiny baby to cry. They need lots and lots of contact and hugs :)

MoonUnitAlpha · 20/12/2010 20:38

I never let my ds cry - I mean, sometimes babies cry of course, but I never let him cry if there was anything I could do to help him. He's 4 months now and I do "let" him cry for 5 minutes at bedtime as he's starting to get the hang of self settling, but I'm right with him touching/stroking him, and it never takes more than 5 minutes.

Letting a newborn scream won't teach them anything, it'll just upset you both - ignore anyone who tells you that you're spoiling him or making a rod for your own back.

organiccarrotcake · 20/12/2010 20:40

Congratulations :)

Personally I would never let them scream. It's been shown to increase the levels of cortisone in their system which affects brain development and if done a lot - over a long period of time - can be harmful. I don't mean that you have to worry if you're on the loo and they kick off!!

I am a big faan of co-sleeping and feeding to sleep. Amid cries of "rod for your own back" I point out that it's a modern western thing to NOT have your baby sleeping with you, and many cultures would feel it very odd not to do it. With practise (will take some weeks) you can feed him without hardly waking up and he will just wake, snack and go back to sleep again. Bliss. But this is a very personal thing.

There were times in the early days where nothing short of a drive around the block would get our DS2 to sleep so DH did this from time to time to give me a break. It didn't last too long.

The answer I would give therefore is, do what works for you and your family. Co-sleep if you want to, don't if you don't but don't worry about the consequences either way as the most important time is now.

WRT feeding, your baby will be sleepy for a while (anytime from a few days to a week or more) and until then you may find he's not feeding for great long periods of time. If you feel the need you can try stripping him down to his nappy which may wake him enough to feed.

LuckyC · 20/12/2010 20:41

Totally second that, mjin. EmmieA, I once spent 6 hours on the sofa with baby feeding on and off. Thought I would go insane at the time. Eventually had to get myself to pretend I was ill - and sort of try and accept that I would ahcieve as much (in terms of housework, washing hair, phoning people, living normal life) as if I had bad dose of flu.

Trick is to find the Zen - just realise that nothing else is going to happen until your LO has established feeding properly. He is VERY cleverly doing exactly the right thing.

Make sure you have LOADS of water, lots of snacks, eat well, stare at your baby as much as you like. Watch lots of TV (you soon can't as you feel bad about corrupting young mind.) Read magazines. Get people to bring you stuff. Restk, recover, get to know each other. Sod everything else. This is just ine brief time in your life.

In the night, as he is only 4 days old, I would make yourself a cup of fennel tea, try to doze, rest as much as you can. Don't worry. He's too little for you to have to do anything at all about steering him in any direction.

This passes, and SO fast. Awww, tiny little baby.

Mine is huge galumphing 9mo now. Life nearly back to normal. Or, 'normal'.

GrizzlyMacDuff · 20/12/2010 20:42

i yes i agree with the babymoon period. If that is at all possible, just chill out as much as you can, and feed whenever he wants, as little or as much as he wants. 5-10 mins is fine at this age, he has such a tiny weeny belly, it takes nothing to fill it, and you probably find it needs filling a lot too!

And remember all babies are different. My DD was content to feed every 4 hours from birth, occasionally as long as 6 straight away and sometimes as often as 3, apart from cluster feeding after a couple of weeks when she fed constantly for 3 hours every night! However, DS, he fed 1-2 hourly from the outset (and would now if he could aged 13 months ), so this time now is so about working out where your baby will fit in with his feeds, take a little time but sounds like you are doing great!

congratulations!

Oh and if you need to feed a lot, definitely get earphones and watch a dvd/listen to an audiobook/sleep

GrizzlyMacDuff · 20/12/2010 20:44

oh yes, and agree about not letting him cry. Even now i struggle with that and DS is 13 months!

MoonUnitAlpha · 20/12/2010 20:47

I had a little night feed treat box by my bed for the first few weeks - topped up daily with chocolate, biscuits, trashy magazines Waking up in the night (and being awake for hours) didn't seem so bad with a treat to look forward to!

PeanutButter99 · 20/12/2010 20:55

I ordered in sky movies. There's only so many repeats you can watch before you go mad! Oh and I bought a couple more games for my Nintendo DS

StealthPolarBear · 20/12/2010 20:58

Yes, I used to just camp out from early evening until I went in the shower before the MW came the next day. Pillow and duvet on the sofa, sncks and drinks and stuff to watch on TV.Moses basket beside the sofa. Sleep when the baby sleeps which should be a lot but broken. from late morning to late after noon go out / have shower etc, do daytime things. But if you try to have a nights sleep you will just end up frustrated.

FunnysInTheGarden · 20/12/2010 22:35

when DS2 was tiny sometimes all we could do was let him cry. Only for maybe 5-10 mins until he fell asleep. It's very very easy to over stimulate a tiny baby and if they are over tired, you being there will just keep him even more stimulated. Provided he is fed and dry, sometimes there is nothing more you can do.

DS2 is now 10 months and sleeps for 12 hours no probs, and has done since he was about 2 months.

llareggub · 20/12/2010 22:44

All good advice here, but it might be worth checking out your baby's latch. Both my sons were pretty sleepy in their first few weeks due to jaundice, but presumably your MW is checking weight gain at the moment?

My older son was pretty nocturnal for a few months or so and I used to sit on the sofa with my laptop and feed and browse mumsnet. I got pretty addicted back then! Basically I just made myself comfy and kept my son with me. If he fell asleep I would put him in the carrycot and I had one upstairs and one downstairs. Eventually we ended up co-sleeping and this was great for making sure I got enough rest.

llareggub · 20/12/2010 22:45

Well, personally I wouldn't let a baby of that age cry.

FunnysInTheGarden · 20/12/2010 23:00

I wouldn't have left him to cry at 4 days, but by 4 weeks, we had no option. Don't be afraid of letting your baby cry btw, sometimes there is nothing further you can do for them and crying for a few minutes is the sensible option.

organiccarrotcake · 20/12/2010 23:07

Sometimes if you're at the end of your tether, placing them somewhere safe and walking away to reconnect with yourself is ok.

But otherwise letting them cry is not recommended.

FunnysInTheGarden · 20/12/2010 23:11

don't think anyone would let a baby cry as a matter of course. But if you need to let a baby cry for a few minutes it will do them no harm, and may even save your sanity!

Limelight · 21/12/2010 00:22

All very good advice here. My thought would be that you need to not worry so much (believe me, I was the expert at worrying SO much) and go with it for now.

At the moment your DS is tiny tiny, and you are no doubt completely knackered and in need of a bit of TLC yourself. If he wants to feed constantly, let him. If he wants to feed for small bursts, let him. If he wants to sleep all day, let him. If he's up all night, then so be it.

These first few weeks are all about survival in my opinion (yours too). If it's easier to be in bed with him, then do that. If you feel like you need to sleep and want a break, then someone else giving him cuddles and rocking him for a short while isn't going to hurt. Play it by ear, learn to trust your instincts (I know how annoying it is when people say that, but it's true), and remember that it does get easier, one day at a time.

And congrats!!

blackcurrants · 21/12/2010 04:43

About the screaming thing: someone gave us this book "The Happiest Baby on the Block" which is very cheesy but we found really effective.

The theory is that human babies are born too soon (but have to come out cos their heads are too big!), and so what really calms a newborn is feeling like their back in the womb. The author (a paediatric doc, american) has these 5 techniques that can calm a screaming newborn: swaddling, shushhhing (a loud sshh noise sounds like the inside of the womb), swinging/swaying, putting them on their side (with you holding them, so basically like a cradle hold but facing outward) and sucking (a dummy, a fingertip, a breast). Some babies like some of these things (the swaddle, shhh, and side combo were like a magical off switch for DS) and some need all and some only need one.. but it's worth a go!

the babymoon thing, where you stay in bed or on the sofa with the baby on you and feed feed feed feed is a really really good idea. Mine fed in short bursts - sort of 10 mins feeding, 10 asleep, then on the boob again - and I just surrendered to it eventually. Helps that I'm a lazy arse and I had lots of good telly. Do you have someone bringing you tea and cake while you feed? That's also key!
Congratulations on your new baby!

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