Is this a fair childcare schedule?

[RookieDad777]

Hi Mums,

This is a new dad speaking. I'm having a hard time agreeing to a childcare schedule with my wife, so looking for perspective from mums out there.

We have a 3 week old son and my wife went through a very prolonged labour and c-section. She is still exhausted from the journey.

I'm back to work as the sole earner. Unfortunately we have little help available in terms of family.

This is the most practical schedule I could come up with. My wife hates the 4 am start and insists I give her 2, 3 more hours to sleep.

Wife:
Sleep: 10 pm - 4 am (6 hrs)
Childcare: 4 am - 7 pm (15 hrs)
Free time: 3 hrs

Me:
Sleep 4 am - 9 am (5 hrs)
Work: 9 am - 6 pm (9 hrs)
Childcare: 7 pm - 4 am (9 hrs)
Free time: 1 hr

I would love to get feedback!

Thanks.

Yep we had a similar 'schedule' with both our DC as neither would sleep in a Moses basket/cot etc for the first few months - only sleep on someone.
I'd go to bed around 10pm & sleep till 3am; whilst DH tried to sleep/feed/entertain & then we'd swap. Meant we both got at least 4-5 hours of uninterrupted sleep a night.
& no, it wasn't possible for me to sleep when the baby slept as I take ages to fall asleep & they'd often only sleep for short amounts of time, or in the pram when I'm walking etc.
We finally moved both Dc into their cot in their rooms around 3months old (I know that's not the advice) but that worked for us. Both Dc woke at points through the night but it gradually got easier as they got older.
I'd say yes you both need to get equalise amounts of sleep if possible & just remember it isn't forever.
DC 1 slept through from 8months & DC2 from 1yr - but both had long afternoon naps too so that helped/s.

Bearing in mind that Mummy had a very tough time and is still recovering from major abdominal surgery and no family to help would you consider using the services of a post natal doula or maternity Nanny?

Your wife does night feeds on the nights your at work. You both share them on the nights your off.

Why would they share them on the nights he is off? Why can’t he do all the night feeds on the nights he is off?

All sounds quite crappy... with my younger one, we used to share when we were both there. At night I did all the feeds as was breastfeeding, but my partner would often hear and offer me a cuppa, or he would do a nappy, or cuddles.

But it felt far nicer to just both help as we could. If you can both feed the baby, can you take it in turns? Or do a night each? A lie in each at the weekend?

I had the baby all day and used to love when my partner got in - he would take a shower and then take the little one so I could have a bath with a glass of wine.

Perhaps your schedule could get a bit more flexible? Your baby will likely start sleeping far better over the coming weeks and months (yay).

@RookieDad777

Our baby wakes up every 2.5 hrs screaming for a feed. He also wakes up 2, 3 times when he's asleep so trying to sleep when he's sleeping just doesn't work. We try but find ourselves waking up every 30-45 mins.

You learn to sleep in those 30-45 minutes. I mean it’s not paradise but it is what it is. You just get better at coping with it and babies also stretch out their sleeping periods as they get older so it does get easier. Be kind to each other- you’re both exhausted. Forget about a rigid schedule and counting up who gets what free time. That way breeds resentment. just muck in together.

I'm so confused as to why you're up all night when you have work the next day

The baby is 3 weeks. Things are going to change so much, repeatedly, better worse better worse better worse.

You work 9-6 and she has the baby during that time. Then the rest of the time you're both on duty and you just shuffle it as much as you can. Ideally, neither of you is getting any more free time than the other. What that looks like will change repeatedly.

Good luck and congratulations. I know some people love the newborn phase but we found it brutal, especially the first time. Things will settle down.

Congratulations on your baby! I had a long labour & c/s/baby wouldn’t sleep/I did all the feeds because I was breastfeeding. New babies are absolutely exhausting. Your schedule does seem a little bonkers though, sorry. A couple of times a week I would pass baby off to my husband when he got home and catch a few hours sleep. Feed the baby and try and put him back down. Then at six weeks he started to go 10-2, quick feed, put down until 6am. He did he’d come into bed for a feed and a snooze. At 12 weeks he dropped the 2am. So it’s good to have a thought about who’s on and who’s off at any one time, but you probably need more sleep, esp once your wife is over her c/s and whoever is on overnight needs to sleep whenever they can. Also, try and troubleshoot what’s keeping baby awake. Do you need blackouts? Could it be wind? Even on baby three my husband would look over and remark that I was winding his lungs, did I know? And I’d drop my hand down a bit and then the burp would come up. Is baby warm enough?
Good luck

Going into work after merely doing night feeds is an actual break - getting up in the night with a kid and then looking after a kid in the day every single day is torture. If I were your wife I'd be going back to work and leaving night feeds and daycare to you. As someone who gave birth, works and did night feeds and day feeds by myself while also working, I think men who moan about having to look after their kids and also work, as they should do, are morons.

That's not the issue. I'm happy to do night feeds 7 days a week since my wife doesn't technically have a weekend. It's the distribution of sleep I'm asking about.

I had similar sleep routine with DH.

I ‘slept’ 10pm-4am and he slept 4am-10am.

This only lasted until baby was around 10 weeks and then we got into a better routine.

There were a Couple of occasions where I was just too knackered to do the morning though. Maybe twice I needed help. I used to find it hard to fall asleep at 10pm as I would be so overtired and I would wake up every time I heard baby cry so I was actually getting around 3 and a half to 4 hours sleep a night.

In theory it sounds like it’s a good routine but I’d add some flexibility into it occasionally. Good luck.

IMO your wife has it made! 6 hours of unbroken sleep a night with a newborn is amazing.

I had an induced 3 day labour then an emergency c section and looked after baby all day and night apart from when dh did half an hour when I had a shower. Mine was bf and would not sleep more than 2 hours at a time for 8 months. I did it all.
Dh did everything in the house, cooking cleaning washing etc.

Having that much sleep would have helped me mentally so much.

But, everyone is different. This worked for us- I was knackered but I was loving every second with baby.

@FabulousIAm

Going into work after merely doing night feeds is an actual break - getting up in the night with a kid and then looking after a kid in the day every single day is torture. If I were your wife I'd be going back to work and leaving night feeds and daycare to you. As someone who gave birth, works and did night feeds and day feeds by myself while also working, I think men who moan about having to look after their kids and also work, as they should do, are morons.

Have to disagree with this.

I found getting up in the night and then having the baby in the day also MUCH easier than working

@RookieDad777

That's not the issue. I'm happy to do night feeds 7 days a week since my wife doesn't technically have a weekend. It's the distribution of sleep I'm asking about.

You distribute in a way that works for you. I can survive on 5 hours sleep. My husband needs 9. Therefore what we need is different

What does your wife want? I'm wondering if this is one of those crossed wire situations where she just wants you to sympathise and agree it's tough but you keep trying to come up with solutions to make things better.

I had a non sleeping newborn. It's shit. Some of the puzzled comments above are hilarious, they clearly had very different babies to my DD1. I wonder if your wife just needs you to empathise?

Might be completely wrong here.

I had two sections. I was not as exhausted as your wife (or you) but might have been with that schedule! My husband was out 7.30-8pm, so obviously childcare was mine then. And as babies were in bed by 8, and I breast fed then night time wakings were mine too. Weekends we did things together, and once the baby was no longer breast fed my husband did occasionally get up at night, but the kids slept through pretty well from 3-4 months.
I had a routine with the kids. I put them down when sleepy and woke them up after an hour and a half during day time naps. Babies were in bed asleep by 8pm, and my husband and I could have an evening together. It wasn't like that 100% of the time, but most of the time.

@FabulousIAm

Going into work after merely doing night feeds is an actual break - getting up in the night with a kid and then looking after a kid in the day every single day is torture. If I were your wife I'd be going back to work and leaving night feeds and daycare to you. As someone who gave birth, works and did night feeds and day feeds by myself while also working, I think men who moan about having to look after their kids and also work, as they should do, are morons.

This is such an immature and bitter response. You've made a lot of assumptions because of your past experiences. Some women choose to be stay at home mums and that is perfectly fine. It was certainly my wife's choice.

How about you just let the baby sleep? ))

@MindyStClaire yes I had a non-sleeping DD too - I used to look on with such awe & jealousy of the mum's whose babies would fall asleep at a playgroup, on the floor, allowing their mum to talk, eat, drink, go to the loo all child-free whilst I was bouncing my screaming and/or awake/alert DD round the room knowing full well she'd fall asleep in the pushchair & then as if my magic awaken as we stepped over the threshold!

We did similar OP - I slept 9-3ish and then we swapped (husband slept 3-8:30ish). Any time my husband wasn’t at work we just shared and muddled through. It was really hard as I too found it hard to sleep when I could hear the baby, and I was exhausted and emotionally drained from the birth and the shock of suddenly having to spend all day every day with this tiny stranger. It won’t always be like this but at the moment your wife’s life (assuming she worked full time before) has changed much much more than yours right now, and dealing with that whilst trying to look after a newborn can be very difficult (it was for me, at least).

Your sleep ‘schedule’ sounds fine, the allotted free time is a bit strange - yes you both need to try to give each other a bit of a break each day, but I’d try to balance it a bit more/be flexible when one of you really needs it.

Like PP said things will start to change quickly so just do what you need to to get through these early weeks.

Oh actually, the split nights sound fine but your wife should think about going to bed earlier! Any solid hours of sleep before midnight will really help. It will mean maybe giving up some free time for now but it’ll only be like that for a few weeks.

Actually I think @FabulousIAm has a point. I certainly found going to work easier than staying home with a baby. Pre covid, DH got to leave the house and talk to adults, using his brain and drinking a hot drink. From being very similar, all of a sudden our lives were completely different and I wanted his. There may be an element of that going on, even if long-term she wants to be a SAHP.

OP is your wife ok? She’s getting loads of sleep and 3 hours of “free time” a day. That’s unheard of with a 3 week old. There is no “free time” that is not spent grabbing a shower or sleeping at that stage.

And I think some of the posters on here have forgotten what it’s like to have a 3 week ok. I literally didn’t sleep at night for at least 3 or 4 weeks because the baby would only sleep on me and I was not happy to co-sleep with a small baby. Weirdly they would sleep in a cot during the day so I napped then. I don’t understand why your wife isn’t grabbing extra sleep in the day or using some of her “free time” to sleep so you can get more sleep overnight.

I think you should both go to bed when you want to and then take it in turns to get up when the baby wakes through the night.

Forget about free time with a 3 week old.

OP is your wife ok?

No, she isn’t ok. She is 3 weeks post major abdominal surgery and is caring for a non sleeping newborn. Who the hell would be ok?

She’s getting loads of sleep

Loads of sleep? She’s getting 6 hours. That’s not loads in anyone’s book.