Triple trouble

[dicko1]

I have beautiful 5 month old triplets all girls. I feel we are doing really well at 'coping' however i cannot get them to sleep through the night. If one wakes up she wakes the others up. they dont have night feeds anymore but it can easily take 2 hours to settle all three again!

Do you one who is more likely to wake than the others? If so, might be worth sticking her in with you for a bit till she settles and leave her sisters to sleep. Triplets rock. I'm currently battling with making mine study for their GCSEs! I have 2 boys and a girl.

Not really i just think they are all such light sleepers. It only takes one to have a coughing due or wake up trying to roll and there all up. Ive recently put them in there own cots as they shared one before but the added space dosent seem to help either.
wow i cant imagine them ever being that old. but your right triplets are fab and at least i know each one will always have a friend in each other x

It'll pass. There is another seasoned triplet mum on here who's kids are a year older than mine, I think. What gestation did you manage to get to? Mine were 33+2

I managed exactly 32 and couldnt take it any longer. They all thrived though and were all home by 36ish. x

Sorry to hijack thread, can't work out how to start my own yet! But the title if this one is perfect for me!

I've got gbg triplets, born 33wks, spent 4wks in scbu just to fatten up and get feeding, now had them home for a week. It's been really up and down and I could just do with some advice!

The main thing is establishing a sleep routine. In hosp they had them feeding on demand and that happened around every 4hrs but at staggered times. At home I tried feeding them every 4hrs at set times and it went ok but often felt we were feeding them when they weren't hungry so a few very arduous feeds and big throw-ups. So I went to demand feeding again and one is waking an hour before others but doesn't seem to be because she's hungry, as she quiets immediately when I cuddle her.

Basically I just can't get the balance right! Wake them when I want them awake and have difficult feeds, or let them wake when they want but never get more than 30mins sleep myself?! Also not sure if I'm feeding them too large amounts - hosp advised us to keep increasing amount slightly in order to get them sleeping longer, so we're now on 150ml, 120ml, and 90ml (varies between them due to different weights) but that seems much higher than guidelines suggest? And really variable whether they finish the "target" amount - sometimes they leave half, other times they're still tooting at an empty bottle!

All in all I'm stumped and really worried I'm setting myself up to never get any sleep if I can't get a routine sorted really soon. Hv is useless so I'm desperately hoping for some advice here!

Thank you in advance!

Sorry only just noticed the message. I totally sympathise with you those first few weeks are a total blur working out this whole new way of life. unfortunately i never managed to even consider attempting any sort of routine of set feeding times for the first 6weeks. It was a case of feed on demand get them fattened up. If you think about it they should still be nicely tooked up in the womb if they were singletons.
The feeding seems normal they havr hungry days and none hungry days. Eventually i did manage to get them feeding within a hour of each other simply by not giving them much if they wanted it before the time, then top up at bottle time.
Do you not get any help, our health visitor put us in contact with a charity who provided a extra pair of hands every third night so we could get some sleep. x

You're absolutely right, it is all about getting the chub on! I just worry about being awake enough to look after them properly, hence my slight fixation with getting a routine going. Relief to hear yours had hungry and less hungry days too! Good strategy to take the edge off their hunger but not fill them before bottle time - I've been trying to soothe them with cuddles and dummies but doesn't work that well! The charity support you got sounds amazing, would love that. Was it homestart? Doesn't seem to be a branch in my area (waltham forest in london) and my hv hasn't mentioned anything but I should probably pursue it independently... I'm assuming you found it a help?! Silly question?!

Yes it was homestart. They really were a great help as triplets we were told we were quite high prioriety. They dont come anymore but the advise they gave us was fab and helped us establish the routine. The girls are now 6 months and although we still dont get many full nights sleep there daytime works well. I personally would say give it till there about 12 weeks then bring in the routine. It gets better honestly

hi! Congrats on the babies. I also suggest but didnt want to post because its not they eay the hv advisea. But do everything you can to time save during the day. I used to get up in a morning and make a days worth of bottles! boil kettle with fresh water pour into bottles streight away add formula streight away fill up kitchen sink with cold water cool them all pop them in fridge. Then just warm them in hot water or bottle warmer when needed. Before bed do all the night ones. I let mine sleep wherever during the day i currently have one on a beanbag one on the sofa and one on the swivel chair. ooh and lots of fresh air can help them all sleep at the same time in the pram plus its lovely getting stopped amd admired all the time.

That's so brilliant to hear you did it that way with the bottles! I'm totally scared about making up formula safely but the way you did it us exactly how I want to do it so that gives me confidence! Still working up courage to take them all out together! Also getting massive buggy downstairs from our flat will be a real job! I'll def get on to homestart. Really good to hear you are still sane 6 months on, reassures me that if my desperate efforts to instil routine don't work, it might still work out ok in the end! It's such an amazing blessing having the 3 of them but I do quite often panic about the logistics!