Calling all Attachment parents

[MummyBerryJuice]

So I totally buy into attachment parenting, extended breastfeeding and co-sleeping and don't think that we could cope with our high-need DS (7.5 months) if we didn't babywear etc but I'm coming under increasing pressure to resort to a more 'traditional' form of parenting. DH and I are happy ( if exhausted) but I sometimes feel my resolve faltering when DS has had a particularly demanding day/night. It often only takes a quick read of the Sears website or some such to reaffirm my beliefs.

I don't know any other AP in rl so it would be great to have a support type thread here.

All contributors welcome

congrats HHHH glad things are going well for you.

Yes DarkAndStormy - we have co-slept since he was born. There is no way I would still be standing upright if he wasn't in with us! Normally what happens is he wakes distressed - will go from fast asleep to a kind of squealy cry. Sometimes I try to comfort him with 'shhh' and stroking/patting, but it doesn't usually work. Mostly I just give him my nipple as soon as possible and he goes back to sleep.

Although this morning he was really upset for some reason. I fed him on and off every 10 mins or so from about 4, then at 4.45 I roused myself properly thinking this obviously isn't working. DH had a go walking him up and down but he got really hysterical (DS not DH!). The weird thing is he often appears to be asleep - he has his eyes closed - but he's crying and thrashing about . This morning after turning the light on to check him over, and giving him some ibuprofen, he snuggled in and slept (for an hour before waking for another feed....) I don't think it was teething - his first 2 only arrived 2 weeks ago.

Does your DS settle after waking?

Hello HHHH congratulations on your DD

Hey folks. Ds is getting better at eating. It is so nice to see him choose what he wants and feed himself, even with a spoon for yoghurt. When I think back to 6 months and how nervous I was about blw I can say I love it. And it feels as nice as bfding od feels good.

Sleep is good, well until 6ish where he wakes often and seems uncomfortable and will only sleep on boob, not sure why that happens.

And I have an appointment on Monday and just did a dry run with dh and he lasted 8am till 11 without me, with dh. Woohoo! (beats all traipsing into shoreditch).

ps - HHHH I'm v impressed at you planning ahead to do BLW. I hadn't even heard of it until DS was about 12 weeks. In fact, I did pretty much no preparation for DS's arrival beyond buying a sling and assuming I would breastfeed. Probably why it took us 10 weeks to get it established .

Ds has the same problem nellyjane he usually wakes pretty distressed and quite often squeals in pain and squirms when asleep, don't know what to do or what causes it Is yours a very windy baby?
Well done marshabrady I'm a bit find myself dreaming of just an hour to myself.. It'll come I know, I'm being patient honest!

Ah darkandstormy it is hard. It has taken over 7 months. I just read back and saw your post about naps. Ds was exactly the same and would only sleep longer if he was on me. It was hard as it meant i didn't have a break. Hang in there, how is he doing these days with naps?

Still not a long napper but since the gaviscon he at least sleeps more often. W're getting there.
Good to hear blw is going well for you and your ds, I'm looking forward to that. Has he dropped any milk feeds yet?

It's a bit hard to tell as the bfding is so non-routine. But I am pretty sure he is feeding less. The three hours this morning was probably one of the longest between feeds. Some of it must be habit/comfort I think.

Definitely less often than at two or three months.

I know what you mean about the non-routine, I've had quite a few people ask when we're out and about; is he due a feed? How should I know! He feeds when he likes and it changes every day!
Feel a bit about how much I'm posting on this thread.. Can anyone tell that I don't have a life? Eek!

Hi everyone. Nice to see all the new comers! We've been havng a few tough nights the side also.

nellyjane my DS sounds exactly like yours wakes up really regularly at night and only boob will appease him but he does seem to get more and more restless as the night progresses. I always thought it was wind and would burp him for what felt like hours but nothing would come out. He does seem to settle for a little while longer if I give him ibuprofen or paracetamol so I often do wonder if it is teeth. He also only has bottom 2 and is terrible for chewing/drooling during the day. So maybe? Who knows though?

We do have the occasional easier night though. Where he will only wake twice or so. Bliss

Don't feel bad about the posting Dark, my iPod has been a saviour the last 7 months. And the good thing about mn is that it's free (unlike the huge online shopping habit I managed to cultivate while exhausted ).

I remember when ds was 10 days and my mother said he's feeding again?....at ten days! I think my ap style would be quite bizarre for her (is o/s).

Two wakings in the night would be luxury here too .

It's so great how just knowing I'm not the only one makes me feel better! Sometimes I feel like all I think about is 'is it teeth/wind/food intolerance/habit/normal?' Don't think it's wind DarkAndStormy - he hardly ever seems to get wind these days.

We're loving the BLW too MarshaBrady. This evening we had my PIL round for dinner and DS ate steak and roast veg -they thought it was great . Really don't understand people who ask if he's due a feed either. I'm a bit of a 'grazer' myself, so why would I try and schedule DS's appetite?!

At least one advantage of all the night waking/feeding is I don't need to worry about him getting enough calories!

Hello there (waves cheerfully & smawns - smiles & yawns at same time)!
Great thread & would love to join you fellow APs. I am like lots of other posters an accidental AP, I thought I'd play it by ear but had in mind a gentle steering towards bedtime routines & cots, & was very shocked at idea of cosleeping - unsafe, suffocation, rolling over etc. I swore I'd never do it (laughs knowingly). Anyway you ll guess what's coming up... Cosleeping became my lifeline & although still a bit edgy about the covers on the bed, he comes in with me at some point most nights/ mornings. So I am whittering, fast forwards to baby being born emcs following them trying to turn him & him going into distress, so never actually went into labour, & it was 20mins before I got to see him, which made me feel v disconnected & unnatural (oh the pointless hours listening to the natural birth hypnotherapy cd!) probably influenced the initial few days & set the path for ap. I was unprepared for this gorgeous vulnerable bundle who NEEDED to be held so much, & I remember noticing even in the hospital how much he responded to me/dh as we constantly held him.
Over the next few months it was beautiful & utterly soul destroying at the same time as he had horrible colic, maybe undiagnosed silent reflux (still waiting for referral to come through!) such trouble sleeping except on dh's chest or on the boob. So lots of sympathy with the 'no more than 40mins sleep' existence! I was v ill so he naturally ended up in bed, on sofa/ rocking chair with me as then I could tend to his every need without having to move around to do so. He was in the buggy though as couldn't carry him in sling, picked him up out of it as soon as he cried though...

Anyway he is now 5 months, sleeps from 11/12 ish in his hammock (godsend discovered at 3 months), until somewhere between 3-5am when he comes in with me. All naps are on me/dh or shuffled off us onto the sofa / floor next to us.
He bf's on demand, constantly through the morning & from 7/8 pm til he falls asleep. I scared myself by counting them the other day & got to about 15-20 feeds a day!
Am casually starting BLW by dint of him grabbing food off my plate, & gumming sticks of cucumber/ nectarine stones & playing with spoons. However he swallowed a clementine piece yesterday though which terrified me so am keeping him away from my plate for couple more weeks until I do it properly!
So, sorry is really long post but am whitterery & typing on phone so it's hard to go back & cut down!
Final thoughts: what is a high need baby? Ds is my pfb so no comparison, to me he feels demanding yet very responsive & so smiley/relaxed when he is 'attached' am tempted to call him a rather laid back baby, however, am exhausted & know am sleeping less & bf more than the other rl mums I know.
I have though realised that the way my mum describes my sister when she was a baby (as terribly terribly difficult & demanding), is kind if how my ds is, except I view it as him just telling me what he needs. For example, my mum says how much my sister cried & never slept, but on further enquiry she was left to cry in cot in room on her own, & did sleep when held... So actually like my ds except I am not trying to force him to sleep anywhere else!
Ok, really final point next (sorry, blushes, you can barr me from this thread!).... Am young back to work in October & v worried about how ap is possible when working full time & possibly going away on business too...
Getting v mixed advice in rl ie stop bf now as you'll feel terrible if you stop because it's too difficult cos of work, or wean him now so it's done before you go back to work, or spend less time with him/ holding him so he gets used to it before going back to work, or other terrifying tales of sleeplessness & 'the dreaded rod for...' So any positive 'going back to work attachment parenting stories'?

Found this thread v. interesting. Am basically APing 5 mo DD - sling, co-sleeping, BFing on demand. She's mostly a very happy little thing, which may partly be due to the style of parenting but is also, I suspect, because she is a pretty laid back, relaxed personality.

She is the total opposite of her 2 yo brother who was, IMO, the definitive high needs baby (terrible silent reflux - on meds for a year -, would only sleep when held, cried and cried, and just seemed to find being a baby awfully frustrating). He was also BF on demand (and still has 2 feeds a day ) and I used a BabyBjorn (much prefer the moby I use now) but we didn't co-sleep and, in consequence, I survived on 2 hrs sleep a night for months.

My approach to DD was partly in reaction to my experience with DS and partly to make life parenting a toddler and a baby easier. And I am happy with it, even though I know DH is keen to get DD into her own bed. She does sometimes start the night in either her amby or Moses basket but always ends up in with us as I am just not prepared to spend hours settling a baby who wouldn't need settling at all if she was allowed to lie next to me.

The way I see it is that it's not going to be forever: she will want her own bed, her own room and her own space at some point.

Oh, and AisieSusie, I didn't stop BFing DS when I went back to work when he was 10 mo. I continued to give him a morning and evening feed - which I think made the back-to-work transition easier for both of us.

Marsha/Mummyberry, this question about further down the road with a baby that wakes frequently for reasons other than hunger and wants to sleep on the boob ....

Hmmm, only my experience with both dcs, with whom I co-slept/bf-ed in bed. Not helpful in that it is different.

Dd was tricky in that she would only sleep on the boob, unless she was in deep enough sleep which was hardly ever because she was a light sleeper. She would wake every hour to cry, fuss, eventually bf-ing worked less and less Cue: after 13 months, one very frustrated mother. She had a bad bout of teething at 17 months and went on a nursing strike. I took the opportunity to wean her then. It was surprisingly painless - she did not protest, whereas she would have brought the house down previously. Almost overnight, her sleep improved - from waking once an hour, she started sleeping through and now is one of the deepest sleepers. Even ds' wailing next to her does not wake her.

Ds was less of a boob-in-the-mouth babe, but avid bf-er. He never conveniently went on a nursing strike. But he woke less and less often and eventually allowed himself to be weaned, through more and more outright refusals from me. I reckon he would have been 3 by then. His sleep was sorted by then. So in ds case, less of a dramatic connection with weaning.

I am not sure whether I can attribute AP to more confident children. Dd and ds were AP-ed by necessity - both pretty high needs.

But ds will probably always be more confident than dd. dd is more caring and empathetic. Ds better at looking after himself and less at looking out for others. It is quite innate.

Neither are laid back, hence both high needs. But they were needy in different ways, which was (in hindsight) a function of personality.

I don't think that means that my hardwork in AP-ing went to waste. For a long time, I envied other parents whose children slept better and were less demanding. If I did not AP, I think my dcs would have been traumatised as very young babies - that is an observation of my own dcs, of course, not all babies, many of whom would do quite well without AP. You just meet your dcs' needs at the time they demand it. They demand different things at different times of their lives. Dd 7 and ds 4 are quite easy now - they are best mates and play beautifully together. AP is just the natural way of parenting for a baby that is more demanding and very nice even for a more laid back baby.

I think there is an element of genetic link, whether you get a high needs baby. Dh was exactly like dcs as baby (so MIL said).

Hello, wondering if I can join your thread please?

My DS is 21mo. I am completely in awe of you newer mums who actively decided to AP. I was completely at sea when my DS was born - even tried She Who Must Not Be Names for a few days and got completely stressed about why DS didn't want to sleep on his own or bf at the 'right' times. . Thankfully, I had a local LLL who got me reading Dr Sears and the rest and I realised that how I instinctively wanted to parent not only had a name but that It Was OK.

Jump forward 21 months and DS is a happy, secure little chap. He self-settles now with either ex-DH or myself (actually, AP is the one thing that ex-DH and I have always agreed with, despite my MIL blaming it for our relationship breakdown. Because non-AP parents never get divorced, obviously ), sleeps through most nights with either me or DH, and still bfs once or twice on most days. It has been a long, hard slog at times but I am so glad we have parented this way. I honestly believe we are starting to see the rewards now.

Aisie - I work FT now, ex-DH is at home FT. DS copes fine bfing in the morning and evening when he is at mine. When he is with ex-DH, he copes fine without (although I spend a lot of time there after work so he rarely goes a whole day without a bf).

Hi Aisie, Sariska and Isaw DS turns 8 months tomorrow and we had a HORRIBLE night last night . He is currently sleeping in his hammock upstairs though so things are not too terrible .

I wonder if it is the 8 month sleep regression or just another unexplainable bad night.

On the question of whether it is genetic, my MIL claims that ALL her babies where 'no trouble at all' - ever. They apparently all slept all the time! But my mum has said that I was exactly the same as DS so perhaps there is some inheritable factors. Unfortunately she is very vague as to when things started to get better .

Something I have learnt though is that things always seem better after a bath in daylight than they do in the middle of the night

Very bad night here too. Awake every time he was of me, crying and exhausted. Felt very frustrating, love to know why some nights are bad.

My mother says we were all good babies, slept and fed well - rose tinted I think!

Off me

Well it was obviously the night for bad nights as mine wasn't that great either!

Re the frequent waking towards the end of the night, it's interesting to know other people have this as well, I wonder why it is? Do your babies get as much sleep as they are 'supposed to'? Read somewhere that at 5-6 months they are supposed to have 14-16hrs sleep in total, anyone close to that? I am wondering how AP fits into that?

Am having difficulties currently with my mothers attitude towards parenting, me & ds are currently staying with my parents & am feeling pretty down about it. At first they were surprised by the attachment parenting thing & questioned it alot, but now they've been converted to the idea a bit too much. They really like the idea of constant carrying & attention, except for them not me!

Am finding it really difficult as AP is about my attachment to my baby as well as his to mine, & am now feeling like I have to have a reason to excuse me wanting to hold him at all :-( I am trying to be generous about it, but I must say it's difficult not to get upset. My mother in particular seems to resent giving himback even to feed, the implication being that I should express so she can feed him, which am doing too much & I feel quite distraught about it. I know it's not trying to disattach me really, but abit hard to feel that even though thinking that! Doesn't help that shes decide to call herself Mamma instead of grandma, & says things like 'a spoon for Mamma, a spoon for ds, look we're both eating... When I am sitting there too aparently invisible (grrr grrr grrr gives in to jealous animal feeling!).

So anyway, wondered if anyone had found any awkward moments through wanting to wear/ be close to your babies?

Glad to hear about bf when backat work (sorry but cant remember who posted this & very difficult to scroll up on my phone sorry!). Did you express in the day at all?were you worried about milk drying up?

It's really nice to have other people to talk to & be supportive about the way am parenting, it's hard to know am doing the right thing sometimes.

Anyone recommend any good books on AP? I am doing it by feel & would be interested to know more

It was me who posted about BFing when back at work. Yeah, I did have to express once a day for a while - for my own comfort. I wasn't particularly worried about the milk drying up as I was only dropping one feed (at about 2pm).

Sorry to hear about all the bad nights. My DD, too, woke a fair bit but I only stirred long enough to plug her on and leave her to it! I think she gets loads of sleep, especially on the days when her brother is at nursery. As a newborn I would say she was sleeping for 22 hours a day. Now, I reckon it's something like 16 or 17, which is a total revelation to me after her brother. But, all naps are in the sling, on my lap or with me lying down with her. A bit limiting....

AisieSusie, I don't wonder that you're a bit peeved at your mother. I suppose it's too late for a gentle suggestion that "Grandma" might be less confusing for all concerned?