7 week old sleeping too much??

[ThreeNine]

I know every child is different, but my soon to be 8 week old daughter seems to be sleeping an awful lot still. I think that during the daytime she isnt awake for more than 5 or 6 hours in total. I've been reading around the Internet and am starting to think this might not be entirely normal? If she's up for too long she starts getting fussy. This evening I tried distracting her and giving her a change of scene when she started grizzling in case she was just bored (?!), but it led to inconsolable screaming. Then it was really hard to get her to sleep where it's normally quite easy, which to me says she became over tired... would you agree??

Basically I've just worried myself that we've been lulling her to sleep when she doesn't really want/need to be asleep. But she wouldnt be yawning/fussing/going to sleep if she wasnt tired, would she?

Reassurance or opinions much appreciated :)

My son's just over six weeks and he sleeps most of the time too. I think it's normal. He's probably awake about the same as yours or even a bit less. Guess growing is tiring work .

Mine is a couple of weeks older than yours but not as sleepy, but as you say they are all different.
Really at this age I think 2 things - they can only stay awake about 2 hours at a time, and they need to feed no less than 4 hourly, except maybe at night. If she fits that pattern, she's nice and alert when she is awake, and you are starting to get smiles, I wouldn't worry.

My 6 week old does this and I think it is normal--
wakes up at 8am, feeds, has a little play about till 9-30,
then another longish sleep till lunch time, then a feed, a bit of wakey wakey time, maybe an hour, then a sleep-from say 2-4pm,
then a feed, and then a sleep till about 7 ish, feed, play,
then she has a meltdown and it takes a while to settle her, but asleep from 8-10pm, and we give her a bottle then (EBF apart from that) then awake and up to bed with us 10-30/11pm,
sleep 11-2/3 feeds quickly then sleeps/feeds at 5am, then again at 8am.

So basically she cannot tolerate to be awake for more than an hour at one go, and is awake for about 4/5 hours out of 24 in total.

Your DD sounds perfectly normal to me!

At 7 weeks I doubt my ds had as much as 5 hours a day when he wasn't sleeping or feeding! He basically fed to sleep at least every 2 hours, and had one 6-8 hour chunk of sleep in the night.

So long as your baby is growing and gaining weight, and has some content/alert periods when awake, then she's fine.

Thank you all, makes me feel better. She is smiling and alert most times ahe's awake, for a bit at least :)

Gapants, that sounds very similar to our routine!

Sounds normal to me. I found my DS very dull in the first three or four months because he was never awake. Family joke was that visitors couldn't say what colour eyes he had because they were never open :) In six months time when your baby is sitting up, trying to move about and wanting lots more attention you'll be looking back at these peaceful sleepy days with a degree of nostalgia!

Don't worry and don't fight it! My dd was the same for ages- she could only stay up for 1 hour max until she was at least 5 months. By the time I'd changed her nappy, fed her, burped her etc it was nearly nap time again. I have nct friends whose babies only slept for 45 mins 3 times a day at 3 months- I thought dd must be a freak. As hv said to me at the time, "enjoy the peace and quiet whilst it lasts".

I didn't even see the colour of my DS's eyes for at least the first few weeks he slept so much. Seriously he loved sleeping and only woke up to eat. Even at 10 weeks he was still sleeping loads, waking for the occasional feed and to be sociable for half an hour and then going back to sleep again. He's now 1 yo and i still get misty eyed at the memory, especially when he's trying very hard to pull the Christmas tree over.