Confused parent to be: routine / Attachment

[elizabethy20]

Hello all,

I'm 30 weeks pregnant with my first, & very excited about meeting our little one, but pretty confused about the huge divide between attachment parenting & routine.

I had been thinking along the lines of this (amotherfarfromhome.com/sample-newborn-routine/) - a relaxed routine. I still think I'd want to feed (hopefully breast feed) on demand for the first few weeks, but the always putting the baby down to sleep when he's sleepy but not asleep thing seems very logical...

But then reading other books - it's hugely scathing of routines. I'd like to do some bits of Attachment parenting - baby sleeping in our room, & baby wearing, but once little one is a few months old I'd like not to be doing lots of little feeds / still getting very disrupted sleep....

Am I crazy? Is it possible to combine elements of both? Has any one started off with attachment parenting & gone into a routine after a few months?
The lady who wrote the blog post says she didn't have to let hers cry it out at a few months old as they always had been use to self soothing...

Is there any balanced in between book? ! Does any one know of a balanced (scientific?!) Comparison of the 2 methods?

Thank you

Baby sleeping in your room isn't "attachment parenting", it's NHS advice for the first six months, to be with you (or someone) for all naps and sleeps.
Demand feeding won't stop after a few weeks.
I love routine in my life, thought I'd do that for the first baby and it didn't work at all. By about three months in I realised that he had his own routine, got tired at similar time, hungry at similar times, and this became the routine, not one I imposed on him.

Backingvocals
Title of swmnbn's new book perhaps?

Haha Backing. Only harsh sometimes though. Other times very apt

What everyone else is saying basically, but you may find your baby does fall into a little routine of his/her own. So for example some tiny babies will regularly have three naps a day and then this becomes two by six months... this is the only 'routine'-y thing that DS did by himself. But we went with it cos it worked for him and planned our days round it.

And breastfeeding - it's very normal to still be waking at night after the first few months to feed. But you might be more used to the night wakenings by then and it might not feel so bad to be doing it.

Breastfeeding is clever though, breastfeeding mums' sleep patterns are different in that you move into deeper sleep faster to maximise rest while still being highly attuned to your baby.

Well I confess I've thought it myself sometimes

I have a friend who got through her CC week by sitting outside the closed bedroom door flicking Vs at her furious toddler on the other side of the door, like a rebellious teenager being told off by a teacher

nb this is not an approved strategy.

You get it to 12 weeks any way you can, whilst trying (and failing) to save your own sanity.

Feed, cry, sleep, poo, rinse and repeat.

After 12 weeks you have a decent idea of what will work for you and your baby, so you attempt to get them vaguely to comply, with varying degrees of success.

That's what I did

Most of my babies would bf every half hour when they were very young. It was for comfort as well as for food. Be prepared for that.

It's also worth remembering that if you physically can cope with less than 8 hours unbroken sleep, and if you can't devote 6 months of your life to answering someone else's every need, then perhaps a newborn isn't for you......

Meant to be

The lady who wrote the blog post says she didn't have to let hers cry it out at a few months old as they always had been use to self soothing
No one has to "let her cry it out at a few months old" - if I read that on a blog I would immediately disregard anything else they said.

My daughter hated routine, took about 9 months to get in any kind of routine at all. One if my NCT friends tried desperately to have a routine and it stressed her out so much as her daughter wouldn't sleep when she wanted her to.

Iggi it's not a cry it out discussion

I fed on demand but had a bath time routine.

I co-slept, but used a pram/pushchair out and about.

I breastfed till age 3, but did purees out of tubes/jars from 6 months.

Most people pick and choose what suits them and 99.9% of people are neither Routine nor Attachment, but some combination of both!

Murphy, if the OP posts it, I can comment on it. She is considering whether to go with advice from a blogger then acceptable to comment on what the blogger actually says. But thanks for controlling the thread!

Congratulations!
As others have said, you're best to wait and see and whatever you do don't read too many books!
With ds1 I tried so hard to get him in a routine, did sleep training, the works. It was hard work and didn't work and I felt like I was getting it wrong all the time.
With ds2 I didn't open a book. We co-slept, he napped when he felt like it, fed when he was hungry and was the most laid back little thing. I was happy, he was happy.
They have very different personalities though - Ds1 is much more highly strung and Ds2 is super placid.
Good luck.

Of course you can combine both! Do whatever works for you.

The idea of putting them down awake is definitely sensible, if you're bothered about the idea of them wanting feeding to sleep. On the other hand, breastmilk is like a magic drug which makes them sleep but is also totally harmless. So... you know? It's just what works for different people.

Equally, you can deal with night wakings in one of two ways. Either you can do everything in your power to reduce them or make them less dependent on you, by avoiding reliance on breastfeeding, and sleep training, or you can do what you can to make them less disturbing, like having the baby in bed and allowing them to latch themselves on in the night.

The golden rule to remember is that all parenting books are just somebody's opinion. There is VERY little which is actually scientifically proven or evidence based, no matter how convincing or logical people make it sound.

If you do want to breastfeed one bit of advice relating to routines which is based on facts rather than opinion is that you should watch your baby, not the clock. Timed feeds can be a bad idea because a routine doesn't know your particular baby, your breast make up, how effective their milk transfer is, how full they are, or how they are feeling that day. Feed on one side until they come off, get fidgety, or fall asleep. (If you're wanting to avoid falling asleep then wait until they are getting sleepy.) Wind them and offer the other side (they might not take it, that's fine). Problem with timed feeds is that if you finish feeding too early, they'll be hungry sooner, which creates the illusion you don't have enough milk. If you try to insist that they stay on one side for too long then you're leaving milk in the other side which then sends the message to your body to produce less milk. It's a destructive cycle.

It's a little person, remember. Parenting is about developing a relationship as much as it is anything else.

Congratulations!

I say be open minded to anything and do what suits you and your baby, nothing is as you expect and books can be misleading and make some people anxious.

Babies are all different and so will have their own individual "routine". I did everything on demand and DD eventually settled into her own routine which we just went along with.

DD was one of the apparently rare babies who was more than happy to be put down drowsy and go off to sleep herself. No crying, fussing or self soothing - she would just drift off within 2 minutes of being put down and sleep right through to morning. Certainly not all babies do this but some do so you never know!

Pick and choose what approaches you like and you'll find something which suits you all, it might take a while though.

And if baby feeds constantly, won't be put down to sleep and has day and night back to front... Don't worry! You're not doing it wrong, it's perfectly normal!

Do what you can do within the NHS etc guidelines.

Don't worry about making a rod for your own back.

Do what works for you, listen to your instincts and do what you feel is right.

Your baby will decide routine etc - assuming you have the sort of baby who can work with routines because believe me, some of them are geniuses who lull you into a false sense of security and just as you proudly boast your little Einstein has worked out how to self-soothe and sleeps through the night, the wee darling will then decided to only sleep in 45 minutes bursts until it is 4 and half.

Don't over think anything, go with the flow and enjoy your baby. Books come in very useful for propping up a cot when your baby has a cold. Other than fuel for an open fire, they have little other use.

I consider myself a fairly routiney person. Ds is 6 months and we're quite set in our ways, but it's by no means exact, and we can be flexible. Tuesdays we go to baby group which is at nap time, so then he sleeps in the pushchair through lunch afterwards! Win! I do try and keep to his routine where possible as it makes my life easier!

I didn't implement anything at all for the first 6 weeks, just went with the flow. Then I spent a few days watching what his natural "routine" was and tried to use that as our routine. Some days it worked, some it didn't. You think you're onto a good thing and it all changes anyway. He slept in our room, I fed on demand, he did actually mostly go down "sleepy but not asleep" but I know we were really lucky with that one! Basically just do what you think is best and although I am definitely a fan of having a routine as it helps me a lot, I know it doesn't suit all babies and you can't force them into something. Oh and he only just started sleeping through and it's not every night , so that part isn't guaranteed anyway!

Thank you all!

Especially to balanced views, & for the link to styleberryblog.com/when-babywise-fails-and-whats-not-wrong-with-my-baby which is a really useful view point.

I guess we've just got to wait & see what happens.... :)

Def wait and see.. Babies are all very different, once you've had more than one you realise this!
My eldest was a Velcro baby for the first 3 mths. She didn't cry much but as soon as you got to 45 degrees when you tried put her down she woke and howled as if you were abandoning her on a Roman hillside. She was like that from the off - the night she was born she was in the hospital bed with me not her little plastic hospital cot

DS on the other hand was quite happy to lie in his cot by himself awake. I remember the first night with him - in the crazy post birth period I thought maybe there was sth wrong with him as he was quite content. This continued - you could feed DS, pop him awake in his cot and he would play with his fingers and drop off. DD by contrast you had to feed to sleep and then transfer to the cot in slo-mo - God forbid you made any jerky motion or she'd cotton on to what you were doing ! Thank goodness I had the difficult one first!

DS was a much harder toddler than her though - so karma gets you in the end !

Good lick OP.

Wait and see is definitely the way to go. All babies are different. DD1 was a dream baby, fully bf, slept 8 til 7 from 10 weeks old. Oh, I thought I was such a great parent.

Then DD2 came along, wanted feeding at 11.30 and 02.30 without fail every night until she was nearly 1. She was really hungry - would drain both sides in 15 minutes flat and then conk out. Still an easy baby but a very different one.

DD1 would not nap for toffee, then napped at nursery until she was past 4. DD2 was a great napper, dropped all naps before she turned 2 though.

The only thing I did find was that at about 4 months old they started developing their own little patterns of how their day would go, So I just went with that. No routines of any other kind.