newborn sleeps all day but won't go down at night

[Rockelburger]

I have a 2 week old girl who wakes every 3/4 hours for a change and feed then goes back to sleep again. It's so much better a routine than I thought at this early stage.

However she has her last feed of the day around 10/11 pm then won't settle and go to sleep. Every time we put her down she cries until we pick her up again. I have tried leaving her a minute or so to settle but she just gets more mad! Then I have to hold her / breast feed for a minute or so to settle her. I then fear putting her down as she screams again if I do it too soon, but don't know when is too soon!

She is breast and bottle fed

Help!!

Sounds normal - she is still very very young and they do feed more at night to help build up supply. I wouldn't worry about being in a routine at this stage, it takes a long time to get into a routine and teach them about day and night. You can start to do some things to help such as keeping lights low at night and being more quiet but if they are crying I would say you should pick up and soothe, cuddle as they really do need this, especially at this very young age. They need the physical contact and the motion to soothe them. It is very tiring, I know, but if you can find ways to snooze and catch up with some sleep during the day then maybe that would help?

Lots of babies have their days and nights mixed up, that's totally normal. Of course that doesn't make it any easier! At two weeks there isn't a huge amount you can do except maybe try to tank her up during the day. You could try feeding her every two hours during the day for a few days (waking her to feed). I'd give her boob at all feeds and then one bottle consistently at the same time every day, probably the night one at 10/11pm. Maybe your DH could give her that and you could sleep from say 8pm-2am when she wakes again looking for another feed.

To be honest it's really do what you can to get through these early days, we let ours sleep on our chests in the evening, I co-slept, bounced the baby to sleep in a bouncer etc. All the things I never thought I would do!

What worked for DS, who was up all night at first, was loosely following the baby whisperer EASY routine. It's very flexible and manageable (good luck keeping a newborn awake for any length of time!) but think I only started around 6 weeks.

Yes you need to try and switch your DDs day and nights around. Try and wake and feed more frequently during the day.

Also try and nap yourself during the day so you can cope with the nights better.

Very normal. DS didn't sleep day or night at that age. I tortured myself trying to get him to go down in his Moses basket and we were both exhausted. I now have a 2wk old DD and although she does sleep pretty well at night it's only because I give her free access to boob, feed her laying down and cosleep. I can sleep through feeds so we both get a good night. Not for everyone but it works for us.