Boyfriend wants me to stop breastfeeding

[amelee]

Help! I am a ftm and my son is almost a month old. I have been exclusively breastfeeding and he was 7.5 pounds at birth and at his last weigh in was 9 pounds so I know that he is getting enough and gaining well. The problem is that he cluster feeds at night and doesn’t go to sleep for more than an hour (an hour is long, it’s usually only 20 to 30 minutes) and when I pick him up to feed he falls to sleep on me whilst feeding so never has a ‘big feed’ in the night. We have tried putting my clothes in the Moses basket, giving him a dummy etc to try and settle him but nothing seems to work. My boyfriend is becoming annoyed with me up and out of bed all night picking him up and trying to put him back to sleep as this disturbs him and he has work in the morning. Because of this he wants me to give bottles at night instead (his mum his also pushing this) but I don’t want to as I think things will just improve as baby gets older... any advice?

Two week old babies shouldn’t be sleeping through and it’s very rare - I suspect he’s remembering wrong. The baby will wake just as much in the night but you’ll have to get up to make bottles! Could you get a cosleeper cot so you don’t have to get up and down so much in the night?

Er. My formula fed 5 month old wakes every 3 hours still. My breast fed DS slept through from 7 months (which I thought was excellent).

I hope you have support

Given he's not suggesting you switch so he can do night feeds, and he's just suggesting it out of pure selfishness, I'd carry on as you are.

Whilst bottles are nowhere near as difficult as some people think (no right minded formula feeder makes up fresh bottles themselves at night, and everything can be in your bedroom, so it's very minimal work), the main advantage of bottles is sharing, and he's clearly too selfish for that.

Well he sounds like an unsupportive selfish arse.

You are doing amazingly and your baby is 4 weeks old and will wake in the night regardless as to how he is fed.

Send boyfriend to the sofa...or his mum's house.

He probably recalls himself sleeping through the night at 2 weeks old, I doubt babys mum was.

It's virtually unheard of for a two week old baby to sleep all night (prepares for 'My baby did' replies...)

Anyway, all babies are different. Even if his DD did sleep through from the beginning there's no reason for it, it's just some babies do and most dont.

My DS was a terrible sleeper. Still is. At 6 months I put him on solids thinking that he would finally sleep through. Nope, he woke just as often as he did before.

Send your DP to his mother if he wants sleep. Selfish fucker.

I’m no expert, but I think that formula now is much more easily digested than formula back in the day, more like breast milk, so grannies remembering how their bottle-fed babies fed 4 hourly from birth, are not comparing like with like. Their babies may have slept longer because their feed sat in their stomach for longer, but if you switch now to formula, your baby probably won’t. As others have mentioned, you’ll also have to faff around with bottles. With my eldest, nightfeeds were one area where I felt breast feeding paid off, as I could lift and feed her and put her back in near darkness without either of us fully waking up, luckily I used to rouse with her hungry grunts and snuffles so she didn’t get to cry that often.

Bf is being a bit of an arse, he should be more supportive, however lack of sleep does bring out the worst. Have a word and fingers crossed he gets a grip.

Just want to add, - are you switching on lights when you feed in the night? I had a very low wattage reddish nightlight that went in the plug socket and was on all night. It was just enough glow for me to manoeuvre round our bed (tiny bedroom) to her Moses basket at the foot of the bed without crashing around. I think it helped us all maximise sleep not increasing the light level in the room.

Have a look at a Next To Me or snuzpod crib
It is like a moses basket without one side that attaches to the side of your bed and sits level with your mattress, so when you need the baby, you don't have to get up out of bed - you can just pull them across for a quick feed and easily put them back again

You can buy them second hand and get a new mattress

Also bear in mind that breastfed babies are usually less colic-y thank bottle fed babies, so the time to burp them after a feed is shorter, so you get back to sleep quicker
If you move to bottles, you might do fewer feeds (and it is might, because it isn't guaranteed at ALL) but you then spend 20 mins burping them and trying to work the gas out of them, so you're not actually getting any extra sleep when it is all added up

How long can they stay in a pod for? Is it longer than a Moses basket

Mine stayed in til 6 months, then went into a full-size cot in their own room...

If his first child slept through after two weeks, either someone was putting too much milk powder in or your partner was sleeping through it all.

Suggest he sleeps at his mum's when he's got to be up for work the next day and not to come back until he accepts this is a brand new baby whose needs have to come first.

Tell him and his Mum to f*ck off 😂

Lol but in all seriousness your baby is far more important than his sleep. How dare they suggest you stop!!!

I'm going to join the very long line of people who are encouraging you to continue breastfeeding for as long as you and your DS want to. It sounds as if you're doing absolutely brilliantly. Please don't let your boyfriend talk you into giving up when there's absolutely no valid reason whatsoever. Congratulations and enjoy the snuggles (even when the frequency of those snuggles at night time mean you're sometimes only sleeping in 20-30 min chunks. That won't last, I promise!)

hi new mum...congratulations on that little darling. Don't forget the following: 1. baby gets precious antibodies from you in your breast milk that it cannot get from formula, and less likely to get a host of health issues including obesity 2. breast feeding is good for you TOO as it generates valuable hormones that help you recover from the birth (oxytocin that helps your womb go back to its normal size) AND reduces your risk of breast cancer later in life. Try to get some rest and ideally sleep during the day and then you will produce more milk for last feed and that should help baby settle and sleep a bit more. Some babies sleep at night early and some don't. Wish you all the best with your new little treasure. By the way with this kind of pressure as a first time mum it can affect your mood....if you start feeling down get to speak to health visitor or GP ASAP. best wishes older mum who has been there!

Safe cosleeper fan here! Breastfed my youngest for three years and have no regrets. Do what you feel is right for you and your new baby, don't be pressured into doing something you don't feel is what you need to do xx

Well done for feeding with such little support, you are doing an amazing job. Maybe get your health visitor to have a word with him about his unrealistic expectations?

All bottle feeding will do is make it more difficult. You will have to get up out of bed go downstairs and make a bottle whilst the baby cries. Your partner and his Mum are being extremely selfish. I’m sure he would change his mind if he had to get up all through the night at weekends with a bottle.

If you want to keep breastfeeding then please do. At 4 weeks my baby was the same as I was still establishing my milk supply, it got better after 6-8 weeks I’d say. He will just have to be a parent and deal with it! You’re doing an amazing job. once breastfeeding is established it is so much easier.

Maybe point out that if you do switch to formula and it doesn’t make him sleep through (which it probably won’t), he’ll have lost his reason not to help at night (eg not having boobs) so he’ll probably have more disturbed nights than currently!

You're boyfriend is being ridiculous, and also really selfish. My baby is ebf and sleeps better than my friends ff babies so I don't think how you feed them has anything to do with it.. she's 2 months and goes 8-9 with a quick feed at 4am.

Bottles will be much harder work than just rolling over and feeding, look up safe co sleeping and if you can, do it and send your boyfriend to the sofa. Does he want to comfort a hungry crying baby while you go make a bottle up because that's what's going to happen!!

1. baby gets precious antibodies from you in your breast milk that it cannot get from formula, and less likely to get a host of health issues including obesity

This is not true (for the benefit of any formula-feeding mums reading this).

But of course OP you should continue breastfeeding. Your husband is being unfair. I’d call his bluff, say ‘fantastic idea! Then you can share the night feeds!’ And see how he feels about that

^^ (the bit about obesity I mean)

Bottles are unlikely to make a difference- if and only if you wanted to price this point, express enough for a few ounces (catch then whilst nursing usually works well) and he can give a bottle of that at say 10pm dream feed
Also make sure you’re eating plenty of carbs and drinking loads, it’s knackerong at this stage. Something like porridge is good because healthy but quick
You’re doing really well x

should say that my bf has a daughter from a previous relationship that was formula fed and apparently slept through at two weeks so I think he sees the breast feeding as the reason why he’s not sleeping

Just to add to the people reassuring you to ignore this: my baby is EBF and sleeps really well (though he still has 2 night feeds, he started sleeping 6 hour stretches within weeks overnight). My sister’s babies were EBF and woke really often. Different babies are different; it’s not about what milk they have.

Definitely look into cosleeping and feeding lying down though. We converted the Ikea gulliver cot to a cosleeper (tutorials online if you google) and it makes nights so much better - so much so that husband will sometimes say “wow, he slept so well” when in fact I’ve been cluster feeding since 4am —feel I deserve a medal for not spitting in his morning coffee when he does this to be honest—