Baby won't settle for his dad and it's putting a strain on our relationship

[jadericho]

Our 5 month old is EBF (though I'm expressing and we're introducing a bottle now) and I'm really struggling with him sleep; he will not settle for anyone except me and not only is this making it extra hard for me at night as I'm running on empty and no one can physically help me, but it's also putting a strain on my relationship with his dad. He resents me breastfeeding, states that's the reason for it and is the blame for all his night wakings and the reason he can't comfort or bond with him properly. I'm totally at breaking point. Our only option now is a sleep consultant which I'm all for but aware we're not made of money, I'd have to go for just a FaceTime or email consultation. Other half isn't on board, he doesn't see the point because he thinks we're just going to essentially pay someone to tell me what he's being telling me; to stop breastfeeding. So he's refusing to go half's with me on the cost. Bearing in mind he's on full salary and I'm obviously on maternity leave as a nurse which is only just enough to manage but I definitely don't have the spare cash floating about. So I'm considering a credit card. I don't want to but needs must. I am that desperate. It's really hard. I know he must feel so rejected and pushed out when he just won't settle for him but then he guilt trips me, it's my fault he's like that because I've comfort fed him since the day he was born. So it probably is my fault, he's so used to me doing it. As a first time mum, no mum friends or any experience with babies or anyone relatable to talk to, I just did what I felt natural. I don't regret it, I've overcome so much in terms of breastfeeding after a tricky start so I'm so proud of how far we've come and i really enjoy doing it so why would I give that up? I just don't know what to do.

This doesn't sound unusual for a 5 month old at all TBH. Surely solids are on the cards and that's something both of you can do. It's also pretty young for sleep training.

What is your ds' current waking times at night? If your ds is able to take expressed milk from a bottle, could your dh give him a later feed?

I feel you with the extreme tiredness. But I agree it doesn’t sound unusual for a 5 month old. I mean this as gently as possible but it sounds like maybe you both need to adjust your expectations.

SOME 5 month olds are just as happy with dad as mum, some will go to any old adult and be fine, but perhaps you need to accept that yours won’t. For now. This will probably change!!

When you say “won’t settle” do you meAn just at night / getting to sleep or anytime?

You have bigger problems than a normal 5 month old.

Are you funding everything relating to your ds??

There are other ways your dp can be bonding with your LO so he's ridiculous to blame a lack of bonding on bf!

My dp reads to my dd every day, takes charge of bath time, gives her expressed breast milk and generally talks to her. Even doing simple things like doing faces at her when putting her in the car seat or pram make a difference.

Don't let him bully you into reducing or stopping bf.

With the sleeping there are loads of threads with advice or book suggestions, try doing a thread search. FF babies wake in the night too! An app playing shower noises through a Bluetooth speaker made a huge difference to us getting dd to sleep.

Good luck!

I’m afraid mine didn’t settle at night for DH until he was a year old and on a cup of milk and even that took me going away for several nights in a row and them having to figure it out! It was exhausting for me but DH enjoyed being the one who got all the sleep and used that to support me in other ways. DH would carry DS in a sling and in the daytime he’d sleep on him that way. He’d also cuddle him, read to him, change nappies, play peekaboo, tickle him, he was fun daddy and could always get a smile. Once he was weaned he was much more patient with feeding him than me. Not being able to settle him at night really doesn’t mean not having a bond.
I’d honestly be more concerned about your DHs behaviour than your babies. He needs to be supporting you when you are exhausted not wearing you down. And why on earth do you have your money and his money when you are living on mat pay because of the baby you created together?! Time for a serious conversation I think. He needs to see the other ways he can step in and bond with baby. I’m not sure any sleep trainer will get involved before 6 months anyway as they still generally need the night feeds. Going to formula won’t necessarily mean they sleep more but one of you will then have to get up in the night to prep the bottles and do the feeds. Fine if he will genuinely do that alternate nights, worse for you if he’ll do it once a week at the weekend and the rest of the time it’s you getting less sleep.
If baby will take a bottle he could give a bottle of expressed milk rather than formula but frankly it’s still more work for you to pump and deal with the pump and bottles than it is to just feed in my experience.
Sorry, not really a solution there just a different way of looking at things.

It sounds like the problem is your partner, not your baby. Perhaps spending the money on some counselling to help him cope with parenting would be a better use of it?

That sounds normal for a 5 month old no matter how they are fed. In fact, my ff one woke much more than my bf one! My dh could settle her, but not because she had bottles but because he spent time with her and bonded with her. He literally had her himself from the second he got home from work until bedtime. Even when I was bf. He wore her in a wrap and took her everywhere. He did her bath every night by himself. He took her out for walks, etc.

Something tells me your partner is not busting to be up feeding a baby 5 times a night (and bottle feeding is such a hassle compared to bf). So sounds like you’ll probably still be up all night, after about 2 days when the novelty wears off and he figures out how shit it is to not sleep, and then you’ll have the added hassle of cleaning, sterilising and making bottles in the middle of the night on your own.

Help him figure out how to do all the other things he can do to bond and make sure he does them all every day and is a present and engaged parent. Suggest he gets some psychological support if he needs it for himself to cope. And keep doing what you’re doing.

Your baby sounds normal ( I’m afraid ) and your partner soudhs like a complete arsehole.

Do not spend a single penny of your mat pay on anything for him- he has a good FT salary. I suggest that you see everything you can because the odds on your relationship lasting are very low I’m afraid.

You need to seek out childcare now and plan to go back to work FT. You have a good career in nursing and you are going to need it.

Do you have close family and friends ?

What’s your housing situation ? Please don’t tell me you live in his house which he owns???

Breast feeding is best for your health and baby’s health. If you can’t cope then stop but do it for YOUR OWN sake. Not his. Why any man would put HIS OWN FEELINGS above his partner and child’s health beats me.

As a PP said, there are plenty things he can do to support you and care for baby. This about him telling you what to do - he is selfish and controlling .

save everything

Hello jade my baby is also 5 months old so can’t claim to be an expert But I think your DH is actually being quite unreasonable, EBF for 5 months is amazing you have done so well! I couldnt continue after 6 weeks due to being on medication so I am quite jealous of you as I really loved doing it!

As pps have said you will probably want to start weaning at 6 months ish so maybe your DH can get more involved in that and it might make him feel like he’s doing more? I have found that my DH can settle baby sometimes when I can’t and vice versa but I don’t think it’s anything to do with the bottle as we did the same when I was EBF. He just takes him for walks, plays with him, baths him, changes nappies etc. Does your DH do any of this, if he doesn’t he can try those initially.

You might have already tried this but for sleeping we do same routine every evening and have found a white noise machine to be our saviour. DS has slept through from 8 weeks (still has a few bad nights but generally sleeps well).

I hope things improve for you because lack of sleep is just shit but to then have DH blaming you for something which you should be getting praised for IMO is really unfair!!

We ended up introducing a bottle of formula last feed of the night.
DH would give the bottle while I expressed. It took some perseverance on his part.
It meant we had EBM in the freezer, and she would sleep better after a bottle

He sounds like a prize arsehole. He's putting his own feelings ahead of his child's and he's not even right.
EBF makes no difference. You carried your child for nine months - No wonder he feels comforted by you.

All babies are unsettled at that age. Tell dad to buy a copy of Wonder Weeks and to start paying his way with the baby. Or tell him to leave, which would be my choice.

You don't need a sleep consultant. You need a better partner.

Seriously, your partner sounds like a dick.

I EBF and my husband hasn't had any problems bonding with our DD. Sometimes I think they have a better bond! He used to get up with her and take her for a bit at night so I could go to bed early, since she did not like going in her cot...

You don't say what your babies sleep habits are like, but my daughter wouldn't go down for longer than 40 minutes at that age. It's a difficult time but it does get better. I thought sleep training wasn't recommended until after 6 months anyway? And honestly, if it's a financial stress then save your money because I think it's all bullshit anyway and all babies will get there in their own.

Op, my baby is just the same! 5 months and refuses to be out down and will only settle on me. My DH tries but DD often screams for me. I'm trying to go With the flow and hope she gets better as she matures. My DH is totally supportive and whilst would love to have DD more knows what she is like and supports me. He would never let me pay for something for baby whilst in MAT leave. I'm afraid your partner sounds very unkind and unreasonable. I feel for you 

Your problem is with him, not your baby OP. You dont need sleep consultants and formula isn't a magic bullet.

What will you do if you change to formula and your man child still can't settle him and he still doesn't sleep. How long will it take before the baby is handed back to you with the added shit of preparing bottles before a feed? Along with blaming you for breastfeeding for so long he's been spoilt?

Tell him that he can bond other ways. He can do the bathtime from now on to give you a break. Take baby for an hour or 2 in the morning so you can sleep before work.

Both of mine were bottle fed. My youngest preferred me and settled better for me until about 5 months. So I don't necessarily agree BF makes a difference.

What else does DH do to bond with DC? Does he do changes, play with them, take them for walks, bath time? There's lots he can do to help bonding.

I'm also going to ask a question I'm probably going to get flamed for on here. But do you let him spend time to bond with DC? I see so many mums who complain about how their partners don't do things as good as they do, but then are too quick to intervene/take over without letting baby or dad figure it out for themselves.

This was my baby at five months. It's only really been since she turned a year (she's 14 months) that dad has been able to do bedtime with a bottle of cow's milk on the rare night I've had out/missed bedtime.

We still breastfeed and dad and baby are perfectly bonded even thought I do bedtime every night bar maybe once or twice a month. In fact DH is out tonight and she's just been crawling round the house looking for home saying 'daddy daddy' every room she goes into. She still doesn't say mummy...

Your H is respectfully, an arse. Do not give up breastfeeding for him. Chances are he won't do feeds anyway and you'll end up doing all the bottles etc. If you want to give up breastfeeding for yourself no problem, but not in this scenario.

I constantly encourage him to bond with him. This afternoon has been a prime example though; he'll be in the living room with our son while I'm pottering about doing housework and instead of playing or interacting and bonding with him he puts Netflix on and our son goes either on his mat or in his bouncy chair. If he starts crying, he'll pick him up and just put him on the sofa with him. But whenever I say something to him, he gets all defensive saying he interacts with him all the time. He works shifts so he doesn't always get to do bath time but when he's not at work he always does bath time. And our son LOVES bath time with his dad, he gets so excited and splashes his arms and legs everywhere, he never does that for me! I can see that they've got a bond but it's like he just gets jealous of the fact he can't feed him. As I said, I stand firm that I'm not quitting breastfeeding especially not on his demand, but I'm expressing and we are trying to get him to take a bottle. He's very hit and miss, sometimes he'll take it fine, other times he'll refuse. Oh and he tried to tell me I should stop physically feeding him but I should just pump for all his feeds instead. Hats off to those mamas who do that because I sure I hell cant! And as for the sleep thing, I'm gonna take what you're all saying on board and hold off with the sleep consultant, at least until the 6 month if things haven't or aren't improving. As for the finance aspect as some of you have asked, he does pay for pretty much everything related to DS, and all the food shopping and gas and electric whilst I'm on mat leave but he's refusing to pay a penny toward a sleep consultant. But like I said, I'm gonna hold off for now and hope things improve. Thank you for all your messages guys, it's the only thing that's kept me sane today

Evenings can be a tricky time for babies. Both my ds's were / are happy for anyone to look after them in the day. But ds1 wouldn't let anyone else put him to bed until he was about 2.5 years old. He cried for 5 hours the first time we left him with my mum overnight at about 5 months, but adored her during the day. Ds2 is still only 4 months and a much better sleeper overall, but it is only me he wants at bedtime.

As a society we have made huge changes very quickly and I am very in favour of that. But we do need to remember sometimes that for most of our evolution a baby needed to be with their mother constantly to ensure food, shelter and protection from predators. Babies are not aware that things have changed.