Giving advice to first time mother on Gina Ford routine and comforting

[speedymama]

My friend gave birth 12 days ago to her first baby. She had telephoned me for advice because like with all first time mothers, she wants to do her best.

The first issue is to do with getting the baby into a routine. She is trying to do the GF method but baby is still waking up at night for its feed (when she called me the baby was 8 days old). I told her that she needs to give it time and that it could take several weeks to establish a routine (it took me about 4 months with my twins).

Secondly, the baby is using her breast as a comforter. The baby tries to put her thumb in her mouth but always misses. The mother does not want baby to suck its thumb because she'll have trouble stopping when she is older. I told her that if that is the way the baby will receive its comfort, then let her suck her thumb and help her by putting her thumb in her mouth. DT1 is a thumb sucker and I use to put his thumb in his mouth when he could not do it.

This is the first time I have given advice to a RL new mother and I hope my advice will help her rather than create problems for her in the future. What do you think?

[foxybrown]

IME baby shock/baby blues should be setting in right about now - I think it is different to PND (although not mutually exclusive)

She must have found leaving the baby to cry extremely upsetting, do tell her that at this age it really isn't necessary. I think babies are quite basic at 12 days old, they need to be fed, warm, clean, cuddled and rested. The very most she should be doing is aiming to go for a walk each day.

At 6 weeks things change again (usually combined with a growth spurt), for me that's my first milestone. Then 12 weeks etc. If you crack a routine, you can't stick with it anyway! Jabs, tummy bugs, growth spurts, all sorts of things throw spanners in the works.

She may also need practical support, tidying up, changing her bed, getting dinner ready that kind of thing. Just to take the pressure off a little.

Do let us know how she gets on.

[Mumpbump]

I suspect that listening to her baby crying for an hour and a half probably left her a jibbering wreck as it would do for anyone. As amateurarsedoctor says, "poor mummy" to be so at sea and (probably) confused by all the conflicting information on what you should do. I could never let ds cry at all - grizzle and murmur, yes, but not full on cry. But, as others have said, not everyone has the self-confidence to simply follow their instincts and they need help and support to understand that it is okay to do so...

I must say, it's a shame she's not getting more support from her mum. (HV's aren't that supportive, ime.) My mum was at the hospital within a couple of hours of ds being born. But I do know someone whose mother was really freaked out by the idea of becoming a "grandmother" and was very odd about her first grandchild, so I guess it's different for everyone.

[MarsLady]

speedy.. what your friend needs to do is babymoon. She needs to be nekkid with the baby and feed on demand. The time for rhythms and patterns will come later.

She needs to be cuddling and kissing and talking to her baby and feeding her. What she needs to do is to look after herself in this time as well. By babymooning she will get the rest that she needs and hopefully PND will not be on her horizon.

It is not good for a newborn baby to go hours without food which is why the baby will and should wake at night for feeds.

I think you're being a great friend, so encourage her to just sit still with her baby.

[CatIsSleepy]

am curious...was it just me then who had a baby who would sometimes just cry? even if she was fed/dry/being cuddled? not just cry, in fact, scream? i think that's what got to me as a new mother...no matter what i did dd seemed miserable!(thankfully things got better after 8 weeks or so...)

[speedymama]

I am planning to do her gardening (if it stops raining) and housework to give her some practical help plus bake her a cake.

I'll let you all know how it goes.

[Mumpbump]

Catissleepy - ds had a patch where he would just scream until he went to sleep for about 3-4 weeks. Completely inconsolable and lots of rocking, patting and pacing went on. But I think it was because he could never settle himself to sleep so was up ALL day - I kid you not - until I twigged to his tired signs and started helping him settle. Once he started napping in the day, he was much better...

[amateurarsedoctor]

Just a thought Speedymama, but I would have loved someone to have the baby while I did some gardening or even had an uninterrupted sleep.

It was the 24/7ness of having a new born that got me down at first so any break from cradling my mewling mass of poo for an hour would have been heavnly.

Could you pop the baby in a pram and go for a long walk or a drive if it's still peeing it down?

[amateurarsedoctor]

heavenly

[speedymama]

Absolutely. I'll take the mother's lead.

[amateurarsedoctor]

You are a lovely friend.

[speedymama]

I saw my friend today and her daughter is absolutely beautiful. She is now 15 days old.

My friend's mother was there and it turns out that my friend had asked her mother to stay away because she wanted to bond with the baby (good) but also to get to grips with the GF method without her mother's interference. Anyway, the good news is that she has decided to ditch the book for the time being because, not surprisingly, the baby was not playing ball and falling in line for the routine. She is now going to just go with the flow. She has also given up on doing the cntrolled crying technique, thank goodness.

The baby spends a lot of time on her mother's nipple and would not settle whilst I was there (4 hours). She tried to give it a dummy but that did not work, she tried winding it but that did not work so I suggested swaddling as mentioned by some of you and she is going to try that next.

She is very tired because when the baby is not sleeping, she is on the breast! She does not sleep when the baby sleeps because she says that she will just have to wake up again[puzzled emoticon]. I think this is going to catch up with her if she does not get more sleep and I know her mother is gently trying to persuade her to rest more.

I made her the world famous Lemon Drizzle cake so hopefully that will cheer her up.

[speedymama]

One thing that I was worried about was that the grandmother kept talking about giving the baby rusk dissolved in milk when it is a month old!

I hope she ignores that advice.

[hotchocscot]

speedymama from what your friend has said, it makes me wonder if she really has got BF right, if the baby is "on" the boob all the time perhaps her latch isn't right and the baby isn't getting all the milk she needs at each feed time, so is constantly looking for more? can you get someone to check for her?

[speedymama]

I have to say, I did ask her this. Nobody at the hospital showed her how to breastfeed a baby. She got the details from a book! I will phone her and ask to contact the HV who should be able to put her in contact with someone who can show her how to do it properly.

[Slowwink]

Have never used cc and dd is now 13 months. It has worked for me. Everyone comments on what a happy little girl she is.

I sympathise with your friend, and she should just follow her instincts. A baby needs love, bodily comfort and, especially so young, rapid response to its needs - not purely feeding.

The mother must be constantly there at first to help the child stabilise its emotions. It is tiring at first, but that's nature for you - things seem to settle down eventually of their own accord as mother and baby work out what's right for them.

Good luck and your friend is lucky to have you there!

[speedymama]

I did say to her that by the time the baby is 6 weeks, she will understand her better and the routine will start to fall into place without having to be rigorously enforced. That is how it happened with my twins. Fortnately, she now recognises that it will take time and that babies are not robots.

[Slowwink]

Have read other posts and agree that new mums appreciate someone being there to hold/ watch/ rock the baby whilst they catch up on some sleep. When dd was newborn, also cos 1 month prem and initial pneumonia - I didn't sleep at all for a week as I was so scared she would pop off in her sleep! And I'd had a C-section I was so tired that I was hallucinating.

[Pannacotta]

You could give her details of the breastfeeding support lines (HVs not alwasy so well up on breastfeeding). I dont have them but if you google La Leche Leauge and NCT they will be there. Also kellymom.com is a great site for bfeeding info. She will still be under midwife care (until 28 days) so if she calls they will come out and see her and check the baby is latching on ok. She should have had midwife visits at home since giving birth and normally they want to see the baby feeding, was this not the case?
Was a bit shocking to read about the controlled crying with such a tiny baby, where on earth did she get that idea from? Hope she wont feel the need to repeat that in a hurry...

[speedymama]

She is seeing a midwife so will tell her to speak to her about the breastfeeding.

She says she got the controlled crying from GF book. She said that in the book, GF claimed to have started getting babies into routines from the first week so that is what she was attempting to do. I suspect that she may have misconstrued what was said but that is the trouble with these books. New parents take everything that is said in them literally because they don't know any better.

[MrsJohnCusack]

am picking up on your comment about 'degree and Msc in Biochemistry' - am wondering if perhaps she is stuggling with not being in 'control' and being able to get the baby to conform to what's in a book like you can with science - there's nothing quite like small cross baby to make you feel like everything is totally slipping away. Hence the following of books/routines (and not actually following what is actually written in them too) And I don't see any mention of the father - is he around or not?

Anyhow, lots of good advice here and you sound like a lovely friend. definitely get her to ignore the mother's outdated advice re the rusk. She could also try the NCT or La Leche League to get someone to come and check that she's breasfeeding correctly. Even so, some small babies DO feed all night and don't settle, my first one did and I wish someone had told me it was normal and I wouldn't have got so hysterical about it all and ended up with PND. I was convinced she should be following a routine and would get into bad habits re being fed to sleep/sucking thumbs/going to sleep on me etc. ONly when I ditched all that and went with the flow did things get better

[speedymama]

She is married and father is hands on but at the moment he leaves the house at 6 am and does not return until 10pm because he is working lots of overtime. He helps a lot at weekends but because the baby is constantly on the breast, he tends to do more of the houseswork etc.

Spot on about her being scientifically trained so use to rules, control, logic etc. Babies are not like that though!

[speedymama]

I also asked her about her feelings and if she was feeling down. She said that she had been bursting into tears but she was OK now.

[Pannacotta]

Very true that once you know that life with a newborn is utter mayhem, then you feel so much better able to deal with it!
One book which I did find comforting is "How not to be the perfect mother" by Libby Purves which is v reassuring about the mad early days (and too).
The "Baby Bliss" book by HArvey Karp is also a good read for first time parents, look on amazon for details. I found both of these useful in a non-threatening, reassuring way, rather than making me feel inadequate as my baby screamed and fed a lot (and slept not enough!). Neither suggests routines are the thing for newborns...

[Pannacotta]

shoudl read (and beyond too)