Routine at 4 weeks...?

[ipfreeley]

Hello! I have a 4 week baby and am wondering when she should be getting into a feeding/napping/sleeping routine?

She isn't really in one now, just tends to feed, poop and sleep, and sometimes be a bit grizzly with wind etc. She has short periods of being awake (30-45 mins or so), but when she's awakes differs each day and can vary in length. She also only naps for long periods when held or in the car. If I put her down, she'll wake after 15-30 mins.

I do put her in her pjs at 7pm, but she stays down with us and just tends to feed/nap/want to be held until we go to bed, where she usually takes 1-2 hours to settle and we can put her in the next to me crib'- sometimes she sleep for 2 hour stints and other 3/4 hours.

She hasn't really gotten into a routine herself, there's no real structure and every day/night tends to be slightly different.
Would love to know when you got your DC into a routine and any advice you might give

Congratulations on your new baby. I think it’s way too early to worry about routines. My first didn’t get into any sort of routine until 5-6 months (reflux baby and took that long to sort) but even my second, who was a very easy baby, didn’t fall into any sort of discernible pattern until about 3 months. Before that from my observation you either drive yourself crazy trying to spot a pattern, or you become a slave to the routine you are trying to impose. 4 weeks is really little and if you can, just go with what she seems to need for now and accept that might be different every day for another two months...

Ok that's good to know, thank you!
A bit of a routine in the day is actually more what I'd like to achieve than at night... just so I can plan when she'll sleep so I can shower/tidy up/nap!

Hi.

Congrats. Your LO sounds just like our baby girl. Spot on actually.

We just roll with it. I did fall into a habit of thinking she was settling into a routine but it was short lived and now i know she definitely wont be in a routine for months.

I was over analysing her cries and questioning why she was going to bed later than the night before etc. But hubby is very logical and says if she is tired she will sleep, and lets just deal with what we have in front of us today, instead of being anxious that something is wrong or why has she changed.

She is a teeny gorgeous newborn so we just ride the rollercoaster and take on everything she throws at us. The cuddles and squeaky noises are sooooo worth it. Xx

Also - i have a sling which i use in the day to get stuff done. She really likes to snooze on us so daytime naps are not so easy at the minute, but i am slowly working on that. Good luck x

Dd sort of put herself into a routine at around 3/4 months. Although she stayed with me downstairs (or I went to be early I’d knackered) until 6 months because of SIDS guidelines. But I did bath, massage, bf and bed with her every night from about 3 months onwards. Then when she went into her own room at 1 she knew the routine and it quite an easy transition,

I don't know if you have been consulting any baby/parenting books but step one is to burn them all.

They had me like this from an early stage - concerned about routines and feeling pressure to follow them.

Once I consciously decided to ignore them when DS was 16 weeks old, I felt much better.

Do what works for you and baby and tune into him - we didn't have much of a 'routine' (and I prefer to call it a pattern) until he was about 4/5 months.

Congratulations and enjoy the evening cuddles! Xxx

Great advice from all of you thank you! I mentioned Gina Ford to my midwife and she visibility flinched!
I think working with what we've got makes sense, and the sling is a great shout! I have one... I just need to get a bit better at using it.. last time she ended up hanging around my waist!!

Lol..! Its fab once you get the hang of it. I pop it on when i want to sort washing/dishwasher etc, She falls sleep then i just keep her in it for her nap. I should transfer to moses basket but i do love the cuddle.

I also have a horse and use it down at the stables! Its fab x

If your baby feeds poops and sleeps id say that's routine enough. Don't sweat it at such an early stage. She's still adjusting to the world and far too small to have any type of routine.

At four weeks my baby didn't even sleep on her own without me forcing her and rocking her and still doesn't fall asleep on her own at 3 months...

That sounds great and perfectly normal for a 4 week old. I didn't really find that either of mine fell into any sort of consistent pattern until they were closer to 12 weeks. It just happened on its own and I didn't have to do anything special.

I followed the Gina Ford routine with both my babies, on the advice of a friend, and they both slept through from 8 weeks. I then recommended it to everyone I know! And everyone who followed it also had babies who were calm, contented and slept well.

I’m a bit scatty and do I LOVED having a plan to stick to. And chaos was the last thing I could e coped with, with a newborn! So I really loved it.

Why not try it for a week or two? I’m so glad I did. I couldn’t have coped with a baby who didn’t sleep through till they were several months old.

@HasThisSoddingNameGoneToo (your name is brilliant!)

I've had a quick look at Gina Ford and I worry about the times between feeds which can be up to 3 hours (mine tends to feed every 1-1.5 hrs) but I understand having some element of structure could be helpful, and I'm so tired now, I am barely remembering her current patterns (if there are any),

I think trying it for a week is a good idea, but I might try to use it as a guideline rather than getting worked up if she goes off piste.
Thanks for offering a different POV!

I've heard really bad things about Gina Ford - just to give a different perspective. 😢🙁 May be worth researching it a bit further before following her routines?

Obviously no offence meant to anyone who followed her with success.

I think using it as a guideline is a good idea. I probably never followed it perfectly (as I said, I’m scatty!) but it gave me a really solid structure.

The feeding times change as the weeks go on. You might find that your baby can start to go 3 hours between feeds once the feeds are regular and predictable..? I don’t know. I couldn’t BF with DS1 so we had to bottlefeed, which I know is very different to BF.

I had no idea what I was doing when I had my first, so I loved having a solid structure.

I also liked how it gave us both a routine that worked for us. I think without a plan, you still end up getting into a routine eventually, but it might not be one that works for you! Gina’s main focus is to give your baby its food, activity and sleep at times that work for you all as a family — IE, eating and playing during the day, and sleeping at night. Like you would want! Not sleeping all day and therefore missing feeds, so having to catch up with it all at 2am.

I really don’t see what could be “bad” about it at all. It’s just a structure. You don’t do anything weird or dangerous..? It’s just planned feeds, a predictable day, and a very dark bedroom so they associate sleep with nighttime.

Each to their own, obviously! But I wouldn’t go back in time and do anything differently. I also loved her weaning book, and still use some of those recipes now.

I think it goes against some of the advice for very young babies just to be able to feed/sleep when they want.. but I think using it as a guideline could help get the day/night structure right like @HasThisSoddingNameGoneToo mentions.

I also think it can place pressure to get a solid routine which some babies aren't great at. My friend tried to follow Gina Ford really strictly and used to stress herself out, then she relaxed it a bit and her DD sleeps 7-7 with a 10pm dream feed and had done since 7 weeks!

I think it's about finding a balance.

I'm currently willing to try anything as I have been a exhausted/emotional wreck today

It’s amazing at getting them to sleep through the night.

If you haven't heard of it, the '4th trimester' is really interesting.

I took from Gina ford that babies need to learn the difference between night and day and focused on that. However, she advises waking sleeping babies, and at 7am, and I was NOT doing that. No chance!! My daughter started sleeping through at 7 weeks without Gina ford 🙂 I honestly think that’s just luck rather than anything I did or didn’t do; same with anyone else’s babies to be honest.

My daughter got herself in to a bedtime routine around 4-5m. We realised she was really ratty in the evenings, so we started to put her to bed earlier. It seemed to work! Before that she was happy downstairs with us in the evenings. So now we have a routine of bath, feed, bed. No routine in the day yet. Maybe this will come?! She’s 6m.

Go with the flow I say!

@modgepodge I was literally just coming in here to ask if I should be waking DD up at 7am. She woke up at 5.35 and fed and was back to sleep by 6.05... now I don't know what to do about waking her! I might see if she naturally wakes up, and if not, maybe give her a nudge by 7.15..? It seems very wrong to wake a sleeping baby!

@HasThisSoddingNameGoneToo what did you used to do?

@Clayplease yes a few people have mentioned this.. will start reading up on it more today, thanks!

It will depend on your baby. Dc1 slept through from 5 weeks to 4 months and then woke every 45 minutes for months on end. From 1.5ish he then went happily to sleep all night and every nap. He's 3 and still willingly goes upstairs and stands in his room waiting to be put to bed at nap and bed times. Dc2 is a demon and wouldn't go in a cot so we cosleep and he's 17 months now.

I would say that those I know who follow rigid routines have less freedom as they must be back at home or have meals by a certain time or their children are cranky horrors!

@GummyGoddess gosh that sounds like a mixture of great sleeping and slightly nightmarish scenarios!

I agree I don't want to be a slave to the routine. But I also need a little bit for my sanity.. as the days at the moment have no structure and it's wearing me down slightly..

I'd just love to be in a position to know roughly when she's going to nap, so I can plan around them. Also, a lot of the time we're doing lots of mini feeds and naps, so we just have a constant cycle and it's exhausting me! I'd love to gradually get her feeding/sleeping for longer (I know this will take time/may not ever happen) but am happy to trial it for a little while!

Every baby is different and every parent is different too, so you will always recieve conflicting advice on things like this.

I've rarely done more than a few very gentle nudges to adapt my DD to structure because I come at parenting from largely a 'baby-led' approach so always followed her lead apart from a few gentle nudges along the way. BUT this has been of course influenced by her personality - the fact that generally she has been a decent sleeper, so it's easy for me to say that compared to other people who have toddlers that are still waking every few hours etc - and also the fact that she cried all the time for months as a baby, if she's unhappy she gets very distressed and cries for hours until exhaustion etc so lots of 'routine-inducing' things point blank wouldn't have worked for her anyway without huge amounts of distress and I wasn't prepared to put her through that. Very different if your baby lays down in her crib happily and only cries for a few mins at a time etc, maybe you would be more prepared to adopt a routine as your baby might not protest too much, but mine would!

At 4 weeks the only 'routine' we had was nappy change + feed around 10pm, we did wake her for that if she was asleep, which she was often unhappy about but quickly fine once she was being fed. It seemed to work as she would give us a good block of 4 or 5 hours or so sleep after she was down for the night around 11pm or whatever. But maybe she would have done that anyway! Who knows? She hardly napped which was worrying and she mostly spent her days screaming so we didn't have any daytime routines and she was fed on demand.

My dd is 4 now so it’s a bit blurry, but I think it was about 3-4 months when she started getting in a routine. I did everything on demand and her routine was entirely led by her, I just learnt her cues.

Ds is now 4 months and I’m taking the same approach of letting him develop his natural routine. I’ve noticed a definite routine emerging though it’s not set in stone.

What I noticed with both is that just as soon as I think I’ve got a routine sorted, something happens (sleep regression, leap, a cold, teething etc etc) and it all changes again!

Honestly.. at 4 weeks.. dont worry.
My little one is 4 months now.. but at 4 weeks (expressing) all I know is she would wake every 3 hours during the day and every 4 at night.
Times changed every day but that was about as much of a routine we had.
We have done baby led from day one. Its worked for us. Baby is so chilled. Slept through from 6 weeks (6hours), and 7 weeks started doing 7-12 hours. At 4 months its 11 hours or so and the sleep regression lasted a week.

If it helps.. a huge bit of advice that helped me.. is that they are mini versions of us.
Sometimes they want a lie in, other times they cant sleep.
Sometimes they will be super hungry and other times breakfast is a no go.
Ever since I learnt that, it's been so relaxed. So if she doesn't finish a bottle or wants to sleep a little bit more.. so be it.