Opinions on splitting the nights with a baby?

[munchymoo]

Just after some opinions really on whether you think the arrangement we have to manage the nights with a young baby is fairly standard?

DS2 is 15 weeks and EBF, feeds well but has reflux (thankfully not colic) which means that he needs to be held upright for at least half hour post feeds and often will only sleep upright on my chest thus I spend hours sitting in a chair all night. He is feeding every 2 hours.

For first 6 weeks we bedshared and I did all feeds, settling, changes etc. and that worked really well but as the reflux seemed to get worse around the 6 week mark that is when I started having to get up for each feed and hold upright etc.

DH wants to be involved and happy to get up at night if nec. What we do currently is I feed baby to sleep around 9.30pm (he's not really ready before then plus we have to get 4 year old DS1 to sleep which can take a while!). I settle baby in next to me crib and DH sleeps in bed next to baby (totally safe as on separate surfaces). I then go into spare room as I'm a really light sleeper and every snuffle keeps me awake. I get about 2-3 hours good sleep and then DH will come and wake me up when baby wakes up anytime from midnight - 1am. So from 10pm to the first wake up DH is "on duty" but he does sleep albeit lightly as is next to baby. Occasionally if baby isn't settled in this period he will settle him.

I then take over from the first wake up between midnight - 1am and feed every 2 hours often sitting in a chair for hours due to the reflux. I will then hand over baby anytime between 6-7am and get an hour or two sleep whilst DH has baby and toddler and gets ready for work - he doesn't need to do too much to get ready as he cycles so doesn't need shower or anything.

The other day a friend said that I was massively lucky to have a DH that does so much and between the lines I think she was saying I am taking the p*ss a bit by going to the spare room for a couple of hours at the start and end of the night ie I should be doing everything as DH works. (even though he is getting 6 hours straight unbroken sleep). Then another friend said that as DS has reflux and I'm up most of the night DH should be doing more!!

I had some issues after DS1 where I felt that I hadn't done enough for him as we had to do shifts - he was premature and tongue tied and basically didn't sleep for the first year, I had mum guilt that I had failed him as I had to share duties whereas a lot of my mum friends had no help and had to do it all alone. I don't want the same old issues to raise their ugly head again this time round.

Just after opinions really on whether our arrangement seems pretty standard or whether I'm expecting too much/too little of DH?

My friends DS is like this and her husband does 8-12, then she does 12-6 and he does 6-he leaves for work.

You’re in survival mode still and what ever it takes to survive the first 6 months is absolutely fine. You’re nailing it and your DH sounds lovely and supportive.

My DS is just over 12 weeks old and, to give you comparison, I am doing it alone (DH in another room with ear plugs in all night!) but my DS goes to bed at 10 and doesn’t wake up until 5:30, quick feed and then back to sleep until 10am! So of course I can do it alone! Your DC sounds a lot more demanding and you sound like you’re doing an amazing job to be that patient and carrying on ❤️

Whatever works for you. I do the nights by myself so DH gets a good sleep. But unlike you I have DC5 and DC nearly 4 who are in bed at 8 and DC 10 weeks who usually sleeps 7-10 hours a night. I am also able to sleep next to baby so that helps too.

Whatever works for your family. You sound like you are working as a brilliant team. DH and I used to do similar in the early days. When she was going through the 4 month regression (and not bf), every couple of nights DH used to send me downstairs to sleep on the sofa and he would do the night wakes. It saved my sanity!

If it works don't break it but if DH is driving or finding his work is massively suffering or he for others are unsafe because he is tired you will need to reassess.

We did something very similar op. I did final feed at 9ish. Then ds was popped into moses basket downstairs somewhere dark but within sight of oh who would sit up while I got some undisturbed sleep. Oh would then do a feed (expressed milk) when ds next woke up. Usually between 11-1 and get him back to sleep. Bring him up in the basket to me. I would then deal with any night wakings.

This worked particularly well for us as oh is a night owl and I'm not. It means I got the most sleep just before I needed it most I.e. before getting up in the night. We had expressed and partially bottle fed since birth as ds was ill and we had to top him up. This meant we could be flexible and never needed to introduce the bottle.

I'm.expecting dd1 in a few weeks and are planning to do exactly the same as far as possible. Ds slept through from about 11 weeks so fingers crossed our technique influenced this and we can repeat.

Considering you have a refluxy baby and oh is happy to do it I don't think you abu at all to use this method.

Baby's are hard. Dispite the above I remember crying with frustration and exhaustion at 3am several times. Child rearing is much harder then a full time job. We get enough guilt as it is without getting it from friends!

But he’s getting a decent amount of sleep so I’m not even entirely sure I’d describe it as splitting the night. Me and DH would do similar where he’d stay up until 11 with DD and I’d go to sleep about 9 and wake up for the 11pm feed and then when we introduced formula he would do that one (that was the theory but often she wouldn’t settle without a breastfeed too but that’s a different issue).
I think the sleeping separately is the key to being able to share nights more; with my first we didn’t have the space to do it and were both exhausted but with my second I plan to sleep separately so at least when DH then needs to stay up or get up early he’s had a uninterrupted sleep

I agree with the above poster, that's hardly splitting the night. You do what works for you. I breast fed so I did all the night wakings, to be fair my baby slept 7-7 with a breastfeed at 1am and 4am after the first few weeks and the feed took 5 minutes and he was back to sleep so it was easy.
DP was disturbed but didn't actually need to do anything.
I lived with my mum for the first 12 weeks (was only 20) and I remember being on my knees exhausted when he was around 8-10 weeks old, so he slept in his Moses basket in my mum's room, she bought him into me for a feed 10mins max and then took my son back to her room so I wasnt disturbed by his snuffles. That made all the difference to me.

When we went over to MILs she used to send me up to sleep in the spare room once baby was fed so I could sleep for a few hours.

What I'm trying to say is, you're not abandoning your child to go and sleep in another room when the baby is safe with someone else. Do what you need to do to get some sleep.

Reading this takes me back to how hard it was with my first. Waited too long to try giving him a bottle and then he refused to take one. So I was stuck doing all the night feeds alone for over a year, and he woke every couple of hours or sometimes more. Long feeds too which sometimes lasted over an hour. I had to catch up on sleep in the day.

With my second tried a bottle in the first week and they’ve taken to it, so we can do mixed feeding and share some of the night feeds. Feel so much better for it. Don’t feel bad for sharing the feeds, your system sounds like a good one.

Gosh, women should not be made to feel guilty because their oh actually supports them and acts like a father!

I had a similar system with oh, though I bottle fed. In the first two weeks we split the night in two and did half each as baby wouldn't settle. Now he's generally only up once I do overnight feed and oh gets up with the kids in the morning so I get a lie in. Anyone who tries to make me feel guilty about that can jog on

Thank you so much for all of this ladies. You’ve helped settle my overactive thoughts and helped me realise it’s all fine. I definitely have perfectionist tendencies which can be harmful if allowed to spiral. Good to know that there are some other spare room sleepers out there! xx