'easy baby' Vs 'difficult baby'

[HalloHello]

In the midst of newborn bubble at the moment and am pondering what makes a baby 'easy' or not?

My 9 week old is pretty chill until I am out of his sight then he gets upset, he likes to be walked around the house, and only naps on us or in the sling, he sleeps 2.5-4 hour stretches overnight and settles well after breast feeding. He is pretty portable and just comes along with me in the sling or buggy as I get in with my life and looking after my older child. He doesn't cry that often and can be calmed with a dummy, cuddles or just change of scenery. I would say he's 'easy' but I'm just interested in what others think/what are your babies like?

My first it was tough for the first 6 months she was a colicky sickly baby .. never slept & couldn’t ever follow any routine! She got better from about 6 months except for sleep …we co- slept & she would always end up in our bed at some point in the night yetshe was such a easy toddler! My younger daughter was a dream as a baby - breast feeding perfectly slept & followed a routine- but when she got to about 15 months Wowsers she was everywhere at once & so stubborn! She still is! But she is a perfect sleeper.
I’d take sleep every time!! My eldest is 18 and still a rubbish sleeper (perfect teenager though) my now 12 year old is still a whirlwind but is asleep by 10!

@BeHappyAndSmile To be fair DD is my first too so maybe I’m a drama queen as well. I do think some people think so - my sister definitely (lovingly) rolled her eyes at me a lot.
Said relative with the baby who could be put down did make some comment to me about how I’d ‘chosen’ to parent, can’t remember what - it wasn’t nasty and was a throw away comment but I definitely had a little cry afterwards, it didn’t feel like we had much choice at the time. And for us it was in lockdown too so there wasn’t really much family support.

But like I say she was ‘easy’ in other ways - slept ok once we decided to embrace cosleeping, took to weaning really easily, loves a bath, still quite likes the car, hasn’t given us any major concerns health wise so far touch wood. I’d love it if I could just pop her in her cot for a 2 hour nap so I can get on with things but it’s never going to happen. She does sleep in her cot for a couple of hours at least at the start of the night now so i have some semblance of an evening and that in itself feels like a miracle.

My DS was such a difficulty baby that were not having anymore! No way. He would only contact nap, only slept max 2.5hr stretches at night until about 15 months, wouldn’t take a bottle or dummy (although did have CMPA) so that didn’t help with all the crying. And terrible eczema, multiple food allergies so weaning was extremely stressful. Very late walker and didn’t crawl which added to stress. Very fussy with food and it’s so hard for him to put weight on and he loses it quickly.
He is nearly 2 now and sleep has improved a lot, eczema is under control, we’re managing the food allergies and I’m really enjoying him now, he is such a happy boy. But I’ll never go through that again. People say ‘another one might be different’ but I’m not prepared to risk it and potentially go insane so we are happy with one!

It didn’t help as my friend had a similar aged ‘easy’ baby who seemed like a dream to me and I was always comparing so it felt like we were doing something wrong, but now I do believe some babies are just hard work!

For me, it was a slow but steady realisation over DS’ first 6 months or so, that no amount of gaviscon or omeprazole or dairy free milks or tongue tie snips were fundamentally going to fix his difficult nature. He screamed in the buggy, sling and car seat meaning I couldn’t leave the house. Slept for about half of what the books said he should and only with a boob in his mouth, on my lap in a pitch black room, day and night. He then spent months 4-14 whinging and crying and fussing 24/7.

Thing is, I don’t think that a difficult baby will be difficult for ever. I firmly believe a lot of difficult babies are just desperate to grow up. DS finally walked at 15 months and is now a very verbal 17 month old who mostly sleeps through the night, and he’s pretty transformed over the last 3 months. He’s still quite highly strung, but I’d now consider him a pretty average, if not relatively easy toddler, having been an utter horror of a baby.

My baby slept pretty much 24/7 very early, I had to wake him up for night feeds and would often wake up in the morning in a panic because he hadn't woken up before me.
He always went to bed easily.
He's just the same now at 40 - totally chilled.

DD1 High needs baby. She didn't sleep longer than 40 mins til 7 months. Silent reflux was an issue but also autism and sensory processing disorder diagnosed at 6 years. Plus trying to follow the 'guidance' like no bed sharing and having no bf experience.

DD2. One of my first memories was arriving home from the midwife unit and settling her into the Moses basket whilst I had a nap. I awoke 2 hours later and was staggered she was still asleep. 2 hours!!!! Incredible. Bedshared till 2 years. Breastfed till 6 years. Fuck the 'rules'!

@AliasGrape you honestly could be me! We'll be drama queens together . Seriously though, lockdown babies are fucking hard and whether we've struggled or flown through it we've done better than could have been expected. Not many situations where you're thrown in at the deep end with a brand new baby and zero support from anyone but your household!.

The evenings are amazing once you actually get them back aren't they! I have to admit we do get a 2 hour nap in the day but I'm up so much in the night I tend to sleep then too so no housework gets done 🙈 but my god the evenings are glorious! Enjoy it and congrats on the beautiful (sleep depriving) addition

Sleep is definitely key isn't it?

Aww I dunno tho.. DS1 was an ‘easy baby’ until 4m he was happy to be plonked anywhere but mostly enjoyed being on us and just slept.. ALL the time. Then his intolerance hit along with 4m sleep regression and it was hell until about 10m he had to be attached to my nip every 45 minutes 😅 .

DS2 sleeps great, 3-4 hour stretches at night, no fuss just plonked back down in cot and taraa. In the day he just sleeps if left alone most of the time. But oh my fucking god he screams and cries and writhes in pain and we can’t figure out why. He wants clothes on one minute off the next. Nappy on one minute off the next. Wants feeding one minute not the next. Pick me up put me down blah blah. (He’s only a month so we just go by what he seems
to want of course, he’s not actually talking to us.)

DS2 is not an easy baby but he sleeps great.

@FTEngineerM

Sleep is definitely key isn't it?

Aww I dunno tho.. DS1 was an ‘easy baby’ until 4m he was happy to be plonked anywhere but mostly enjoyed being on us and just slept.. ALL the time. Then his intolerance hit along with 4m sleep regression and it was hell until about 10m he had to be attached to my nip every 45 minutes 😅 .

DS2 sleeps great, 3-4 hour stretches at night, no fuss just plonked back down in cot and taraa. In the day he just sleeps if left alone most of the time. But oh my fucking god he screams and cries and writhes in pain and we can’t figure out why. He wants clothes on one minute off the next. Nappy on one minute off the next. Wants feeding one minute not the next. Pick me up put me down blah blah. (He’s only a month so we just go by what he seems
to want of course, he’s not actually talking to us.)

DS2 is not an easy baby but he sleeps great.

Agree with this. DS was by no means a brilliant sleeper, but wasn’t truly awful either - I’ve seen far worse described on mumsnet. I’d have taken awful sleep to have a ‘happy’ baby. A miserable baby is the absolute worse.

She toilet trained her at 18 months as she said she “wasn’t going to be one of those mums carrying a potty everywhere”.

Toilet trained at 18 months?! Sorry but that is way too young.

I really hate the "easy baby" / "difficult baby" terms, but I THINK what people mean is that an easy baby is one who sleeps when they should, never fusses (with the exception of when tired or hungry so easy to sort) and gives you normal queues (eg this cry means I'm hungry this cry means I'm tired).

As they change all the time tho, you could have an "easy" baby one week, and a "difficult" baby another. So don't tell yourself your baby is easy as you might find it harder when they become difficult!

For what it's worth, my baby is "easy" most days, but I'm yet to experience teething, potty training and god knows what. So I darent share with anyone that he's easy...

Our 11 week old has her moments but mostly just so chilled out. Sleeps really well and not glued to me which is great with older ones to look after too. Our eldest was the toughest but we were finding our feet with her, current is 6th and she followed twins so feels like a breeze in comparison.

DS was tricky, DD is an easy peasy lemon squeezy bowl of sunshine. I think it's part the baby's personality/needs, part your personality/needs and part how you as parents react to things.

DS was a crap sleeper and we ended up cosleeping which I hate (and DH hates too) so we never really embraced it is whereas friends who did seemed to be less frustrated by the whole thing and better rested. I've got friends who struggle with the physical side of having an active toddler whereas we're pretty active people so the idea of spending hours in the woods or the beach or the park is perfect for us. I've found getting out the house with them easy and I'm grateful they both sleep/slept in the car, buggy and sling as it makes life so much easier. DD is a horrendous traveller though and can only manage about 20 minutes in the car seat before the screaming starts unless she's asleep.

DD1 was my difficult baby - silent reflux, couldn't lie flat, hated the pram, terrible sleeper, hours upon hours of walking the floor with a screaming baby. She's 3.5 now and much better, I'd say a fairly typical three year old in that we have plenty of tantrums at home but when we're out and about she's brilliant.

DD2 was a delight. She just didn't cry. Put her down and she'd fall asleep - the carry cot finally got used! My family got sick of my sending them photos of her asleep in it, it took months for the novelty to wear off. When she started nursery they couldn't get over how sunny she is, she just smiles. Now she's 16 months and making her feelings known so it will be interesting to see what the toddler years are like.

IME it's pure dumb luck. Things like routine help many babies but they won't turn them into a good sleeper or cure reflux or sensory issues.

And I think even an easy baby would've been tough for my first, your first just takes a bomb to your life and I think i would've found that hard regardless.

@nonono1

She toilet trained her at 18 months as she said she “wasn’t going to be one of those mums carrying a potty everywhere”.

Toilet trained at 18 months?! Sorry but that is way too young.

Genuine question, as I said I don’t have my own DC, why? I’ll clarify what I meant, a potty was used at home and they had one of those seat things for the toilet. I’m not saying she was reliably dry, I lived away then so wasn’t around for the ins and outs of it.

@BeHappyAndSmile none taken! I’ve no skin in the game really, just thought I’d chuck my thoughts in. My friend had twins and they were as different as night and day; one would run up to me and start rooting through my bag to see what I’d brought him while his sister would scream and hide behind the sofa 😂 - she did come round eventually but was like that with everyone and in all social situations.

Definitely not an easy baby either, Velcro baby and very screamy, my friend often says she’s glad they weren’t both like that! However, everyone survived and they are 18 next year.

I think all babies are "easy" tbh , with my first I had bags of time as no other dcs to look after, they slept like a bf baby so awake frequently but were smal so easy to settle. I even had a refluxy baby wgo lived in a sling as i could never put them down. The more physical they got the harder it got for me personally, settling an older baby is soooo much harder , they can stand up , climb, all of mine walked ran from 12 months or before and then it was full on and constant until 3. Loads of sleep problems with teeth and illness. 0-1 was a doddle for me... My youngest is 4, im 37 and look less haggard now than years ago in the thick of it with 3 small dcs ..

I agree with a pp about " easy" vs "difficult", when mine were toddlers they would run and climb a lot , it was totally innate in them. We got out as much as possible but obvs avoided situations where they had tp sit still for long periods of time ( older now and can do this no problem), it wasnt like we didnt try , we did and it just didnt work. I remember saying this to another mum when i had a mobile baby and toddler and where we had to leave a restaurant earlier than planned and she said her dc were " good" as they could sit for ages.
Our dcs are older now and v sporty and me and dh are the fittest we have ever been thanks to our dcs!

Abitlost2 please, please, when someone is struggling, dont tell them all babies are easy. Some truly are not. It is so demoralising to be told it should be so easy when you haven't slept for longer than an hour at a time for 4 months.
Comments like that stopped me going out to baby groups, and isolated me further at a point I was really struggling. I now know it was probably meant in a well meaning way, but at the time it just felt like I was being told not only was I making my baby unhappy, but it was something so simple, I should be able to manage it easily.

It s like I dont usually comment on weaning threads, because for me, it was dump food in front of child, let child eat and clean up afterwards. It was easy for us. DS loved, and still loves, food. It isnt everyone's experience

@InTheLabyrinth completely agree. DD screamed for hours every day, I was broken at points. If someone had told me all babies were easy I’d have probably slapped them.

On the flip side as I’ve said upthread I have a delight of a toddler but I wouldn’t dream of minimising someone’s experience if their toddler was challenging… it’s definitely completely luck.

Apparently I didn’t sleep through until I was nearly 3, my sister slept 6 hours in a row for the first time at one month and pretty reliably did that stretch from 12 weeks onwards. Both parented identically, both fed identically… mum says that if she had had 2 like my sister she’d probably wonder what everyone was complaining about

My first son was very difficult. He slept through the night from 4 weeks old (!!) but struggled with napping in the day and was ALWAYS crying! I got so stressed taking him to baby classes as he was always the miserable screaming one!
Second baby is so easy! He doesn't sleep as well as the first (at night anyway, though was better at day napping) but is much more content and rarely cries. I can't believe the difference. He is just a delight.

I had what people would call an ‘easy baby’ and constantly had people tell me how lucky I was. I still found it fucking hard and in no way easy.

It’s all about evenings and routine for me. My second is super easy because she goes down happily at 6pm (for now, anyway) and lets us have dinner/relax in peace. DD1 did from an early age too, but it was a mission to get her to sleep in the first place. Still likes to mess around at bedtime at 2.11, despite being permanently exhausted.

I also need a daytime routine with naps/feeds, so I don’t find babies easy until that’s in place. DD1 barely napped so we found a 3 x 28 minute nap routine at around 3 months. In that sense she was ‘easy’ though rocking her screaming in a buggy for half an hour to get such a little break was soul destroying. DD2 also does micro naps but needs LOADS of them, so in that sense she’s hard despite the lack of sleeping.

It’s all perspective I think - I never minded night wakes if I got my evenings, and didn’t mind short naps so long as they were predictable.

Such a shame we can’t order babies that suit our preferences!

• despite the lack of SCREAMING

I used the words " personally" , "in my opinion" . I didn't have "easy babies" as i mentioned one was v refluxy and wouldn't be put down at all. I still found thay easier than toddlerood , a.lot.easier. All i ever heard was how much easier it got, i was shocked at how much harder it was as a result. My ten month old slept worse than when they were ten weeks and I was surprised as all I heard was how much easier it should be. So yes, i found the baby stage with each baby "easy"