Baby sleep? Is this Normal?

[MumOfHals]

My baby is 4.5 weeks old ( was 6 weeks premature ) so he's circa "38.5 weeks"

He has days where he will open his eyes and be awake for a good while, then he will have days where he will barely open them?

Like this has been his pattern, sleepy days, awake days...

I'm starting to worry as they say a baby sleeping a lot can be a sign of illness.

He had a chest X-ray and bloods on Thursday as I was worried ( following his discharge from NICU) and nothing was wrong.

I feel the experience has played on my anxiety and I'm questioning what 'could be normal'

( yes I am getting help for my anxiety, it's not an over night fix xxx )

Yes absolutely normal! The world is a tiring place for a newborn, especially a premie. As he gets bigger he will start to be awake for longer and longer stretches 🥰

What's his feeding like? And his nappy output?

Brand new babies can sleep for > 20 hours a day

He wakes up ( cries ) for feed, when feed is due and he drains the bottle. Lots of wet nappies and little poos, with a big poo every 2 days? X

So how many feeds would you say he does per day - 3? 6? 8? 12? 20?
And how many wet/dirty Nappies?

He does 8, 4oz feeds a day, a large nappy at every feed - which is every 3 hours. He also has nappy changes between? 1 small poo a day, one large (explosion) poo every 2/3 days

I have 2 babies born at 40+4 and 39+0. That's 11 days difference I think. There was a very noticeable difference in how sleepy the 39 week old was in comparison to the 40+4. I am convinced it was that extra 1.5 weeks of cooking and no one can convince me otherwise haha (obviously realise every baby is different and it could be a coincidence and my sample size of 2 is hardly representative).

Anyway the point is your baby could legitimately not be born yet, I'd expect him to be very very sleepy for awhile

My babies have all been a little early (1 week, 2 weeks and 3 weeks) and each baby has been more sleepy at the start the earlier they came. Being premature even by just a few weeks means they weren’t totally finished cooking. Imagine your baby was still in your body they would be sleeping the majority of the time. Your baby is doing this and just happens to be born so please try not to worry (easier said than done I know!) and do keep in touch with the hospital even if it is only to Help keep your anxiety down.

also on a side note our fist was a very traumatic both and I had severe PPA we bough the Sunza Hero MD device and it was life changing for me for restful sleep knowing it would alarm if she was in difficulty in the night and allowed me to snatch truly restful sleep when she was also in the middle of the night

@Whentwobecomesthree yes this? DD1 40+2 and DD2 39+2, DD2 definitely slept a lot more the first 2/3 weeks. My mother kept commenting she hadn't seen her awake etc x