Your high needs baby- how are they now?

[NewMomma21]

Hi there,

I’ve posted before about my very high needs baby. He is now almost 8 months and while things have improved, he is still a lot of work. He is very bright and alert and needs almost constant interaction and stimulation. He will not do any real stints of playing solo, still refuses all tummy time so hasn’t started to crawl so requires a huge amount of 1:1 interaction to keep him entertained. He still cries a lot, mostly out of boredom or frustration. While he does sleep through the night, I am exhausted from the relentlessness of it all alongside looking after his sibling who is 2.5.

For anyone who has had a high needs baby, how are they now? Just looking for some light at the end of the tunnel after a very long week

DD cried for the first 2 years of her life for hours on end. Never slept. I was a zombie. Around 2, she started sleeping and became the world's best toddler. Never a tantrum but talked nonstop. Now a young woman, she still talks nonstop so she found a career in journalism where talking and interrupting are useful skills.

Yes! She cried and cried, fought sleep with all her might. She and I "co-slept", as otherwise I would have gone completely bonkers. She also did not nap at the child minder's, so she almost got kicked out of there after a month (that was when I cried at work, as I did not have a backup solution... it was one of our lowest days). She also had to be in constant motion... no leisurely strolling for me with my baby in a stroller, I had to practically run with it if I didn't want a meltdown. Even if she fell asleep in the stroller of carrier, I had to continue briskly walking or she would wake up. I remember being so envious of moms with their babies that would allow them to stand still for any length of time in public!

One issue that complicated the sleep is that she was a snacker, she would never eat her fill, never spit up as a baby as a result. So I would come home from work, we'd go "to sleep" and she would nurse every 45 min or so at night. She, at 16, is still a snacker! She eats about 6 meals a day, and they are all small - in the end, quite a healthy way to live, just not conventional. And we learned very quickly that, when she was a small child, she had to be fed at regular intervals or there would be floods of tears.

She was an easy toddler, no tantrums, got along with other kids and liked nursery. No problems settling in when we moved countries and she encountered a new language at 2. Since she started sleeping through the night (at 18 months? 21 months? don't remember), she's been a great sleeper. No night wakings, no issues. Also - unlike me as a child and teen - there have been no problems getting up for school and getting herself dressed and ready. You would probably not pick her out as a difficult baby among her peers now, which is amazing to me as she was so clearly an outlier.

Mine is 7. She’s a wonderful kid, incredible imagination, affectionate, funny and smart. She’s still very sensitive and prone to anxiety (worry tummy aches are common) and she needs less sleep than me so I can still see many of those really early traits in her but she’s not really “high needs” any more. She loves her drama group and has decided she wants to be a writer/actor when she grows up, which would suit her down to the ground!

My high needs baby is now a high needs toddler
But saying that, she is joyful! Funny, feisty, chatterbox.
I can deal better with the high needs and clingness now because she brings so much happiness to our House with her quirky ways!

@Slavica my DD was exactly the same baby! I walked for MILES with her for her one nap of the day that wasn’t a 5 minute cat nap between feeds (which happened every 45 mins). Although clearly not the same toddler if yours did not have tantrums…

She sounds very like my DD!

@distinctpossibility DS1 was referred to a behavioural optometrist at age 7 and in additional to many dyslexic tendencies was also found to have many retained reflexes including Moro. Sally Goddard is a useful author. He did lots of exercises but remains chronically anxious (he is now 23).

He rejects his ASD diagnosis (along with sensory processing disorder and auditory processing disorder) and prefers to see himself as agoraphobic rather than having acute social anxiety despite being comfortable in an enclosed dog field but hiding in his locked room if the plumber comes to the house.

DS2 also has an ASD and ADHD diagnosis without anxiety and is thriving at 6th form and due to start a degree in mechanical engineering.

They both have very different profiles and my experience is that anxiety is key in terms of ability to function. Especially where anxiety appears unrelated to life events and is present from a young age and does not resolve despite interventions from specialist school, OT, SALT, CAMHs etc but increases. DS1 is less overtly anxious now but this is achieved through avoidance of anxiety triggering situations (ie all encounters with other people).

OP - sorry for derailing. DS1 was a high needs baby (there's 5 years between DS1 and DS2 for a reason - massive sleep deprivation!). But I thought a delightful toddler - with hindsight little professor - so funny and insightful and opinionated. So now we live a truncated life and he's back to being funny, insightful and opinionated. Of course I worry about the future and have planned best as I can but we live in the present (he can obsess about the past - an incident from when he was five is as real as if it happened yesterday).

But your child is so young even if high need, you don't know what the future holds. It may get easier, or harder. But you'll love and support them whatever (with support for you if it gets harder).

She actually is still quite intense. She's 11 now. She struggles to entertain herself and gets bored easily, but she really thrives off social interaction, so she's very sociable and extroverted and makes friends easily. She can definitely be annoying and I often find myself shouting 'just go DO something!' because she'll follow me around everywhere. She's very different from my less high needs one who is very good at just tinkering and playing by himself. But the difference is that she's old enough now to know that she just needs to go entertain herself or stop being so intense. It has meant she's got lots of good strong friendships though.

My DD was like this. She just got easier and easier with time. She was a dreadful baby! She was easier as a toddler but still very feisty with plenty of tantrums. She became the most lovely little girl. Such a sweet angel - so good natured. Now she's 13 and a typical teenager in many ways but she's a good kid. I'm very proud of her. When she was a baby I really thought there was something seriously wrong with her.

This is my life now, my 8.5 month old is so high needs, everyday is exhausting. Today has particularly been quite bad, high pitch screaming anytime I try to put him down, patience is running very very thin. Please tell me it’s got easier?

Mine is 9 now. Still high strung, still struggles with sleep a bit, but otherwise absolutely delightful and a complete piece of piss to parent. Sensitive, thoughtful, intelligent, bookish, funny, interested in the world, sensible, popular. In every way a lovely companion.

Hi there. DS just turned one (today!). I would say he is still high needs, he needs a lot of stimulation and entertainment and wants to be walked around all day (my back!!) but considerably less so than he was at around 8m. At that point he was still all day screaming. For us there was no magic moment of change, it was slow, it was gradual, nothing in isolation made a big difference. As he has become more mobile he has become less of a screamer. He is a curious, intelligent, mostly joyful boy who hated being a baby with every ounce of his being. My advice is put that baby in a stroller and walk, pop in your headphones and take a long walk if you can. Take it one day at a time. Be kind to yourself, a high needs baby is a hell like no other. Have low expectations, as soon as I let go of hoping something would change things became a little easier. If you can make time for yourself away from the house and baby, the noise of constant screaming is very overwhelming if you can get time alone don’t feel guilty take it! Hope things improve for you soon

Hi, thank you for replying. We do lots of walk, it massively helps both of us! I shipped baby off to grandparents today and I had alone time in silence and slept and I feel better. I think I put a lot of pressure on myself and just imagined things so differently when pregnant…I mean who imagines their baby being a screaming so and so all day long! You’re right, my expectations are too high, on days where he is particular bad, I just need to surrender to his needs and take it as it comes. Not scared to say baby stage has not been my favourite, it can only get better!!!

Mine is turning 19 tomorrow. She was diagnosed with ADHD this year. She lacks direction and focus. She changes her mind frequently. She is disorganised and a bit chaotic. She gets a bit obsessional over things and people (but not to the point of harm).

But she is awesome. Very funny, very charming. SO good with people. Very sociable and a great listener. Perceptive. She works as a carer for the elderly at the moment, and they all love her.

Ha this sounds exactly like me!!!

He is a funny, sensitive, and loving but very independent 15 year old with a love of adventure! Very bright and handsome too!
He was an incredibly high needs baby, unable to put him down, napped on my lap, separation anxiety that seemed to last forever. He also was (still is!!) allergic to milk and eggs (but in the beginning, was also allergic to wheat, fish, soya, almonds) and had tongue tie - BF was so painful for a few months. He has asthma too which meant a few trips to A&E in the early years with all the coughs and colds they get. It was hard going but we (I!) just went with the flow! It doesn't last for ever, though it feels like it at the time!!