Not sure how to help wife?

[TheBlueRaccoon]

Looking for a bit of advice.

My wife and I have just had a baby. First and foremost, he is amazing and so is my wife.

I’m having a real issue with how to help my wife.
she is breastfeeding, so is naturally tired, but she won’t take opportunities to sleep when she can.

We are mix feeding, as she feels that she isn’t making enough for the baby, which I’m completely fine with and never had a problem with, but she won’t feee him bottles through the night or she won’t express milk so I can’t feed him at night, but it constantly feels like she resents me for sleep (sort of) during that time.

I will wake up before work and take him so she can get a few hours uninterrupted sleep in and a shower in peace. Sometimes she takes that opportunity more often than not she won’t.
I do the housework if I’m not working or with the baby, or I’ll say to leave it until a day I finish early (I usually get back after 10pm so can’t put the vac on that time) but again, she won’t. I do the cooking on the days I’m back early enough to do so. I’m really trying and if there’s anything else I can do I’ll do it.

It feels like she’s trying to be a hero, but the result is both of us getting less sleep.

Her timing of things just feels off. For example, She’ll want to shower when the baby wants feeding, but I have nothing to feed him with - no expressed milk or no formula I’ll suggest getting a bottle ready just in case and she’s not keen on the idea, then I end up with a hungry screaming baby for the next 40 mins with no way to feed him. I feel utterly useless and it’s horrible watching him cry as I try everything to calm him but the one thing he wants I can’t give him.

Things like this happen all throughout the day and I'm stood there thinking “why didn’t you do this when he was asleep?”

I’m not getting anywhere near the amount of sleep she thinks I’m getting and I know both of us could be getting more if we did things a touch differently. It’s gotten to the point where I feel guilty for sleeping. So I jump myself awake if I hear her coming into the room.

we’ll go to appointments with midwives, health visitors and they’ll tell us things to try or things we could be doing and she doesn’t want to try them, then acts like I’m an idiot for suggesting what they’ve suggested.

Our lives are more difficult than they need to be and I can’t see why she can’t see it.

She is an amazing mum and wife, I’ve tried to be supportive but everything I say is taking as criticism or a dig when it’s not. It’s driving me up the wall.

I thought it could be a bit if PPD but I tried to raise it and it didn’t go well.

Any advice is appreciated.

Also if your wife is worried about her supply and you can afford it pay for a private lactation consultant. I had one visit from one and she was incredible and solved my problems. And was on call for me afterwards!

The way to help your EBF wife is not to take the baby. It is to do literally everything else.

Your words:

In my eyes, helping around the house is obvious and men should be doing that regardless if they have a baby or not.

Wrong. Your wife is exclusively breastfeeding and recovering from birth. Operate on a 100-0 baseline with housework, not 50-50. She should be "helping" you with housework when she can, not the other way around.

Your baby is very lucky to be getting round the clock breastmilk. You facilitate that by doing everything else, not tearing the baby away from that.

And never ask your wife to express milk. That is not beneficial for mum or baby.

Agree. On reflection I think my partner did this with maybe with some help from family. My role was solely the baby in the first few weeks/months.

I think you've got to ensure your wife feels like you're on her side. Try a week of just leaning into whatever she wants to do and see whether that enables her to relax and trust in your instincts more.

Establishing breastfeeding is hard - my baby was attached to the boob for up to 90 minutes at a time in the early days and I was getting very patchy sleep despite my husband's best efforts. I'd have found it irritating for him to keep suggesting formula at me, even though prior to birth I'd said I'd be open to it if baby wasn't getting enough milk. Is it possible your wife has changed her mind on formula now that she's establishing breastfeeding?

Pumping is awful, I've done it twice and it just made me feel sad and unhuman - baby is much more efficient at extracting milk and pumping doesn't give mum the same feel good hormones as she gets whilst breastfeeding.

I did feel very jealous of my husband in the newborn days, it felt like he could continue being himself whilst everything about me and my life had fundamentally changed despite my best efforts to stay "me". I guess I'd thought being a mum would be an additional element to my life, but really now I'm primarily a mother and all the other things that I used to be have faded into the distance (at least for now!)

The best things my husband did for me (which also helped with breastfeeding) were ensuring I was well fed, hydrated, and happy. He'd bring me breakfast in bed during paternity leave and once that was over he'd bring me fruit and tea in the morning before heading to work, he'd top up my water bottles without me asking, he'd experiment with different ways to soothe the baby so I could grab an hour to myself. Despite all this I couldn't help resenting him sleeping whilst I was awake!

You'll need to think about the longterm as you go forward here - trying to implement solutions and schedules on a resisting wife is only going to harm your relationship with her.

That having been said, I wouldn't take a 40 minute shower without first having ensured the baby is well fed - all my showers are done post feed as otherwise it's too stressful. I've also found a baby swing was a lifesaver in the bathroom - I just popped the baby in as I showered (or went to the toilet) and I could keep an eye on them rather than worrying about what was going on in their cot!

Best of luck OP, I can see you're really trying. Parenthood is really tough on both parents, not just mum!

Have you told her how much you love her? She probably feels like a milk machine, please do find time to hold her physically as much as she’s comfortable with.

More practically, could you batch cook some meals and freeze them. That way you won’t have as much cooking after work and can free yourself up more.

Has she had her hair done recently, her nails, or had time to do something that makes her feel like herself? It sounds like you’re both in the trenches at the moment. Also I’d be concerned about a bit of PPD.

Finally, have you asked her what more you can do? No raised voices, super calm.

My DH used to have a go at me for not ‘sleeping when baby sleeps’ when we had a newborn and it drove me up the wall. I find it difficult to just fall asleep during the day, I’m a light sleeper and always have been. When the baby was sleeping during the day, if I could put him down, that was my time to do a little something for myself (shower, bath, just doomscroll for a bit) until he woke up and I had to be mum again. Don’t underestimate how much your wife’s role and identity have changed in a short space of time and the impact this can have.

If it really is only 40 minutes since baby was last fed and your wife if showering it would also drive me nuts if you started interrupting my showers with the crying baby! I would know they couldn’t really be hungry.

Can you work on some ways to soothe baby yourself like rocking, putting them in a sling etc? Have you taken baby out for a walk so your wife can have half an hour alone?

One of the most seismic shifts in my eyes was that my DH got to leave the house and be himself every day whilst I had to be ‘on’ for baby 24/7. My baby is 9 months old and I still love it when DH takes him out for a few hours!

Has your wife got a Haakaa OP? It isn’t a breast pump as such but it suctions onto the other breast while she’s feeding from one breast and catches the milk from the non feeding breast. So no additional time expressing. You can build up a surprising supply from this. If she used this when feeding you could then feed breast milk to the baby when she’s away and it may help her supply too. It was a lifesaver for me and my husband in the newborn stage!

A screaming, hungry newborn takes precedence over your wife's feelings. If she's in the shower and your baby is hungry, give the poor little thing some formula. You are his parent too- if he's hungry, it's your job to do whatever it takes to feed him.

@Auldlang, you are being unbelievably rude and aggressive. The OP is not.

"She’ll want to shower when the baby wants feeding, but I have nothing to feed him with - no expressed milk or no formula I’ll suggest getting a bottle ready just in case and she’s not keen on the idea, then I end up with a hungry screaming baby for the next 40 mins with no way to feed him".

As others have suggested, get some ready made formula in. Prepping food for your wife and making sure all chores are done is important. Not just when you finish work early at some time.

From your the tone of your first post you are helping your wife. You don't understand how all consuming EBF is. The most important thing you can do is be emotional supportive. Your wife is doing her best and is exhausted emotionally and physically.

I found it extremely unhelpful when people said to sleep when the baby slept. Adrenaline and worry would prevent this from being a remote possibility. Your wife needs time to rest and recuperate.

Stepping up and taking on all laundry and food prep would be helpful. Making sure there are drinks and snacks on hand. Taking the baby to wind and change when they have finished feeding.

Early days and weeks can be so hard.

This in spades.

Expect nasty bitchy comments @TheBlueRaccoon .

You shouldn't be expected to wrangle a hungry baby for hours on end - your wife needs to express milk for you to feed your son with.

Just to say, she can produce enough breastmilk, it's supply and demand.

The more you feed, the more milk is produces. Baby will naturally want to cluster feed (suckle/feed non stop, often for hours),,late evening and through the night when small. It's exhausting but natural.

And you can't schedule breastfeeding, it's feed on demand. The more bottles the harder it will be. But she shouldn't be having 40min showers! Feed, go quick 10min shower, and realise esp initially, baby might need a feed 10min later. Breastfeeding is also for comfort not just milk

Also, sounds like you're being a great father and partner. Keep doing the chores, giving emotional support, drinks and snacks for partner. And congratulations on your baby

Your wife is breast feeding.
Leave all the feeding to wife. She will get a feel for what the baby needs as the baby gets older. She will have the best chance at increasing her supply if she breast feeds entirely.

You try and keep up with the laundry, food shopping, cooking and cleaning up kitchen. Try batch cooking a few meals on one of your days off. Just the two of you so you could almost cook all evening meals on the weekend.
Clean the bathroom once a week.
When your wife is feeding, give her a glass of water.
Listen and watch, compliment and help.

Be prepared to take the baby and change him afterwards BUT listen to how you can help around the feeding. It is your wife's call.

Your wife will loose sleep over night for months. She is feeding the baby.
You sleep as best you can. Do not feel guilty.
It is a good idea that wife does sleep when the baby sleeps.

On the weekends, especially when the weather is warmer, be prepared to walk the baby in the pram for at least an hour at a time - with or without wife - it's her call.

Congratulations!

Hi OP. Ignore the roasting - you’re asking to try and do better and that is commendable. Re: formula, as others have said - the baby shouldn’t be going hungry. However there may be reasons why your wife doesn’t want formula giving e.g. if her boobs feel really full, the baby may struggle to feed off an over full boob and a shower helps relieve that for mum and baby. So she may be showering to help both of them feed, if you give formula whilst she is showering - it’s a wasted effort for her. I’d suggest reading up about breastfeeding, La Leche League have lots of good information and then you can ask your wife better questions to really understand what help she needs.
How often does the baby go for a walk? If I want a break, my husband will take the baby for a walk because a) my baby always sleeps out walking and b) it means I physically know that baby isn’t there for me to look after. It’s more restful. Babies also sleep better if they have been out walking.
How often do you tell your wife what a wonderful wife and mother she is? Newborn stage is hard. Sometimes it is good to hear it.
All of this is trial and error but just do your best - it gets easier.

Her hormones are all over the place and she's exhausted. She doesn't yet have the headspace to plan.

It would be advantageous if she would express or let the baby have formula but she may feel that it's her bit to do the feeding. I'd ask her aside from keeping on top of the house which bits she would like you to do.

Whilst she's showering you could take the baby out in his stroller so the house is quiet which would be lovely for you and him.

Hi there, it's a midwife with infant feeding experience (of supporting women in breasfeeding support groups). It sounds to me your wife is trying to maximise her milk supply. This is my guess as it's not so obvious from your post. Yes, it's horrible to watch the baby cry for 40 mins. I think syour wife would benefit from a lactation consultation. Are there any free breastfeeding support groups locally? You can go there yourself, if she doesn't agree. You have to arrive before they start, men are usually not allowed when the session commences to protect women's privacy. You would have to catch the infant feeding midwife before the group starts. Alternatively, you might invest £150-200 for a private lacation consultant with relevant qualifications. It's not even that expensive considering the cost of formula. Your wife is probably feeling guilty and doing her best. She might also be resenting you for all sorts of reasons, not just because you get more sleep. It took me 10 years to let go of the resentment my husband did not support me enough in labour (this was my perception, not his). Try to go with the flow, be supportive, do not interfere with the way she does things unless your baby looks at risk. She will find her way as a mother. Lack of sleep is a serious impendiment to rational thinking. I always tell women every drop of breastmilk is precious, and they are doing amazing considering the circumstances. Lot's of women suffer from the birth trauma, when the birth didn't go how they had expected it to go. She will need to process it in her own time. Be patient with her would be my advice.

This. This is the best comment I've seen here in this thread, and there are a fair few very good bits of advice.

I think of it like this: every cell of your wife's being right now is focussed on baby. Your job is to support your wife. Think of your wife like she thinks of the baby.

Does she need more water? Breastfeeding requires A LOT of water to make all that milk. Does she need a hot meal? Is there anything in the house that needs doing?

When she's just fed baby suggest you take baby while she does whatever she feels she needs; stare into the abyss, or have a shower, or have a nap. No judgement on what she chooses, let her choose.

Stop thinking that this is a puzzle for you to solve with logic and schedules. Just focus on supporting her.

And remember, this too shall pass. It's just a phase.

Edit: I was replying to another post but that didn't work and now I can't find it!

Firstly you sound like you're doing amazing, it's so tough having a new baby and looking back (mine is 9 months now) it's actually really hard for dad because they feel helpless. I felt like I had to do everything "right" and the pressure was horrendous. Eventually I had to just give in and basically accept things that weren't working because our lives were as you said harder than it needed to be! Get some of the pre made formula bottles, I understand her being on and off about formula feeding but at the end of the day you have to do what's right for the baby and they can't be left screaming in hunger for 40 minutes when she takes a shower I'd definitely be firm with that one so if she hasn't expressed then formula it is. It's such a hard time and a massive adjustment and constantly figuring out what's next is exhausting! Give each other grace and patience, my husband and I started having de briefs 🤣 what's working for us what isn't what I need what he needs etc. Communication is key but that's also hard when you're so tired! I imagine her hormones and emotions are all over the place as well so this is something extra for her to deal with too. I'm someone who feels guilty taking time for myself so my husband ended up saying go upstairs now no excuses I'm fine, don't feel guilty we're off a walk or something which did make it easier to relax as I knew there was definitely no resentment. Sorry if this is a ramble, just passing on what might be helpful as a mum with a husband who's coming out the trenches as they say! You got this!

Also meant to add.. a hug goes a long way lol, sometimes that snap back to reality with a nice soothing hug helps even just a little bit! Also, keep her (hopefully massive, cool for 12 hours) water bottle topped up and hand her food even when she says she isn't hungry 🤣

I wonder if (apart from generally feeling overwhelmed), your wife is upset about breastfeeding not going as smoothly as she hoped? I had the same experience with my first, and wish there had been better advice available then.

I learned, with the second, that the raging screaming hunger in the evenings was going to lead to increased milk production the next day. It was stressful, but it worked.

That may or may not be what is going on, but could you consider seeing if there is any breastfeeding support in your area?

You sound like a lovely husband, but maybe, practicalities aside, she needs you to sit with her and be there as a support when things are tough- when you're there. That might be more important to her than clean floors just now.

You sound like a lovely caring husband.
ignore some of the more unpleasant and aggressive posters on here.
MN is famously a vipers nest.

I haven't managed to read the full thread. How old is your baby? With breastfeeding, especially in the first few months, it's important to feed on demand to keep up supply. Any feeds with formula will disrupt this and reduce supply, this is probably what your wife is worried about. When she's having a shower, could you go out for a walk? Buy a carrier and learn how to use it, if you don't have one already, and some time outside in the fresh air will help you at least, rather than being inside with a crying baby. Would your wife be up for teaching you how to latch your baby? Then you can help feed the baby at night without your wife having to fully wake up.

It is a steep learning curve and I would definitely try to keep an open mind and open dialogue with your wife. You're both learning and it will take some time to get used to things, plus babies change all the time! Ignore posters having a go. I've been a single mum from the get go and I would have loved to have a partner who was as helpful as you.

The puzzle and logic thing is bang on. I think men are very strategic and always look for ways to fix things and make things better (this isn't a criticism as most of the time it's a good thing!) but I said to my husband when this was us that sometimes I don't need you to pour endless amounts of energy intro trying to fix something that you can't really fix. I asked him to focus more on the emotion / supportive side of things and this definitely helped!

Great that you're trying to really help, that's lovely. What I suggest:

-she insists on night breastfeeding so she doesn't lose milk supply. This is a genuine reason. I struggled with mine and almost got PND from 6 weeks of making so little (a lot less than your wife by the sounds of it). The day I gave in and went full bottle feeding, I genuinely felt my hormones righting themselves a bit and the spectre of PND went. But point being, she's probably extremely focused on milk supply staying up and I think she has a very valid point there.

• She'll be overwhelmed, sleep deprived and hormonal, her whole body and life has just had an earthquake under it. I don't think she has PND she just has a huge amount on her plate. And yes she probably resents you for sleeping (given that her body has also had to go through so much and nothing in her life resembles what it was, suddenly, anymore, whereas in her eyes yours probably does). Even looking in the mirror sometimes, post partum, it's not about being down on your body, it's sometimes like you don't even recognise yourself. Childbirth is a huge mental hit for so many reasons. With the best will in the world, for this reason, I'd just accept a bit of sleep resentment for now, and focus less on what doesn't feel fair. She's firefighting a lot of the time so can't focus on the right delivery and timing sometimes.
• Sleeping when the baby sleeps is nigh on impossible with how high the stress hormones are in her body. She'll know that naptime is her golden ticket to: nap, clean, eat, shower, go to the toilet, get a moments peace, not live in a bomb site, and so on and on. It's overwhelming and too much. If she needs a shower at a time that doesn't seem logical then just go with it.
• She's alone long hours with a baby. It's unbelievably unrelentingly hard.
• 100% buy some readymade liquid formula for times in the day you can just take over. You all need that.

I think you sound like you're really trying to be supportive. Good luck!

OP, please ignore the man-haters on here. It isn’t personal, every man gets bashed on here and the assumption is always that you must be an arsehole. It is CLEAR to those of us who think rationally that you’re trying to help. You’ve gone on Mumsnet and done a whole post to try and help your situation! Something I don’t think it would cross the minds of a lot of men to try.

She’ll be emotional and exhausted so try not to take her behaviour personally, it’s a hell of a lot of pressure feeling like you should be able to ‘do it all’ as a new mum. Catch her in a well-rested positive mood and try to say to her everything you’ve said here but in a non-critical way. Just say all you want is for her to be happy and feel supported and how does she want you to do that? Don’t make suggestions or tell her how to parent, let her make the suggestions and try and go from those. It’s really hard not to take it out on each other in the newborn days, the best advice I got was ‘don’t have a tiredness competition’. You’re in this together.

I agree with this too @TheBlueRaccoon
My mum stayed with me for the first 4 weeks after my daughter was born as I am loan parent. I did everything for the baby - she literally thought of food, meals, tidied and cleaned the house and did everything for me for the first few weeks - it was such a help.
i did express a little in those early days and mum gave an occasional feed but not many. everything she did was more aimed at me.
Listen to your wife and ask her in a calm way how you can best help her as you really want to; reassure her; give her a hug or handhold; make sure she has fresh water near her all the time when she’s feeding.
it’s kind of a looking around and looking ahead and preempting things that need to be done.

you sound great @TheBlueRaccoon -it’s impressive you’re asking on here and I hope you get some useful replies x