April 2011 - Food Glorious Food, Sleep Glorious Sleep <subtle key change> They're our babies, we'll obsess if we want to!

[fraktious]

Thread 4 - that's one a month!

Another shit night last night, gaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh.

In my not so expert opinion I put it down to one or both of the following:

He's not getting enough milk in the day, due to being too bloody nosey to feed, so is getting it in the night instead.

Developmental stuff is going on. He is very close to sitting up unaided and he can roll both ways. He is also waking himself up by rolling into the bars and getting suck

21 weeks today (and my mum and dad need more sleep)

Ps nice to see you Buck!

Ooops :( M did the thing this morning that everyone warns you about... she rolled off the bed :o :( and missed both the rugs so onto the wooden floor. Obviously lots of crying, but was ok after a feed and a hug. Phoned the doctor but they said as long as she seemed ok not to bring her in. One of my friends at the breastfeeding groups works for NHS direct and also agreed that she seemd fine, the health visitor didn't seem too concerned when I took her to get weighed this afternoon either. I feel awful as I was stood right next to the bed where she fell anyway, but looking the other way.

chilli don't beat yourself up, it happens. Babies are very robust, in fact T rolled off the other day and suffered no ill effects :)

ILike - we had a run of dreadful nights last week. But now T can sit up totally unaided and without even padding to catch him, and 3 teeth have cut. Last night he went 9pm-5am, 5.45am-8am so much, much better.
Tonight I must go to bed when he does though, I am exhausted.

Thanks for all the hugs and support re. DS1. Today he did really well at preschool, joined in properly with a big group game and the staff were so pleased and so excited to tell me when I picked him up! Then we've been to a birthday party and he was fine with pass the parcel and playing with a whole load of other kids so I'm feeling much better about things.
I need to find out from preschool when the Senco is coming, just so I'm prepared emotionally for when they want to talk to us about what they see.

ILTMIMI - Sympathies for the lack of sleep. After all your advice during our bad patch, I've made a real effort to make sure P feeds every 2.5 - 3 hours during the day. The number of night time wake ups has improved (although the length of them hasn't - more on that later!) but I'm not sure if that's due to the frequent daytime feeds or the fact that she's now mastered sitting up unaided.

Hello Buck! Hope F's cold didn't keep you up last night. How's being back at work going? Are you finding that you're settling into a decent routine now?

Kitty - Hope S (and you) are sleeping a little bit better. I'm sure that he'll pile those lbs back on with some extra feeding! As some of the others have said, at least you know why he has lost the weight and it's not come as a big surprise to you. Sod the housework, cooking and everything else for a bit and concentrate on feeding S up!

Chilli - Eeek re the rolling off the bed. We had a similar accident today. P was showing off her sitting up skills at our BF group. I turned round to talk to somebody for a sec and before I knew it, she had fallen over flat on her face . She screamed her head off for a minute, more through shock than anything else I think, and I felt totally awful. I was convinced that everybody was thinking what a neglectful mother I am!

Can you all talk to me about self settling? How many of your LOs can reliably do it? P really can't self settle very well at all. She doesn't really feed to sleep that often, so we're reliant on lots of rocking to send her off.

Recently she has had really long periods of wakefulness in the early hours of the morning (not crying or distressed at all...just wide,wide awake) and it's taken up to two hours to get her back to sleep. I always feed her but it seems to be waking her up even more at the moment rather than send her back to sleep. We desperately need her to develop some self settling skills. I know I can't rock her to sleep for ever and the long periods of being awake are killing me and DH.

How have you encouraged your LOs to self settle? She's only 20 weeks and I'm not prepared to leave her to cry at the moment, so that's out. Do you think that PUPD is the way to go?

X posts Ali. Glad that DS1 has had a good day at pre school . Fingers crossed that it won't take too long before you're able to meet the SENCO.

Thanks for the support. She's happily eating the firefly at the moment and seems fine, though there is a bit of a lump on her head.

Star I feed to sleep most of the time, though she sometimes decides she's had enough, finishes with a flourish, closes her eyes and goes to sleep (rather than falling asleep with nipple in her mouth). She can self settle when she wakes in the night (often still awake after a feed) but she doesn't seem to do it any other time, or maybe we're better at leaving her to it when we're wanting to go back to sleep too.

Ali sound like DS1 was fine today :)

Star L doesn't need much settling at all-luck more than anything else I think! At night I put her in her cot and read a couple of chapters of a book to her- she either falls asleep during that or just lies and listens. I can then leave the room and she will quietly go to sleep. If she wakes through the night (usually dummy fallen out) I literally walk in tell her I'm there, that I love her and to go back to sleep and pop dummy back in. She's normally asleep before I'm out the door. I do feel very blessed with how easily she settles at night but I feel for those who are having sleep issues.

M 99% feeds to sleep tbh. There have been rare occasions when I've left her awake on my bed (which is the only place she naps atm) to go to the loo or something and gone back and she has fallen asleep, but they are rarities.

And she rolled this morning :)
So that prob should be the end of her napping in our bed then I normally put a pillow on either side in case. But i must get on with trying to get her to nap in her cot at some point.
She did manage a few naps in the buggy recently so may walk her to sleep a few times instead.

Also got the highchair out of the loft today, she had a sit in it with some cucumber :)

Right, best get M to bed - she feeds for about an hour at bedtime, which is doing my head in at the moment, i get so bored sat in the dark with her, so i read the news on my phone, play games, etc. It's ok if boys are settled or Dh is here, but can be a nuisance when trying to get out of the house!

T feeds to sleep too at bedtime. During the day he also feeds to sleep, or I rock him in the buggy in the kitchen while I'm doing other stuff and he will drop off until DS1 comes in and sticks his fingers up T's nose. He will also sleep in the car, thank God, although he wakes up the moment we come inside.

Last night he was really awake after his feed at 5am, and was doing press-ups in his cot, rolling about, cooing, roaring (MrsW - the noise you are describing is called the dino-roar in this house, both boys have done it!) and generally not wanting to settle. So DH got up and went to play computer games with T on his shoulder while I went back to sleep.

ILike - yes yes to being too nosey to feed. Today we were at a friend's for a little party, and T was wanting to feed but then having two sucks and looking around, 2 sucks and looking around. I was frantically trying to cram him on my boob because I could feel my letdown about to go - but alas, a wet dress, wet baby and my friend got a sprinkled floor

Hey all,

He finally settled sometime after midnight last night. I don't know when - about a fortnight ago I decided I won't look at the time overnight, as knowing exactly how little sleep I've had seems to be far worse than just feeling a bit tired.

He's still coughing a lot, although we'll see how he is when I put him down in a minute.

Who asked about self settling? F now does it well, albeit noisily. If he's crying properly, he needs cuddles. But he'll often drop off after 20 mins of talking/grumbling to himself. With the monitor tunes on repeat.

He's 25 weeks now, and we've started playing with food. He shouted at some carrot sticks & broccoli at the weekend. And munched some rice.cakes today. We've so far only given food to play with at home. I think we'll wait a bit to give him some to have at the CMs.

Breastflow bottles have been a success, he's now taking about 100ml twice during the day.

And apparently DH has magically turned into a domestic god!

Apart from the sleep, and the usual issues with teenagers at school, it's all ok...
...for now!

Well no openreach mannies got a snog, because the feckers didn't turn up. To say I'm is an understatement. Spent almost 2 hours on the phone trying to find out what's going on. I'm waiting on a call back. What makes it even worse is I work for the company who supplies my phone and broadband. Think big blue thing that holds the clouds, so I can't really shout at anyone.

I've tried to keep up with what's going on. Big hugs for everyone suffering.

On self settling B has done it by himself practically since day 1. There might be a bit or grumbling and we need to put the mobile or lulaby back on but i can count on one hand the times I've had to rock him to sleep. I wish I knew the secret, I could make a fortune!

Right I'm going to post now. Its 19.50. Let's see how long it takes to appear!

19 minutes Fizz - obviously not the world's fastest connection!

Hmmm, well I'm encouraged that lots of you are still feeding / rocking in the pram to sleep. It's not just me then! I think I started getting really stressed out by people constantly telling me that she should be self settling by now.

P doesn't self settle as such, I feed her to sleep in the evening when she starts looking tired and during the day it's the same although she will normally nod off in the buggy/car seat when we're out and about. On the days DS is at preschool she seems to either spend all day on the boob or have longer naps. Like Ali P has shorter naps when DS is around . Yesterday was a boob day, resulting in thanks to P's teething but today was a nap day so I actually got some housework done.

I've been to Aqua Zumba this evening, have to confess it's the first exercise class i've ever been too . A couple of friends went along as well and we had a great time. Don't think I followed the routines very well but I enjoyed shaking my booty in the water

Just realised I told u all s lost 4 1b but it was 4 oz, so not much at all. And s doesn't self settle either, needs rocking to sleep.

Star Can't really offer any decent advice on self-settling, R just started doing it by herself, she's not as good during the day but I just look out for the tired signs ear rubbing comes first then more obvious eye rubbing and getting grumpy/fidgety. I stick her up in her cot with her dummy and a muslin cloth (she likes something to hold on to) and just close the door, she'll normally gurn a little bit and then drop off. If she starts to get really upset and properly cries, usually if we've missed the ear rubbing cue, then I'll go back in and pick her up to settle her and then try again, if she's really not going to drop off then I'll just stay with her and hold a hand and stroke her nose and that always works. But 99% of the time she'll just have a little whinge and just drop off herself. At bed time she will reliably just go in her cot (no dummy or muslin) and go straight to sleep. We did have to rock her when she was smaller but it just seemed to phase out over time.

Felt bad yesterday as my SIL was watching her for me for a bit so I could go shopping to get something for DPs birthday and I forgot to tell her that R would probably cry a little before she fell asleep at nap time. My mum came home from work to take over and found SIL walking around the room shushing R trying to get her to sleep and had being doing so for about 45 minutes!!! Woops. My mum was like "no, no, just put her down and shut the door" 5 mins later she was sound!!

After a night/early morning feed I just put her back down and ignore her, after about 15 minutes of babbling she usually just goes back to sleep. I think I've only ever had to get up at 5.45 for the day on one occasion and count myself very very lucky!!

Well think I've exhausted the sleep topic there, sorry it's probably no help whatsoever!!

Fizz @ mannies!! Booo that they haven't fixed the problem though. I will endeavour to be nicer to the people on the other end of the phone once you're back at work just incase I get you!!

I thought 4lb sounded like quite a lot to lose! 4oz sounds much less worrying!

Aqua zumba sounds good. At the moment I'm relying on walking with the pram and BF to whip me into shape. Not sure I'll be resembling Gisele anytime soon!

X posts (again!). I'm very about your self settling baby Mrs W!

I think I need to try and be more patient with P. It's just hard when rocking usually gets results!

To be honest I think it was more DPs influence that helped it along he was far more able to put her down and just walk out of the room crying or not!! I used to sit down stairs cringing until she dropped off. I doubt it's the most orthodox method of sleep training but it worked out for us.
I know you don't want to leave her to cry but can you definitely tell when P is doing a tired cry as opposed to an upset cry? If so it might be worth trying to leave her just for a few minutes to see if she'll drop off? I found it difficult to spot the difference to begin with but have it down to a fine art now!

Happy birthday buck

Had a much better night until 620 when he woke on his front and it took me half hour to settle him, then had to get him out of it to put down, an hour later, 20 mins later woke on his front again. Feeding now. Feel more tired than the rubbish nights.

Ps did someone ages ago mention a friends website that sells dribble bibs?

Thanks Kittycatcat waves over here :) My surname may be confusing folk. It's me architien :)

Avert your eyes if you'd rather not know the start to my birthday, thank you to those that do and act as a much needed shoulder to cry on:

Bit of a rubbish start to the birthday. I woke up on the sofa freezing with no blanket. I must have fallen asleep last night exhausted. No card from DH but a poem about how he didn't think I wanted a trinket for my birthday instead he's going to save the money towards paying the overdraft " (which through his stupidity he built up and every week I'm trying to balance things to pay it off) so together we walk towards a lighter future". He's right I didn't want a trinket, I wanted the DIY projects he had started two years ago finished so I don't trip up/get dismayed/ get splinters in my feet. No homemade card from F despite me heavily dropping hints on mothers day that I really wanted a collection of cards from a very young age from each of them to keep. I also hinted heavily that either mother's day or birthday each year I'd like a rose plant to go in the garden so that when I'm old I can look out over a collection of them with nice memories (I collect old fashioned roses but in the last couple of years I've not been able to spend the £12-15 every now and again when I see one that I like so I thought that would be a good compromise). I knew that he wouldn't get me a cake so I bought a chocolate cake but it's half gone I see. The bottle of wine (Cairn O Mohr Oak wine..yum yum yum, shall have a glass once little ones are slumbering) I bought is still chilling in the fridge at least as is the lamb shanks I bought to make a nice birthday dinner for us all. Also it is freezing out but beautiful and bright so I've opened the curtains wide and sod it I've put the heating on (I hate being cold yet I'm sporting a blue skin tone with jumpers a lot more often that I'm really happy with due to trying to save money due to aforementioned issue). Sink of washing up, dog peed on the kitchen floor as DH has woke up late for work and he is not walked, no toilet roll left in the loo, toddler has already emptied handbag on Sitting Room floor and opened lip balm (dog hairs in lip balm, just what I've always wanted), sunshine is making the house look clarty (as we say up here). My mum died just under a month after her 32nd birthday, TBH I think I'm finding 32 really hard :(

And breathe.

Oh arch

Does your husband realise he's been so horrid?

And happy birthday! Lamb shanks sound delicious

Can you bake with the DCs today and take some photos to add to your memory box? And do some drawings together, and then you could have a little scrapbook page of your happy day?
It must be very tough for you what with your mum having died so soon after the birthday you are having. How thoughtless of your DH not to have realised and tried harder for you

(((hugs))))

(((((Hugs))))) Arch - aren't men crap!

Oh arch on your behalf. I like alis idea! Big hugs. Xxx