March 2013- here we go....

[Oodsigma]

Welcome old & new to the other side!

I'll start with a stats list!

Ood -ds 7/3/13, dc4! Elcs

If anyone wants to add any more details feel free!

Wow leni I'm nearly speechless at what you've been through.
And to jojo too re being back in your pre-pg clothes mid-pg surgery!

DD went 10:15 till 2:15 and I fed her just for 15 mins them slept from 3 till 5:25 which I can't believe - such a difference to last night!

Basically I think it was down to whether I was waking her at the wrong time or not: DH and I had a big chat last night about her noisy sleep and when I've been getting her up to feed. You see, after our discussion on here about noisy sleepers, I read that newborns have many REM sleep patterns (tired, may not have the terminology right) and at the end of each cycle they get really noisy because they are essentially lightly waking up.

When we had DS in our room, I used to think I was soothing him back to sleep as I'd shush-pat him every time I thought he was stirring/waking up. We put him into his own room at 3 months and that first night I jumped out of bed when I heard him stirring on the monitor but I stopped myself from going in unless he actually started crying. But he never did and so he slept through from that first night.

So DH and I agreed that I'd try the same last night. Basically I didn't go and pick DD up and take her to feed unless we thought she really was awake and that only happened once at 2:30 before 5:25. And she didn't feed for long, just one side (I tend to feed her both every time - my right side was rock hard this morning) and then she went back to sleep so I thought I'd just put her back down again.

I also think the fact that she fed solidly last night for a couple of hours must have helped too. But the fact that I didn't have to dread every noise from her and had DH to help me decide whether to get up or not was a massive help too so I could snooze happily and know that I wasn't going to 'miss' feeding her or something (as daft as that sounds).

I'm sure it'll all be back to rubbish the next night but I'm writing this out in case it helps any of you x

Pudtat yes about the nails, she's scratching the hell out of my boobs, her face & everything between. Plus shes also into the end of feed nipple grab.. Need to invest in a cutting implement. Also, how the hell does he get o much dirt under them, she's 7 weeks old!!!

ah, I put that down to being the dead skin and dried blood they collect with their scrabblings.

Ditto with the nails - adding sharp baby claws to thrush-ridden boobs is an awful combination

We had the worst night so far, DS screamed from 11pm until 5am inconsolably and no amount of bouncing could stop him. I was literally ready to run away and thought that when OH came home he'd be able to settle him as normal, but no, the writhing colic continued until about 30 mins ago. Not sure how much more I can take!

MW called and the hospital list our heel prick test so she's coming today to repeat it. Not great as today I really need to sleep when DS does more than ever before. I suppose I can ask her for any tips to settle him but I doubt she'll have much to help.

Aaaaaaarrrrrrgggghhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Pudtat I'm calling them blobs from now on

jojo what's your secret? I think DS is gearing up to sleep through, if only I could get my head around his feeds! He is capable of sleeping up to 5 hours at a time, just need to get that at the right time of night!

Leni here I was feeling all sorry for myself because DP is in Germsny until Monday and I'm now completely in awe. The last couple of years sound like they've been really challenging for you, you must be so proud to have come out the other side. RE slings, I use a Connecta, and can highly recommend it. Wearing it now in fact, I'm comfy and DS is snoozing.

Wing I don't go to DS until he's crying, and even then I don't always go immediately. I may well get flamed for this, but often it's as you describe and he's able to settle himself after a short grumble. If he's genuinely upset, hungry or awake I respond accordingly, but I think it's good to let them work things through sometimes.

Right time for a bottle and then to pack! DS and I are spending 3 whole nights at my parents this week, the longest ill have been there since I moved out 7 years ago! Hopefully things won't get too stabby....

Zombie like today. Bubs had his first jabs on monday so of course yesterday he was feeling rotten and let us know it! Refused to be put down without screaming constantly and the only way we got to sleep was by me cuddling him and co sleeping (which means OH sleeps and I doze and wake at every snuffle). Going to try and nap after a cup of tea and some cornflakes. I think a pyjama day may be happening today. Hope everyone else is fairing better. Will try to catch up later.

Does anyone know if you can get baby straitjackets? The arms are driving us all mad. 10.30 bed for me, 2.30 bed for baby, 5am straining and wiggling, 6am fully escaped and wide awake. Fed, changed, let her have a wriggle on my bed until 7. Then back in the basket and basically ignored her, and she slept for a whole hour.

Jojo what's your secret? Ten till nine sounds like heaven.

leni crikey, you've had a hell of a couple of years, haven't you? Glad you've finally got a baby, even if no furniture to put him on.

Wing the many sleep cycles thing makes sense. Also explains why our daytime naps tend to involve 30-45 minutes of sleep then wide awake again. I've yet to discover the trick to getting her to go straight back for round two...

plonko no flames from me for ignoring all noises until they turn into full-blown crying. The man does it but I tend to be quicker to return the dummy or whatever, and she does sleep better for him. I have been known to ignore proper crying too, if she's somewhere safe and I know she's not hungry or windy or needing a clean nappy. Sometimes the crying's just inexplicable, and if we go to her every time she'll never learn to stop of her own accord.

So, I've decided this baby is starting nights in her own room. This has many advantages, chief of which being I hopefully won't wake up at 2am every night - last night if she'd not been next to me I would've slept from 11 until 6, and would feel far less like a corpse now. Also hoping if she gets her arms out she won't wake up so easily if there's no basket to hit. My plan for today is thus: feed, burp, change, make bed, hang curtains, put baby in cot, pray for sleep. And possibly turn the cats into a very fetching hat and gloves set if they even think about breaking into the nursery.

Do what keeps you sane, Stormy. I read that the short sleep cycles, the delightful ones that end in grunting and whimpering, should not be responded to. Picking up the baby etc just stimulates them when they should be learning to settle through them. As for the flailing arms...I've got electrical tape, duct tape, masking tape and Sellotape. Although the latter is being used to hold the tray in my broken condenser drier.

Zig how was getting the jabs? I'm dreading it! Sounds like you deserve a cuppa and feet up this afternoon.

I officially have the hungriest baby in the land. We were supposed to leave the house an hour ago but I'm pinned to the sofa again!

Well, by the time I'd finished hanging the curtains, she was asleep on her playmat. Woke up a bit when I transferred her to the cot, kicked off the blanket I tried to put over her, but was clearly knackered. So I stuck the dummy in her mouth, closed the door, and went for a smoke. That was fifteen minutes ago. So far, it's all quiet, though whether she's asleep is anybody's guess. Either way, I'm not going back up there until 3pm unless she starts crying.

It's amazing how much better I feel just for fifteen minutes' peace without worrying!

Meanwhile, the cats seem to be enjoying having access to my room again - I can hear them clattering about up there through the baby monitor.

Repeated heel prick was much worse on a 19 day old - it poured with blood! Poor lamb howled after being so rudely awoken. Has since slept through from around 10.30 to now though apart from a short boob feed - maybe it's the formula that makes him all mental at night... Hope this thrush cream works quickly!

The hands/arms thing is weird isn't it? Often I look down and see he's managed to stick a finger in his mouth with the nipple or teat at the same time, or he's pulling his bottom eyelid down or actually sticking his nail into his eyeball, yet he doesn't seem perturbed by it at all. When he's dreaming he does nazi salute arms too

I always wait until proper crying starts now because it seems to switch on and off so quickly, last night's squeaky farting was pretty hilarious and resulted in some half arsed grisling but not real crying. The colic howls have proper tears though which is horrible

Hit "post", baby started crying. I swear she does it on purpose! Only two cries though, and now all quiet again. So she's either asleep, dead, or abducted by aliens. Fingers crossed it's the first one...

leni we get a lot of Nazi arms when drifting off to sleep (never at naptimes as she's swaddled for those), and sometimes conducting the orchestra too. Someone told me the other day, the way to check if a toddler's actually asleep is to hold their arm up over their face, and let go. If they smack themselves, they were asleep. So presumably sleeping with arms up in the air doesn't last forever - enjoy it while you can!

As for the fingers in the eye - my elder niece always used to do that when sleep. It looked hideous. Especially as she was about four when she finally grew out of it.

Well managed a 15 min power nap before his highness wanted dinner. Why do they always wait til you put clean clothes on them before they puke milk everywhere?

plonko I'm sorry to say the jabs were horrible. He properly screamed and was the most upset I've seen BUT by the time we got home and I'd changed his nappy he was fine again. He was obviously feeling rotten yesterday though. He was quite hot and couldn't sleep as well as usual. Plus when he was awake he just wanted holding. Very hard work. He seems much more like himself today though and has even had extra sleeps to make up for it so seems to have just been a 24 hr thing.

stormy I admire your ability to put bubs to bed. I'm terrible for checking on him although I do try to leave him if he's not crying and even then I give it a few mins to see if he will settle.

leni I think you've got a copy of my baby. Fingers rummaging in eyeballs and nazi salutes a plenty. He also does a good superman and wallace & gromit impression.

I'm not doing that great at it, zigwig - currently a bit of a snot-faced mess because she won't sleep for more than forty five minutes. That said, she has currently been totally silent in her own room for just over two hours. My sister just texted to reassure me that the baby is not dead, and that I would've noticed aliens, so to enjoy the peace while it lasts...

see now I've got ok at not over settling I think, but doesn't mean that tonight after an unsettled few hours early evening, when I finally got him to sleep at 21.00 I just bought him up to bed in his carrycot, expected an hour and a halfs lip at most. he's just woken up and started his next feed! I on the other hand have been checking him every 30-60 mins since 23.00 so haven't fully benefitted from the sleep! however, he was exhausted earlier, so figured the sleep would be good for him. just need him to do a decent job of emptying the boobs now as they think he should have been up hours ago .

kip not lip - blooming phone!

That's great pud! I last fed DD later than normal at 11 and got her up to feed give mins ago so nearly 4 hrs stretch. Hopefully after this feed then she'll go through to a decent time, say 6, which at least feels like morning and not another mid-night feed.

I'm still having night sweats. It's horrible and can't be nice for DD either when she has to feed from me

Hmm well after I posted the shove the night went downhill somewhat. DD went down at 3:30 but woke up at 4:30, fed on/off with a nappy change until 5:15 then woke up again at 6:20. I've got no idea why. So a good start but a pants end to the night.

Hope you've all fared better?

The above not the shove.

My night went thus: 7pm baby to bed; 7.15 baby asleep; 8pm dad and brother turned up with pie to give emotional support and reassurance; 9.30 man home, tea eaten; 10.15 me to bed, man to try a dream feed (unsuccessful thanks to gigantic poo); 10.45 baby asleep again; 2.15 successful dream feed by the man; 5.45 baby awake, fed and changed and back in the cot; 6.15 baby asleep; 7.30 baby squeaking so we got up and started the day; 8.45 baby back down for first nap.

Now, if only I'd managed to sleep through rather than taking over an hour when I went to bed, and then being woken by the man swearing at the cat in the basket when he came to bed and taking another hour to get back to sleep, I would be feeling at least 95% human right now. Got wonderfully puffy eyes from yesterday's snot-fest though.

Have had far less fussing during feeds since I realised the teats come in different sizes. Newborn size is obviously frustratingly slow for her now. Should've realised sooner, but in my defence, when we got the bottles I was a hormonal soggy mess and didn't actually look in the box and see the different sizes. Ah well, we live and learn!

Morning all. Seems it was a mixed night all round. My LO got to sleep better than usual, we were all in bed by 11, but then I couldn't get to sleep because of the stupid wind. So I didn't get any extra kip. Then once he woke for his feed at 1.30 he wouldn't settle again and after much crying he ended up in our bed again. I hate to do that as I'm sure we're setting ourselves up for trouble later on.

The plan today (assuming minimum trouble from babies) is to try do some cleaning as the house is an absolute mess.

zig could indeed be setting yourself up for trouble - there will come a point when you have to make the baby stay in his own bed, up to you whether that's now or further down the line. If you do it later then you get more sleep and less hassle right now, but if you do it now you have a hellish few days or weeks and then lots of sleep and minimal hassle thereafter. And, of course, the longer you leave it, the more he gets used to waking up, crying, and finishing out the night in your bed.

I was told by my sister last night that baby goes to bed at seven, and baby does not get out of the cot until seven, except for feeds and nappy changes. On no account does baby get picked up and cuddled and played with and taken into another room. I asked how she dealt with her babies fussing in the night, she said "Basically, by being quite mean and ignoring them unless they properly cried." Her younger daughter was sleeping from seven until five, with a dream feed at eleven, at nine weeks. So I'm inclined to follow her advice, because a) it will probably work and b) if it doesn't I can blame her.

FWIW I don't even notice people's typos anymore, my brain fills it all in without question!

After the now usual painful poos/colicy tummy evening in the sling, DS and I went to bed at about 12.30am after a feed, he went down by some miracle (boobs help) and didn't stir until 3am then was grisly until gone 5am when we managed an hour of being settled until OH got home and did the early feed. I wore the sling in bed so I could just stick him in it and get him to sleep quicker.

The thrush is still tear-inducingly painful, and whenever DS rips off the nipple shield or scratches me my body has that reflux to push him off which obviously I have to resist. That gets harder the more tired i am but it's worth it because he sleeps afterwards.

Currently trying my second hired sling - a Boba Wrap - quite good so far because it's all one piece with only one tie which doesn't have long spare ends hanging off. DS sits high up and feels like he's almost tucked inside a T shirt as the fabric is so light.

Stormy I think you're right. During the day I manage quite well to let him self settle it's the nights I struggle with because he's in our room. I think when he goes into his own room it will be easier. I might make that sooner rather than later as he seems to settle much better when he's on his own. My new monitor arrived today so I'm going to start putting him up to bed in the evening instead of keeping him downstairs until we go up. I'll start that tomorrow when it's all charged.

It's going to be an interesting weekend. Saturday we are going to our friends 40th and OH sister is babysitting. We're only going for a couple of hours but it's the first time we've left him with someone else so it'll be strange, even though I totally trust her. Then Sunday it's my cousin's baby's christening which involves a long drive and being out all day which is another first. Hope it's not too stressful.

leni have you been brave and tried fingernail trimming yet? It's pretty scary, but should help with the scratching. As for slings, I was looking forward to trying them out, but she's happy to do her own thing when awake, and I don't want her in the habit of sleeping on me, so not much opportunity, really.

zigwig good luck with tomorrow evening - if it works and he sleeps you'll get an evening to yourself, which does wonders for the sanity!

First morning nap went beautifully here, then I went to my dad's for lunch and she slept perfectly on the sofa for an hour. Current nap not going so well yet - I can hear her fussing up there. Will hold off for two minutes and hope she goes off...