May 2017 #17 the fun continues

[teainbed]

Hope everyone will continue to chat about their beautiful May 2017 babies!

Hello everyone - not sure if any of you remember me from when we were all pregnant?? Noticed some new names too so hello
I went totally AWOL form here towards the end of pregnancy. Baby Gurtie came 10 days early - 2 days after I finished work!! All a big whirlwind, was a 2 hour labour, though from the 4cm bruise on her little head the mw's think I had been in labour a few days (I thought it was braxton hicks )
She is BEAUTIFUL, more so then I could ever have imagined. We have named her Phoebe. She is now a healthy 3 1/2 month old (she came April 30th, so I'm a bit of a fraud being on this post, but I was with you all through my whole pregnancy so your stuck with me!!!).
Unfortunately she wasn't putting on weight in the early stages being breastfed. And I felt SO much pressure from the mw's and hv's that I caved and turned to formula. Have regretted it ever since with the poor mite suffering from reflux and now constipation. I know the NHS team are supposed to be supportive and helpful, but I found my visitors to be pushy and judgemental - just wish I had been stronger and stuck to my guns with bf'ing.
Anyway, sorry for the essay! Lovely to be back on here and see that we all have lovely little babies

Welcome back @Gurtie28 ! BabyTea also arrived in April and is now 17 weeks! Sorry to hear about your feeding problems.

Thanks @teainbed lovely to see the same names still on here! Huge congratulations on your little one!!!
I am currently in a reflux verses constipation battle. She is on anti reflux milk which is a god send....however it has made her constipated and she passes very hard stools. Dared to try regular formula today but instantly the reflux cane back - big dilemma. I feel like the basically have to choose between the two ailments. Anyone else has this? Any ideas how I can combat both?

Welcome back @Gurtie28

My story sounds very similar! Baby Barnes was born 9 days early in under 2 hours (no Braxton Hicks confusion with my labour though). He's very slowly gaining weight (he's slowly dropping further below the 0.4th centile, although gaining each week). I'm doing formula top ups at the moment as well as bf. We were using comfort formula for colic but have had to change to dairy-free formula so now the colic has come back with a vengeance. However, his painful wind which woke him every hour or so throughout the night has been better for the last few days (we only switched formula on Sat). We're also battling reflux which I think is also a bit worse since changing formula and he's on omeprazole for that (but he spits most of it out). He's also not pooped for over 50hrs which is unusual as he'd be a 3 times a day baby.

It is difficult having to almost pick which cause of discomfort your baby has to have so I do sympathise. Have you spoken to your HV/GP about the constipation? Although there's then a chance you medicate something caused by a medication and get stuck in a bit of a vicious circle 😫

I hope Phoebe is now gaining weight though and try not to be too hard on yourself about bf vs ff. fed is best!

@Barnes79 hello!!! Congratulations to you too! Somewhat relieved I'm not the only one battling with little tummies. Agree 100% - there was a point where she was on special formula, and trying gripe water and then infacol, then the GP prescribed gaviscon - in the end I just thought I had no idea what was working and what was causing what, so we scrapped it all and started over! ATM the HiPP organic anti-relux formula is really keeping the reflux at bay and she just yums it up - but now we have painful hard stools.
So sorry to hear you are without a poo for so long! Poor little duck, can't be comfortable! Is there a guideline for how long without a poo before you go to GP?
I started a thread on here about this, one Mum advised Lactulose - but I feel like that is very extreme!?!

Gurtie does the reflux cause her much pain or discomfort? I'd pick sicky over constipated unless it was painful sick.

Hello @savagehk how are you?
The constipation is the lesser of two evils (for now). Her reflux was really bad and made feeding time a huge struggle (taking 2 hours to have 3oz at it's worst) and she couldn't lay on her back to sleep. The constipation seems to effect her when she is pooing - I have been having some baby massage lessons and have been helping her to go l, but once she does she is fine and happy again. As it stands she is passing 1 a day, it's just how hard it is that is worrying me...

Hi

Does anyone have any sleep tips for a Velcro baby? The baby has been sleeping on me since about 1 week and he's now 10 weeks so I'd like to get him weaned off me! We co sleep at night which is fine for now, I'm hoping if we can get him sleeping in the day the night will naturally follow.

At the moment he'll nap for hours on a person but when we put him down he wakes up after a couple of minutes of not before. I read @Tiggermama earlier post which sounds good but struggling with him just crying straight away when we put him down awake. He often falls asleep on the breast as well so I miss that but when he's sleepy but awake! Any other tips anyone has would be great!

We don't swaddle him because he never seemed to like it and escapes quite easily. He's very fidgety!

Hmm, between starting this post and finishing it I managed to shush him to sleep from awake in his sleepyhead. He only lasted 15 minutes until he startled himself awake but it feels like progress. No idea what was different to the last time though!

@Uptown8617 that's exactly how getting them to nap on their own works so you'll get there! Tiggerbaba now self settles for all his naps, still with me standing nearby until he's almost asleep but he doesn't really need that anymore. It is time consuming as hell to start but so worth it. Yep he cried every time he was put down too, just keep on picking him straight back up, soothing him then putting him back down when calm again. And stay where he can see you clearly or keep a hand on his tummy and smile, even if he's on the verge of crying! It only takes a few days then tiggerbaba seemed to feel more secure and drops off in his own. Make sure while he's learning that you don't leave him to cry even for a minute when he wakes, you NEED to be there for it to work in my experience. It's not any kind of sleep training, just trying to make him feel confident enough to sleep somewhere that's not on you but that you are 100% there with him. Not letting him get upset on dropping off/waking was definitely the key.
It really helps if you can plan naps, it's different every day for us but I know after 2 hours or so he will start getting tired so I prepare then. The warm blankie over the back is a great help at first too!
I started doing this around the same age as your wee love so it's totally doable! Over the next few weeks they start to really consolidate how to nap and fall asleep so it's worth the hard yards now. We are just starting a regression and I'm sooo glad now we got this sorted in time!
Mine hated swaddling too but the startling will reduce on its own. Out of interest what time does your wee one go to bed? X

Thanks for the reassurance @Tiggermama, I don't know how you do it though! I've just been trying for over an hour and must have picked up over 20 times. Apart from being soul destroying it'll break my back if nothing else .

He doesn't really have a routine, generally he'll go to sleep anywhere between 8 and 10pm and then he'll wake when I take upstairs around 12pm and have a small feed to go back to sleep. (He'd sleep longer if I didn't have to move and put him down). We've tried doing a bedtime routine with a bath, feed, sleep but even that changes depending on how his naps etc have fallen that day.

Yeah it is hard going. I'd only try it for maybe 1 or 2 naps a day, pick your battles until you see some progress. He's still learning and it takes a good few days tbh, just make sure he gets enough daytime sleep as well in the meantime, even if it's on someone. I actually wrote down when tiggerbaba ate, was wakeful and when he slept for a couple days to see if I could see a rough pattern, it really helped for naps as I was so knackered I literally couldn't remember from one day to next!
I'm a big believer in bedtime routine, it feels totally pointless for ages but he will probably be picking up sleepy signals even if he doesn't always go to sleep!
Tiggerbaba definitely went through a phase from about 8-10 weeks where he WOULDN'T be put down to sleep at all, it doesn't stop overnight but if you keep on trying, whatever it is you decide to do, you should find he will fight it less in the next week or two either way. I can only say this seemed to work for us but I hope things get better soon for you!

We swaddled and did shush pat for naps. He needed a lot of help to nap until 12 weeks when he started going down himself. He sucks his thumb which helps. It was brilliant because we went from spending a good hour and a half a day helping him to get to sleep to just plopping him down in the cot awake. I would agree just keep trying but if he's never napped alone he might need a bit of help going down in the cot.

@uptown8617 I may be way off the mark here but thought I'd stick my 2pence in . When I can see baby gurtie is overtired in the day but gets upset when I put her down, I take her on a tour round the house in my arms and talk to her about our day (literally I give an hour by hour account of what we have done that day, sure the neighbours must think I'm loopy) then I put her down but keep talking and she settles off really quickly. It's probably that I bore her to sleep - but hey ho - whatever works!!

Any tips on self-soothing versus dummy use? The Baby Whisperer book said that by 12 weeks he would find his thumb and I could stop the dummy, but that's really not happening.

Pippin does suck various bits of his hand but only for entertainment - he can't reliably get a thumb in and if doesn't seem to soothe him. If he's doing that when he gets sleepy he'll actually stop sucking whatever it is and make big fish mouths at me for his dummy, and gets upset if I don't provide it. But it falls out while he's going to sleep and that wakes him. Then once he's sound asleep it falls out without waking him. But what that adds up to is he can't get to sleep on his own, or fall back asleep if he wakes in the night, and it's mostly the dummy stopping him. He's never wanted to feed to sleep and he has got good at shush-pat instead of cuddling.

We are in a similar position @CoxsOrangePippin. Baby W can't yet reliably find her thumb/hand and we spend a lot of time putting the dummy back in. Hoping the hand control comes soon!

It might only be a few more days @CoxsOrangePippin hopefully he'll get it soon!

DD can find her thumb and has randomly fallen asleep twice when I've popped her down for a minute, but usually takes either feeding or rocking to sleep. She wouldn't take a dummy. Some just aren't thumb suckers though, DS did for about a day but didn't bother after that.

I'm sure I can see a tooth about to break through

Thanks Tigger, Tea and Gurtie. It may not work but we'll persevere and hope for the best. He has gone to sleep twice now so we know it can be done!

I was worried we should be trying the same thing for every nap to reinforce it so it's good to hear you didn't do it every time. We'd never get any sleep otherwise.

Fingers crossed for the thumb! I am trying to not interrupt him with a dummy when he is sucking a bit of hand even if I want him to be going to sleep instead.

uptown we started with just one or two naps a day similarly and now they mostly (but certainly not always!) happen like that. Still short naps though.

Having had one baby who was (and still is) a terrible napper and one who just seems to do it by herself, I have come to the conclusion that it's a nature not nurture thing. So my advice is not to spend too much time trying to create a napper, as some kids just are not good at it!

Ranty post time

MIL and FIL go to visit friends last weekend. When they get there these friends are full of cold but say they've had it for x amount of days so are no longer contagious. MIL has MS and picks up bugs very easily. Fast forward a couple of days later and she's full of the lurgy. We visit their house a couple of times over the weekend with MIL keeping a distance from DS so she doesn't pass it to him. He's been grumpy the past two days which I put down to having a leap WRONG. The poor little mite has woken up now absolutely full of cold and I'm furious at MIL. I said we should have stayed away but these family members were desperate to meet DS so she insisted we went.

@BouncingBlueberry what is it with people like that?! I feel your pain. My MIL came to visit when the baby was 1 week old, spend the best part of an hour hogging him, cooing right in his face which annoyed me anyway, then sneezed into a tissue and said, oh don't worry it's just a bit of a cold. I was so annoyed that she'd not told me and not kept away from him! Luckily he didn't get anything. This is in contrast to my own mum who cancelled a visit the other day as my niece has croup and as she's been exposed didn't want to risk it.

Sympathies to you @BouncingBlueberry that's very unfair of them.

My own sister was like this with vomiting bugs. She really didn't get it until she had her own DC.

@BouncingBlueberry argh, that would drive me crazy, I can see my MIL/FIL doing similar they just don't understand germs 😣

On naps, baby rise will sometimes go to sleep herself, sometimes she needs cuddles, sometimes I can put her down once sleeping and she'll stay asleep sometimes she won't. I haven't worked out what makes the difference 😳 so we're just going with it 😁

I've found a local bf support group so I'm going on Friday we're not having problems, I just feel I need some more experienced advice/reassurance, and it's different people to talk to.... every baby I've seen being fed at any group has taken it from a bottle so I feel like I need to find my people (real ones as opposed to this lovely bunch of strangers).

I just read that again and it sounds really judgy I don't think there's anything wrong with bottle feeding (everyone fed and no one dead) and everyone should do what they want, I just meant I haven't seen anyone else bfing so I'm going looking for them!