FTM - what can I do to help newborn settle at night?

[Bibijayne]

As title. Had baby at 36+6 last Thursday. Came home Sunday. He's been very upset and hard to feed Sunday night and tonight.

I figure a lot of this is to be expected, but what can I and my husband do to help?

We're taking it in turns with skin to skin at night, feeding him expressed milk/ offering him breast if he seems hungry (though he's not happy latching on at the moment. Lactation consultant coming tomorrow). Any ideas?

We're both pretty exhausted - again, we figure normal.

Also, how long did postnatal exhaustion affect other mums? I feel like I'm running on adrenalin alone. Physically shattered. I'm getting sleep where I can, but I still feel pretty sore which doesn't help.

Advice really appreciated!

Congratulations on your baby :)

What worked for me and dh in the early days was to do ‘shifts’ through the night rather than both being awake at the same time. Is there anyway you could try taking it in turns to sleep/hold the baby? Sorry if you’re already trying that I just didn’t want to read and run.

These early days are properly hideously exhausting and for you. I hope the consultant can help you.

congratulations on your new arrival.

keep in mind that he has no idea what day and night are, and absolutely no concept of what "settle" or "sleep" mean, so the idea of settling to sleep because its night has absolutely no meaning for him at all, and won't for a very long time.

sorry, thats not much help, but just telling you that you are right, its normal.

Put a little cellular blanket underneath the crib mattress (top half) to create a slight incline in the Moses basket. 2 of mine were a bit colicky and this helped settle them. Also a build up of feeds during the day and final one around 10.30 to try to get a small stretch.
Also could you get someone to come and keep an eye on baby for a few hours and give baby some expressed milk and just get an uninterrupted sleep for yourself for 5/6 hours Sleep solves everything.

Thank you all. We've just given him a bit of expressed milk (10mls) and put him in his basket for a little. I'm continuing to pump so we can give him little bits quickly whoever is awake (my nipples are very flat and my milk ducts far back so he's struggling on the boob.he's very gassy too - so we'll look at anything to reduce collickyness as I suspect that isn't helping.

Will nab my mum/ dad to help for a couple of hours so we can both sleep.

I had first sleep shift this eve, so hubbie having a break now.

Congratulations 🎊

What is the baby sleeping in? My dd was very unsettled until we put her in a grobag. She hated blankets, I still have to put blankets back over her and she's 8 now.

I co slept with DS for the first 3 months. I got much more sleep and I really enjoyed it. I'd still be co sleeping now but he loves his cot so don't worry about the 'rod for your own back' thing. Exhaustion is torture so do whatever you need to do to sleep

Henry is pretty small (about 5 and a half lbs) so we're having to swaddle at the moment. Haven't found any bags that are small enough for him at the moment.

Ugh it’s hideous in the first few weeks. It gets better and you do get used to function on broken sleep as well. Make sure you eat and drink as that helps you cope. Have you tried a sleepy head? My ds who is 6 weeks loves his and I’m convinced that helps. Also do you have a sling?
If he is unsettled when being lied down and when feeding do keep an eye out for reflux.
Hang in there, it gets better. My son is now 6 weeks and I have started to not hate every minute this week.

Congratulations!

Those first few weeks are exhausting and It’s bloody hard work establishing BF, but it’s also an amazing time getting to know your brand new little person!

From my own experience I would be wary of “topping up” with expressed milk in these early days. Your body produces milk in response to babies demand so expressing interferes with this if done too often. ( plus you’re making more work for yourself - cleaning and preparing pump/bottles) with my first DC I did similar and it really affected my supply. Don’t forget a newborn baby’s stomach is smaller than a walnut so they need to feed little and often.

Glad you have lactation expert visiting tomorrow, they will look for any physical issues such as tongue tie and make any tweaks to babies latch. I also saw an advisor who made just the slightest adjustment to how I held DS but it made an amazing improvement.

I found if I ate cabbage/cauliflower/broccoli they really affected ds2 and made him quite colicky. (Although he now has no food issues, yet ds1 has many food allergies,)

Sleep or rest as much as you can, eat proper food/meals and drink PLENTY of water.

Slings are amazing! Ds2 pretty much spent his first 6 months in one!

Enjoy, it all goes far too quickly x

Both of mine loved being held like this when they were unsettled

Thanks @watermelon - have been given nipple guards which are helping the little man quite a lot. I'm on instructions to have at least one longer stretch of sleep a day as I'm at very high risk of postnatal psychosis which is why the top-up/ expressing has been recommended so my husband can do the first night shift.

I see.... so in that case carry on as you are, till you speak to the lactation specialist and rest/sleep when you can,

Www.kellymom.com is a fantastic, research based website about BF

You could look into baby massage although I think they might have to be a couple of weeks old when they start.

A technique I learnt at baby massage that really helped mine when the usual winding didn’t work, was to lie them on their back, then hold both of their feet/ankles , and gently push their knees up and into their bodies. This usually resulted in a very loud release of gas .

When I was discharged with my late premie after 10 days in hospital, they recommended keeping the lights on low and a radio playing softly in our bedroom - hospitals are noisy and bright all through the night and home can be really dark and quiet in comparison so newborns are startled by the transition. It seemed to work though maybe we just got lucky!

PS congratulations! Also I don't know why you're a high risk for postpartum psychosis but feel free to PM me - I was similarly high risk with DC1 and made myself ill just worrying about this.

So my first baby was an awful night sleeper. I would just cry with exhaustion. I expected the same with my second as nothing I tried with my first worked. But....my second (now 6 weeks) is sleeping 5-6 hours a night and has been since 2 weeks. The only thing I can put it down to is the fact that my house is never quiet of a day with a toddler running around mental so she keeps getting woken up. I think she has gotten used to day time being loud and night is dark and quiet. With my first born...it was always nice and quiet of a day so he would get lots of sleep of a day and be up all night. This is the only explanation I can come up with. Ive also put a pillow under her mattress because of reflux.

Congratulations :)

He might be unsettled due to wind. Try to always gently wind him after feeding, especially if using bottle to feed expressed milk. Listen out for the burbs.

Also find very gently massaging his tummy clockwise helps digestion and to move along gas.

Hope you get some rest. Have lots of "sofa" days...just sit on the sofa, put on a box set and let baby feed as much as he wants. Even better if you have a friend or family member who can sit with you too (but who you don't feel you need to entertain).

I have a 2 month old (&3yr old) and in the early days baby not being winded enough I am sure was cause of upset. Also when my 2 month old is tired he really prefers a quieter surrounding, classical music, calmness. Our house can be very busy so I try and settle him in as soothing environment as possible. This seems to really help.

Best of luck Op xx

Thanks @FraterculaArctica I have bipolar disorder (managed without meds at the moment) and I had a lot of complications in my third trimester which have left me pretty weak postpartum.

Sorry to hear you are so tired. I noticed you said about a sleeping bag.. one of my twins was a similar size to your little one and we used a sleeping bag from jojo maman.. I will pm you a picture. It was a couple of weeks in but suitable for newborns.. they were so cosy!

Argh I can’t send it over pm but the fox sleeping bags (which have sleeves) were perfect

Those early days are so hard but it gets better

DD was a terrible sleeper (eventually diagnosed with CMPA). A few things you could try that worked for us:

Incline the moses basket so their head os slihhtly higher

Tummy massage for wind (YouTube)

White Noise (DD now 4 still loves her Ewan the sheep)

Wrap a warm hot water bottle in a tshirt or something that smellls of you and place it in the moses basket then take the bottle out when you put baby in so it's nice and warm and smells of you

Love to Dream Swaddle Up

Most of all try and get yourself some rest yourself whenever you can, always accept help when it's offered etc.

Congrats x

How was the meeting with the lactation consultant today @Bibijayne? I hope you got some good advice.

Do try not to compare your recovery with some sort of 'expected' - it depends so much on how your pregnancy and birth went and what your baby is like. If you've had a tough time you will absolutely be exhausted - don't do what I did with DC1 and run around trying to 'get back to normal'. You will get there even if it takes longer than you would like.

I have no experience of bipolar but please remember a risk of something doesn't mean it will definitely happen. Do your best to rest but don't panic if the baby doesn't let you sleep as much as your healthcare team have recommended.

Keep posting, the early days are a massive shock to the system in every way!

Thanks everyone! Boob has gone from zero to hero, though this meant I got a blocked milk duct. On antiobitoics as it looked like the start of mastitis. I'm very busty at the best of times and now it's come in my supply is very good, so baby Henry was getting milk without unblocking the duct. Been pumping and massaging to clear - which seems to have boosted supply.

Baby Henry has decided he has a healthy appetite, he likes getting quite milk drunk.

Things that seem to upset him most are wet nappies (rather than poo) and gas. But now we're mostly feeding direct from breast he's getting less wind. Have expressed a reasonable amount so if I need to rest (like this afternoon while antibiotics kicked in) we can feed him breast milk. Been managing between a quarter and a half of a bottle when clearing a boob (I'm not sure if clearing is the right word, but was told that if Henry wasn't interested in second breast to pump it out to maintain a more even supply/ prevent blocks).

Congratulations on baby Henry OP

If youre on Facebook join UK Breastfeeding Support group, it's brilliant

The Gro Company have sleeling things for smaller babies, I think their Grosnugs are but youll need to check

Hope your mastitis has eased off now