Bus Graduates Part 3: Next stop babies!

[Hatepickinganame]

OK so the title isn't the best haha but didn't want to lose you all and the other thread is filling fast! Gonna flip between the two to tag everyone and make sure I get the usernames right.

@professorastrocat @Talcott2007

Aw well you enjoy it now @MummyBearBoo !

No dummy here either, though only tried two so far. I think it's her high palate and from having tongue tie, makes her struggle with them.

I have a drink occasionally I've tried mam dummies as my eldest liked them and tommee tippee but they both make her gip or vomit! She quite often wants boob for comfort at bedtime but complains that milk is coming out and as I said I don't boob feed her to sleep!
I really need to go to bed earlier especially now school is starting again and I've got to get up earlier! But I'm enjoying my evenings while I can she's 3 months old soon and the 3-4 month sleep regression is soon due!!!
We're still tier 3 atm xx

Thanks @calimommy -that makes me feel so much better after having a corona (the lager 😂) tonight! I occasionally take a drink to bed coz once the babies down I usually have quite a few hours before I have to feed her if she wakes at 3 or not til 5 there wouldn't be any alcohol left in my system especially if it's not the same rate as blood!! I'd obviously never drink enough to make me incapable of looking after her I couldn't anyway coz I would need her to take a bottle then!! Xx

Does anyone have any advice on how to get baby to sleep? He is a total nightmare to settle at night (has had 3x 30 min naps since 8pm and we’re both awake crying at one another on the sofa right now). We are so tired and the only advice I can find when I Google is that it gets better eventually. Which isn’t really reassuring when I’m on my own in the small hours. DH is wonderful but back to work now so can’t do as much of the graveyard shift as he did before. Thank you in advance xx

My first was like this @Wise0wl . Properly getting day and night mixed up. How old is baby now 2 ish weeks?
What is your sleep set up? Is he wanting to feed - it's very common for cluster feeding most of the night at this stage (are you breastfeeding?). Can you sleep in the day when he does to catch up? How is his day sleep?

It does literally get better soon as they change so quickly these first few weeks - it's best at this stage to never worry that things will never change and you need to fix something. This just causes more stress then they change anyway.

@wise0wl mine was like that for the first few weeks, its only this last week (she's 4 weeks old) that she's started having longer stretches of sleep. I've just started things like having a clear definition of night vs day, ie lights on and curtains open during day, plus normal noise levels and after her bath in the evening lights off, quieter noises etc. We have zero routine here though, I'm still just feeding on demand and day mapping where possible to catch up. No real advice lol but your definitely not alone and it will get better. Big hugs.

Jinxed it she woke up at midnight last night for a feed but the i put her back down in her bed at 1am and she slept til i woke her up at 8.15am!! So I managed to get me and the oldest ready for school before she woke up! Xx

@Wise0wl I'm sorry. It is so very hard at the start. If you feel like you need to, put baby down in a safe place and walk away. Stand outside in the air and just breath for a min. Crying for a few mins won't hurt baby and it will give you a min to reset yourself. I always say to my husband, if I ever say I want another baby, remind me of this, and then I am an idiot and forget and have another baby 😂 But it is important to walk away if you feel like you are loosing it. Xx

Thanks all. Posting in the small hours helped me feel not so alone!

@professorastrocat he’s 4 weeks which is why I thought it might be better by now. Day sleep is ok-ish; he’ll usually have a good nap at 7am and 2pm ish. But otherwise he’ll sleep for 20-45mins and not much longer. When he’s awake he wants to feed most of the time, I’m bf and that’s going ok (I think!) but I’ve just fed him to sleep post bath, in the dark with white noise and he’s just woken up 5 mins later. I give up!

@Hatepickinganame @calimommy thank you both, I so hope he grows out of this and it’s soon a distant memory.

@Wise0wl I think short naps and often is normal at this age, certainly not worth worrying there should be any routine to it. Did you pop him down somewhere after feeding to sleep? If so, wait til a deeper sleep to move, use the floppy arm test! If he was just asleep on you then who knows...but he'll do different things each day at the moment, he'll get into a swing of things soon. All our bubs are so brand new they think they are still a part of us.

How are you doing yourself?

How's everyone else!?

@Wise0wl luna did this to me last night. Was out of it in her basket. Decided to move her upstairs and go to bed myself, ot was about 9pm and she woke up maybe 5 minutes later (after around a 30 min nap) and didn't settle for longer than that until 4am 😴😴😴 shes super unsettled today, not looking forward to tonight!

My DD2 had her 2nd lot of imms today she's 13 weeks old today and exactly 3 months old tomorrow!! She spent most of the time from 3pm crying I mean really crying totally inconsolable not even boob worked she wouldn't eat or sleep either (she had her jabs at 11.45 so dunno if this was a delayed reaction) finally got her to sleep for a bit at 6pm then she woke up and fed and she's still a bit iffy but better she's asleep now anyway hopefully for the night but sleep regression is looming! Xx

@MummyBearBoo oh it's hard isn't it?! Want the jabs, also hate them for a little bit afterwards 🙃 I thought my third baby was the one to break the non-sleeping cycle. From birth he did 4 hrs, then 6, then 8. He was my favourite baby I decided. And then around 4months he 'woke up' and stayed awake till 2ish 😂💀💀 but in fairness he has slept through the night since then, whereas those other two arseholes were still awake at night until 4&5yrs 😂 It's a toss up what this one does....

@MummyBearBoo hope she's ok!

@Wise0wl I tried swaddling tonight in a grobag (tommee tippee? Bought from a friend) we got two stretches of 3 hour sleeps! Might be coincidence 😅although we've been up since 2am now...

I'm dreading sleep regression coz I've got a false sense of security-last night she fell asleep on me at 8.30pm, she woke up at 10.30pm for a feed for 20 mins after which I put her in her bed and she's only just woken up for another feed (well at 8am) so she slept for 11.5 hours but with a 20 min feed but now my boobs are so full and sore coz she usually wakes at 3am or 6am for a feed! My DD1 didn't sleep very well in her own bed for about 2.5 years we ended up co-sleeping with her when she was in our room though her bed was attached to the side of our bed or letting her come in our room at about midnight once she was in a junior bed! They used to advise how to co-sleep safely but now they advise not to at all! Xx

I think sleeping bags make a difference my baby started sleeping better and stopped waking as much when I put her in a 1 tog snuz pouch -the temp in our room is usually around 19 degrees so too warm for a higher tog but she used to kick the cover off so think she'd wake up cold so sleeping bag has helped!! XX

@MummyBearBoo our bedroom is around 20/21 degrees, so even a 1tog seemed to much but this growbag is jersey, its literally no thicker than her bed sheet and she seems to love it. She finally went back to sleep at 5am after another feed at 4am, and we got up at 8.30. Definitely enjoyed some solid stretches of sleep!

That's a good stretch til 4am -I considered the tommee tippee ones but they only went up to 4 months and she was already over 2 months when I was buying one plus like my other daughter she likes to sleep with her arms above her head so she's not that bothered about being swaddled! Coz she had so much sleep she's in a really good mood today! Xxx

@MummyBearBoo do what you have to do. I usually sleep in the nursing chair for the first year 😂 not great for the neck but when my eyes need to close any space will do. I never plan to but I fall asleep feeding from exhaustion. The nursing pillow helps hold baby in place. It means you have one very cold boob when you wake though.

I always feed in bed and go on my phone to keep me awake if she wakes in the middle if the night I use my nursing chair and sing to her at wind down time! I can't use the bath as part of her bedtime routine coz while she loves it I have to bath before 4pm otherwise she hates it and cries the whole time if I do it in the morning or early afternoon she's great I think she's just getting tired and grumpy in the evenings! I've started using the Huckleberry app which is pretty good it works out when your child should nap and lets you know any patterns and what boob to feed on next if you're bf! Xx

@professorastrocat I’m ok thank you! Struggling with lack of sleep but otherwise recovering well!

@Hatepickinganame great idea about grobags, I hadn’t considered as our room is so warm (22°) but might investigate thin ones!

@MummyBearBoo glad she’s sleeping well, I use Huckleberry too and find it so useful.

Put izzy down awake as usual thankfully she finally went to sleep but she was chatting away for ages!! She managed to roll from her front to her back today very slowly and it took her a few attempts kicking her legs to get her over -my eldest did this at 3 months too she can't roll on to her front yet but I'll still need to keep my eye on her a bit more!! Hope you guys are all doing ok! Xxx

Luna has just started making cooing noises, and she adores bathtime and were starting to get some smiles now 😄 sleep is still hit and miss though 😴 I can't believe she's a month old already.

How is everyone checking weight gain? I bought some normal scales and weighed myself (wish I hadn't!) Then weighed me and luna to get a rough idea as there is no baby clinic now. She weighs around 10lb, which I think is ok from what I've read but worries me I can't check properly 😳

@Hatepickinganame -I do the same with Izzy weighing me and her!
My little lady is such a chatterbox if you say hello to her she makes a sound that actually sounds like hello obvs it's not but it's cute!
She got a rattle on her rocking chair and she proper shouts at it!! Xxx

I'm still bf and planning to for another 3 months but my period has just started today! I think it may have started around 4 months last time but I can't remember xxx