feeling crap...where to start...

[Scarlett175]

after feeling like I was getting somewhere with this baby malarky have met up with the gang of mum-friends and suddenly feeling poo! feel like I have loads of things to tackle and no clue where to start.

DD was sleeping min 5-6 hours max 8 hours, straight through, in her swaddleme wrap since 9/10 weeks (she is 12 weeks now). This was with bed/bath routine but being fed to sleep downstairs then took upstairs to our room. Since the hot weather this has all got a bit disturbed. We were worried she was too hot in the wrap (she started waking 3-4 times) so got a low tog grobag to try her in. After 2 nights of 3-4 wakings (weather cooler) decided to put her back in swaddle as her arms still seemed jumpy,but she still seems to be waking at least 2-3 times.

All the mums now all of a sudden seem to have babies that are just being put down and fall asleep themselvesin gro bags, arms free...DD has never done that, will just cry and jolt, and take another hour of settling. If I BF her to sleep she will sleep a minimum of 4 hours straight. I wasn't stressed about this, as I figured it would sort itself out when we wean her or just with time. Now I feel really anxious about feeding her to sleep as I have to do this for naps also (she naps well, but only in sling, on a person or for short amounts of time in carseat/pram etc). Am I making a rod for my own back?? is this that hard to correct later??

To be honest I felt smug that she was getting 2 good naps a day and WAS sleeping at least 5 hours... now I feel crap. Should I try her in grobag again, and tackle the bF to sleep thing now?? gggrrrrrr feel so rubbish.

I think you may have answered your own question there.

When we first had our daughter we did all the things that you are not meant to. Allowed her to sleep with us and even found DH asleep in the sofa with her asleep on his chest. And yes even now at the age of 4, 5 in september she still prefers to sleep with us.

Luckily we can now talk to her and explain. If I was you I would try not letting her nap too much in the daytime and I know that isn't always possible. Have you upped her night time feed? Because that always helps.

Oh and with the weather I am finding both my children are not settling aswell and waking up really early. Too early! But I know come the winter it will settle back to normal again.

Hope this helps

I think you are doing really well. You are getting good stretches and decent naps. For the moment, that's what counts. And babies will change up and regress and then progress (although I've mainly seen regression).

Try not to compare to your mums group babies. They are all different and it's no comment on your parenting skills (telling myself this as I had to spend a week with a baby who slept through 7-8 when mine was waking hourly..). Also, people lie! So take it all with a big pinch of salted be really proud that you are meeting your baby's needs.

I'm sorry but ignore the other mums. I bet you they're exaggerating. If my baby did what yours did at that age I'd be so pleased!

I remember one of the mums saying that she would read her DD a bedtime story and she'd drift off to sleep afterwards... Then later she let slip she had to rock her to sleep

Keep doing what you're doing. 2-3 naps a day is great as are the stretches at night. As for self settling - you can start trying that soon but don't beat yourself up about it. My DS self settled for the first time around 5 months, started to do it regularly around 7 months but now at 9 months I have to BF him to sleep most nights as he's either teething or overtired!

It sounds like you're doing a great job. At 12 weeks I was pounding the streets with DS in a sling all day as it was the ONLY way he would sleep. As long as she's getting 2-3 naps of 30-45 minutes a day you should be fine.

I would keep on with swaddling as long as it helps her sleep. I weaned my DS off the swaddle and into a sleeping bag twice but had to go back to it again as his sleep got so much worse. (A number of my friends with babies seemed to make lots of comments about how theirs had been in grobags for so long and I felt like DS had somehow failed. At 6 months, though, he suddenly decided he didn't like it any more (although sadly he doesn't sleep so well without it).

Sleep does get messed up by developmental/growth spurts which can lead to more night wakings and being less easy to settle for naps. When my DS is working on a new stage of development I have to feed him to sleep for naps as things like rocking / the pram don't work.

Igglybuff is right, don't beat yourself up about the self-settling. My DS started to get the hang of self-settling for naps around 5.5 months, but now at 6.5 has forgotten it again. Feeding to sleep is a wonderful tool IMO!

Ignore what everyone else says and only worry about things if they are really causing you a problem (not if other people think they are a problem IYSWIM).