New mum........at wits end already!!!

[MummaLamb]

Hi, I am a new mum, DD 3 weeks today! Attempted to introduce a version of Gina Ford that works for us (to the letter is too strict I feel at this age). The problem I'm starting to have is at night. DD is just about moving to 4 hourly feeds (bottle not breast) and during the day naps and wakes quite well and is very alert when awake but at night she won't settle, struggles with wind, and refuses to go down unless she has a cuddle and the last two nights she'll only sleep in with me (not a habit I want to encourage). Can anyone offer any advice on how to structure her sleep better so that she goes down earlier than midnight and after feeding, goes back to her own bed. I'm desperate for a bit of sleep.

My advice is to just go with it and really don't worry about bad habits and the like. She will change so quickly, do what you need to do to get sleep, even co sleep if needs be. In 4 weeks time it will all be different again. It is hard enough without beating yourself up because your baby hasn't read the books!

Congratulations!

just throw the books away (or at least put them away where you can't read them) and LISTEN to your baby.

Do whatever it takes to make sure you are both fairly well rested - give her lots and lots of cuddles and if she sleeps with you, GREAT!

you will have loads of time to establish routines - in fact, she will naturally fall into some kind of routine that is right FOR HER, and you can then tweak it to make it work for both of you.

It is NOT a battle of wills, or a race to get into a routine. Try and relax a bit and enjoy it all...

things change SO quickly over the next few weeks and months

oh and congratulations - babies are magical, exasperating, frustrating and gorgeous all at the same time

Gina has never met your baby.

Sure, some people find Gina works and their babies settle beautifully into little routines. My dc1 was very routine led, absolutely nothing to do with me he just did it. Dc2 was entirely different and still doesn't sleep through the night at almost 3 years old!

Your baby is just 3 weeks old, she is still trying to work out that she is a separate entity from you and is wondering why she feels hungry sometimes when she has spent the past 9 months absorbing nutrients 24 hours a day, being walked around and cocooned 24 hours a day, hearing your voice and your heartbeat 24 hours a day.

Routines are fine if they work for you but if they are just making you more frustrated then step back and see what does work instead. If she needs a cuddle to go to sleep then do it, is itreally that bad? What harm will a cuddle before bed do? I still give my mum a cuddle before I go to bed if I'm at her house, it doesn't mean I still need her to sit with me while I fall asleep.

If you don't want to co-sleep then perhaps take a look at the No Cry Sleep Solution book, it is great for understanding a bit more about your baby's sleep cycles and had some really good tips for gently encouraging babies to fall asleep without having to feed to sleep etc. Don't worry too much though, it sounds like she settles really well in the day so it will come at night too. Remember though, babies change all the time and when they have growth spurts (frequent at this age!) or go through developmental leaps you often find that all their sleep and settling skills take a small holiday, gradually thoguh you will get there.

Thank you so much for your messages. I just don't want her getting into ny bad habits that will take an age to get her out of. I don't want to make her a perfect baby, even though obviously she is!!!, just help her settle into this big, strange world.

What defines a bad habit, if it works for you go with it. Being a new parent is exhausting (as well as truly wonderful of course ), try and make things a easy for you and your new baby.

And I agree....chuck the books.

Congratulations.

Tried reading Gina Forde and after having 4 children was amazed that babies actually slept when you wanted them and were only hungry when it fitted the routine! These are little babies ,all very different and cannot see how anyone could just push them into something so rigid. Go with your baby and as she gets a wee bit older you can gradually move her into a routine that suits you both :)

Congratulations on your little one. It can be hard when you have a baby who wont settle at all in the evening but I think many babies are like this in the early days. A lot of babies seem to 'wake up' around 3 weeks and no longer just drift off to sleep by themselves easily like they do in the first couple of weeks. My ds was like this and a lot of others I know were too - but they did all settle down when they were a few months old. In our case it was when he was 8 weeks. He went from being up and down, unsettled all evening to going to bed at 7 or 8 (I did feed to sleep - a 'bad habit' that was a godsend and that DS dropped by himself without me needing to do anything). The change happened over the course of a week. We didn't do anything different to what we'd been doing before, he just grew up a tiny little bit and was more settled. I also know a few babies who had day and night mixed up around this age and that too sorted itself out. I think it's just babies settling into life...it's exhausting but it does pass and you could drive yourself crazy trying to 'fix' it when time will most likely take care of it for you. I would try to get as much rest as you can when she is napping and trust that this is just a phase (a tiring, frustrating one) that will pass in a short time, even if it feels like it's lasting forever right now. Keep going with the routine if it feels right for you and your baby, but try not to stress to much about the evenings not happening the way the books say they should. She'll get there by herself soon.

Thank you so much to you all for your supportive posts. I'm learning to just go with it. I feel better and I'm pretty sure my baby does too.

Hi mumma - my ds just 3 weeks and all over the shop but he's my fourth so I know this phase will end (I remember with ds1 I was despairing). Agree with all the advice to chuck the books (especially Gina ).

I stressed lots with ds1 about my lack of order and routine and that I should have I one and didn't (friends seemed to) but at about 4 months he found his own groove and I've found the other 2 have been the same. 3 weeks is very young - loads of cuddling required - you really can't spoil them at this age.

Agree with everyone else. At that age i rocked, cuddled, fed, drove, walked and slinged my DS to sleep and he has absolutely no bad habits or sleep associations at 11 mo. Settles and sleeps brilliantly for 12 hours now. I also co-slept till he was about 12 weeks because he too was very windy/ refluxy and wasn't comfortable on his back, so he slept on my chest and we all got some sleep - magic!

But i do remember those early weeks very well and thinking i had to get into a routine. DS got into his own routine when he was good and ready and was very unhappy with me trying to force it. As soon as i ditched the books and listened to him we were both infinitely happier.

Congratulations! Enjoy the cuddles now, they're gone too soon.

Throw away the books and go with the flow. If she's still sleeping on you when she's 18 then you need to worry xx

Hi there and congratulations.

I'm going to be the one to disagree on the not using books because I know I found them very helpful and reassuring. To be told 'not to worry and go with the flow' (as I was at the time) didn't help me, it made me more stressed - because I'm a bit of a control freak.

I think Gina's books work well for these kinds of people - while at the same time remembering that your baby needs to be treated as an individual as well. So I took the basic sentiment from her book (regular feeds, good naps during the day but not excessive sleep and a good bedtime routine) and made the rest up as I went along or trusted my own instinct. That's what worked for me and my LO, but everyone is different. No-one is right or wrong.

Agree with you. I found ginas book very helpful because even if you don't follow it to the letter it helps give you an idea of how much sleep they need and when they should roughly feed etc.