High Needs Baby Support Group (thread IV)

[ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged]

Yoohooo! Over here!



The last thread was filling up so I've started us a sparkling new one.

The original thread was to support those of us with babies fitting the following criteria:

1. Feeds frequently daytime
   
2. Feeds frequently nighttime
   
3. Needs to be constantly held
   
4. Wont sleep alone
   
5. Hates the car seat/pram
   
6. Short naps
   

Some of our babies have grown out of some of those now, but we're still here to support each other through the sleepless nights and noisy car journeys and to offer hugs, chocolate and wine to anyone who's struggling.

So if that list sounds familiar then come and join us as we delight in our active, inquisitive, curious and restless babies or toddlers!

[zambooloo]

Hi everyone, I feel I need to apologise for my absence and ask if I can re-join? I am seriously crumbling here :(

Dd now 8 months and still waking every hour from 11 onwards AND wakes for the day at 4.30 or 5 if we are lucky. She sleeps perfectly from 6.45-11 so why oh why can't she carry on through the rest of the night?

Back to teaching ft on Monday - I think I might actually die from lack of sleep!

How is everyone? Sorry haven't read thread yet.

[zambooloo]

Sorry that was very me me me wasn't it?!? Feeling sorry for myself :(

[LittleWaveyLines]

Lychees - have you tried bouncing on an exercise ball? I find it's a bit easier - also Madame here hated most slings at the beginning except our stretchy wrap - but she loved them all by 6 months. Could you get to a sling meet or sling library to try some others?

DD - 12 till 6,30 am last night! Seriously, this is not my baby! So there is hope for all those with hourly waking babies - just wait it out until they're 14 months or so...

[LittleWaveyLines]

Zambooloo - could you change her hours so she goes to bed later (at the same time as you) and so then sleeps in later? I got DD to sleep from 9.30pm till 7.30 so we got the best bit of the night (a whole 2 or sometimes 3 hour stretch! ) when I could sleep if I wanted....

[ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged]

Just another three weeks to wait with DS then? Thanks for the hope LWL...

Zambo - you'll cope I actually found I had more energy when I returned to work and have been shattered over the holidays. For some inexplicable reason, I find classes full of teenagers less exhausting than DS! Just make life as easy as possible for yourself (double up lesson plans where you can, befriend peer assessment...)

Lychee - [hugs] Sorry, no advice, just hugs.

[daisylulu]

Hi ladies

Can I join please? I had joined the early wakers thread but our issues actually go WAY beyond that. In fact I'd love early waking to be our only issue!

DD is 16 months and I really thought things would be a whole lot easier by now....

Our background is - colicy as newborn, reflux, dairy/soya intolerance, extremely sensitive to teething/colds, will absolutely not self-settle, wants to be held to sleep, when does sleep ok is a very early riser, won't sit still, into everything, won't sleep in car, hates car seat/pushchair and is a climber BUT she is clever, funny, willfull, cuddly and loving.

I feel like I'm at the brink of losing the plot right now. DD is teething all four molars and sleep is absolutely hideous. Most nights she ends up in bed with me, with DH in spare room. I had always told myself I'd never co-sleep but there feels like no other choice. I hate to think of all the rods Im making.

I feel like passing ships with DH and I'm snapping all the time. We used to be so happy. I know sleep deprivation is used as a form of torture but is there ever a point it starts to feel like depression?

Sorry for the self-indulged post. I feel better for letting it out and am hoping, particularly when these teeth have popped through, I can offer some support to you guys on this thread too.

Thanks for reading!

[LittleWaveyLines]

daisylulu Welcome. Oh yes sleep deprivation merges with depression - and you end up crying lots... I really recommend chocolate and just lying on the floor with your eyes closed as they play safely nearby or on top of you..... I also think besharing is not making rods, but survival. People who haven't been there don't know! I have on many occasions in the past year actually hallucinated with lack of sleep so you have my sympathies...

Truth - it has been such a sea change! I haven't done anything differently - she's just all of a sudden stopped waking every hour or 2 for most of the night! If someone had told me this would happen a few short weeks ago I wouldn't have believed them... we are actually now talking about re-assembling the bedframe, thinking about DP coming back in the bed for the first time since paternity leave ended, and actually using the cot as a cot rather than for laundry storage!

[ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged]

[Hugs]

I've run out of Kendal Mint Cake now, but I did bake some berry flapjacks yesterday. Want some? Here, have a to go with it.

So sorry you're struggling, but you've come to the right place. Self-indulge away. We'll listen. We also love rods

I don't know much about depression, but if it feels like it to you, then I would say see your GP sooner rather than later.

If you don't mind me asking, are you at home with DD fulltime or are you working?

[ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged]

X-Posts.





That's flipping amazing. I hope you get to wake up next to DP soon



Ugh, any of the rest of you wasting the last day of your hols working? (Sorry for minor hijack, but I know there's at least two other teachers on here)

[LittleWaveyLines]

I'm still in denial re work and have done NO planning since the last few days of last term.,.... That's what tomorrow's INSET is for isn't it?

[ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged]

I know, would you believe our school has the audacity to actually run training tomorrow?! Pah. I've got my planning done, it's all the stuff I do for my TLR that I've neglected, and part of the INSET is about that so I kind of need to do it. I've just replied again to your other thread too by the way

[daisylulu]

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone

I work 3 days a week and DH works 4 days - work honestly feels like I rest and I do appreciate how lucky I am with our set up. DH is fab with DD but in the night DD only wants me and gets into a god almighty rage if DH tries to settle her

My employer provides an 'employee assistance program' which gives access to free counselling. I think I'm going to arrange some sessions. I think I'm exhausted rather than depressed but I think it might help to have a chat with someone who's paid to listen to me moan (I have had counselling in past when we lost our DS when I was 5 months pg. It really helped me out of the big pit of despair I was in at the time. On a side I wonder if that's in some ways why I'm struggling a bit now- I always thought that when I finally had a healthy baby I would never moan about sleep deprivation because I would appreciate every second with that baby - but I suppose life isn't like that and I need to accept being a parent is bloody hard work!!!)

It's reassuring to hear of the positive stories on here. I flit between thinking I ought to be 'making' DD sleep better to thinking there's nothing I can do until she's ready. We are going through the final wonder weeks so I think that's probably got a lot to answer for.

For anyone that doesn't know about the 'wonder weeks' there's a great app that tells you when your DC is going through a wonder week- I've found it often explains DD's seemingly random behaviour and fussiness.

Do you think these HN babies turn into exceptionally brilliant children/adults?! I do hope so....

[LittleWaveyLines]

"Do you think these HN babies turn into exceptionally brilliant children/adults?!" - of course they do! I was told I was one

[SpannerPants]

I was a HN baby too my mum says she's getting her revenge for me not sleeping until I was 3!

We've gone from DS not sleeping too badly to everything going wrong for the last week. Last night he woke every 30 mins and needed me to shh and pat to resettle him (until 3am when I caved and took him into the spare room), the night before he was awake for 3hrs in the middle of the night screaming with no obvious cause - tried everything I could think and in the end he just cried himself to sleep in my arms :(

DP wants us to try CC this week as we're on holiday - I really don't want to but we've been doing no-cry sleep solution since January and even before the latest set back he was still waking at least 3 times a night.

Welcome daisy - lack of sleep and depression are linked, in fact insomnia is a symptom of depression but I always find everything seems worse with sleep deprivation. I feel like crying all day after a bad night! It sounds like the counseling would be worth a go though?

LWL DS is 14 months next week, I'm hoping for a sudden improvement in sleep!

[daisylulu]

Thanks joyful and everyone else for your kind words.

Hmmmm candyfloss. Thanks !

Wishing everyone a peaceful night tonight.

[LittleWaveyLines]

I'll send him along when I've found him!