New poster seeks advice!

9 replies

TeamC · 23/05/2006 17:32

I'm mum to 8 week old Jessica, who is an absolute joy etc etc BUT I would welcome advice from you experienced people on multiple sleeping issues!!!

The main issue at the moment is that Jess tends to fall asleep whilst I am breastfeeding or during winding, but as soon as I put her down in her Moses basket, she becomes wide-awake. This means it can take anything from one to three hours to settle her at bedtime and when she wakes in the night. She sleeps in stretches between one and five hours (usually three to four hours) once she actually falls asleep so I am not hideously sleep-deprived, but would like to shrink the time in the bedroom and extend my day out of pyjamas - we tend to spend 12 hours in the bedroom to get 6 hours' sleep! Bless her gorgeousness, she is rarely a crier and tends to ask for food by grizzling and chewing her fists.

So ... any tips on settling her? Should I put her in the Moses basket whilst she's awake and try to settle her there? If so, how?

Thanks in anticipation :)

OP posts:

Britney · 23/05/2006 17:50

Don't know whether this will help you but the best advice I can give re: sleeping is get her into a bedtime routine as early as possible. With both my kids (now 5 & 2.5 and generally great sleepers) bedtime has always been around 7pm. When they were little, they would have a bath at 6pm, followed by a feed, then bed. I would sing to them until they were visibly getting drowsy and put them down.

Good luck

SoupDragon · 23/05/2006 17:52

Um... pass!

At (her) bedtime, I feed BabyDragon to sleep lying down and leave her in the middle of my bed. Then I transfer her to the basket. Sometimes it takes a while to get her to go to sleep at bedtime (I just go back in and feed her ome more!) but she doesn't stir when I transfer her.

During the day, she goes to sleep like a dream only to wake up as soon as my bum hits a chair with a hot cup of coffee though. She's, um, 15 weeks or so. 16 weeks probably.

lorna3586 · 23/05/2006 18:38

Sit back and whatch her before trying to fix her crying. If shes quite jerky with her arm movments this usually means shes tired so try wrapping her up in a blanket nice and tight with her arms tucked in so they dont wave around and put her on your shoulder dont jiggle her or pace around just stay quite still and slowly pat her back and shhh her quietly then place her slowly in her moses basket, put your hand in front of her eyes so she cant see anything...this will help her fall asleep. I wish i had done this as my sons now 8months old and doesnt have the abillity to fall asleep without being fed. Also she could be waking up because her moses baskets cold and shes used to your body heat...try putting a hot water bottle in the moses basket for a bit to warm it up obviously take it out before you place her in it. Good luck hope you find this useful.

EmmaKB · 23/05/2006 18:59

My 8 week old is sometimes hard to settle in his basket. I find he settles better when swaddled. I was a bit unsure about swaddling and the whole overheating thing but I bought a special swaddle blanket which is very thin. This seems to work most of the time.

lorna3586 · 23/05/2006 19:28

yes swaddling is brilliant with new borns as they cant control there arms yet so when there arms start waving about it frightens them abit and just makes the crying escalate. yes just use a thin blanket to swaddle jessica in. hope all goes well

Original poster

TeamC · 23/05/2006 20:05

Thanks lots for your advice. With new resolve, I have just put her to bed - this is the first time I've started the bedtime routine before 9.30. I don't want to count any chickens :) but it only took 45 mins to settle her - I wonder if this is when she's most tired so it's just the right time to put her to bed, and she was over-tired before??? Anyway, fingers crossed, I'll let you know how I get on. It's so useful to hear your opinions, thanks very much indeed :)

OP posts:

lorna3586 · 23/05/2006 22:39

Did you manage to get her off too sleep without the breast? Ive just started the pupd method with my ds tonight so far hes woken twice. Its going well so far....

Original poster

TeamC · 24/05/2006 20:56

Started well - she slept for 3 hours until 10.45. Unfortunately, she then took 3 hours to settle again and only slept for 2.5 hours after that; then two hours to settle for another two hours' sleep ... and that was it!
So not feeling great at the moment. But determined to stick with it, and am going to enrol DH's help on a more active basis (rather than just sympathetic noises!).
She's gone down again at the new bedtime tonight (7pm), only took half an hour to feed and settle, so that's good. But not optimistic about the night! Oh well, no pain no gain ... or something :)

OP posts:

lorna3586 · 24/05/2006 21:42

Hi team c, have you had a look at babywhisperer.com/smf? I was given it by someone on another thread and its brilliant i had a look at the pupd method and there are many different ways of doing it. Obviously you cant use the method on babies younger than 4months but they do have a way of getting younger babies to sleep without the breast. I think its called the shhh/pat method. You swaddle the baby nice and tight and pat and shhh basically what i told you to try but there might be abit more info about it on the website. Its day 2 for me on doing pupd on my ds and he just got himself off to sleep by himself!!!Its a miracle, and this is a baby that just 2 days ago was feeding up to 9 times a night and couldnt get to sleep without the breast. So i think its definatly worth having a look at. good luck, im sure tonight will be better. Can i ask how you have been getting her to sleep? as in when it took you 3hours?

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