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Sleep

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Original poster

8Wk old baby unsettled at night - fighting the swaddle/wind?

13 replies

babyox · 22/08/2006 21:33

Hello there.
Have already posted this on the behavioural strand before I spotted the 'sleep' strand...duh, shows how sleep deprived i am. Have agreat DS who is 7 wks 3days - 12lbs. Generally all well and he's a happy little soul. He feeds well usually 7am, 10,(sometimes 12) 2, 5,6 during the day and has 3 naps - around 9am (for 1 hr) 12ish (for 2hrs) and again at 4 for an hr. he used to fight sleep during the day and get horribly overtired but now recgnise the cues and either take him for a walk or stroll him round the apartment to help him snooze. We put him to bed at 7ish...and he usually goes down without bother...settling til around 10.30 when we wake him for a bottle of breast milk. Until recently this worked and though he wld wake twice in the night for feeds he was reasonably settled in between. For the last 10 days he has been very un settled between midnight and 6am. Though not crying he's whinging, I can hear him frustratingly writhing in his swaddle...struggling against it until the point where he kicks out of it....then its either reswaddling/pacifier/feed.Trouble is when unswaddled he doesnt really settle and thrashes around everywhere. Dont think he's getting any real sleep...and neither am i. We thought it may be wind but i think he's now hating the confinement of the 'super swaddle' as DH calls it. It's like he cant live with it can't live without it...hate to see him so frustrated in the night and dont know wht to do...help please!!

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Waswondering · 22/08/2006 21:35

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

wellsie · 22/08/2006 22:09

Bite the bullet and put him a gro-bag. DS hated being swaddled from 7wks so gave up and put him in his gro-bag. Still fights sleep at night - see my other thread but at least he doesn't look like he's going to bust a blood vessel trying to get out of the swaddle. Sad to think thats that bit of the baby stage over with They grow so quick. Good luck

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:15

I was wondering how effective your swaddle is. I swaddled my dd up till she was 8 months old. The key is to make sure both arms are straight when you wrap. If the elbows have a kink, no swaddle is tight enough. Also start with your blanket in a diamond shape and put them in as tightly as possible. You can never overtighten a swaddle.

trying2bgood · 22/08/2006 22:21

My dd2 would fight the swaddle so I did move them to the sleeping bag, and that did improve things. However, saying that i would first check your swaddling as kidee says, my first loved being swaddled and only fought if I did it badly!

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:34

link on swaddling unfortunately, the website that had really helpful diagrams is no longer available, it seems, on one of the links. the DR Harvey Karp book mentioned has the diagrams and is an excellent baby book on the 'fourth trimester' and how to keep you sanity.

Waswondering · 22/08/2006 22:36

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:40

\link{

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:41

nope, read this post at the bottom there is a of the 1st post is a description of how to swaddle.

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:53

i found it! buried in the bottom of one of my MN posts from last year!

mmmmwwwaaaahhh! I love myself sometimes.
how to swaddle

kiskidee · 22/08/2006 22:54

its in some foriegn language but go down to page 3 for the diagrams.

Original poster

babyox · 01/09/2006 01:14

hello there.thankyou for all you responses and apologies for the delay..full on as you can imagine. Bought a bigger swaddling blanket that is harder for DS to kick out of and seems to be doing the trick...though he still tries to kick out of it as he goes off to sleep he's not as frustrated through the night and for the last 3 has gone through til 7am without a feed. Yeeehah! fingers crossed and thankyou again

OP posts:

KJS1974 · 08/01/2010 23:56

Hi - I have been searching everywhere for a solution to the tough time I am having with my baby at night and the original post here exactly describes my situation. My son is the same age, weight and almost identical feeding and eating pattern and we are having the same situation.. i realize the original post was a long time ago but would love to know what the outcome was and if there was any other advice. By the way the tightness of the swaddle with straight arms doesn't seem to make any difference - my husband is a demon swaddler and the baby still does the same thing. Thanks very much!

Igglybuff · 09/01/2010 12:31

KJ does your baby have wind? My DS does and it kicks in at about 3/4am where he's so restless. We stopped swaddling him as a result and try and burp him to help. He's also got reflux which makes him wriggle.

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