Are females more manipulative?

[meanmum]

I have just had a second child (daughter) and she is 6 weeks old. I created a really bad sleep habit with my son which I have managed to break without too many issues. I promised I wouldn't do that with child number 2 but am worried that I am creating another bad sleep habit, slightly different to my sons but not too much so.

I spent all morning this morning nursing dd in my arms as I fed her a bottle. Every time I put her down for a sleep, whether she was awake or had fallen asleep in my arms, she would wake up within 10 minutes screaming the house down. Actually a lot of the time she would wake up as I was transferring her to her bed and lie there awake until she got fed up with it and then scream the house down.

Because she's number 2 I'm much tougher in terms of her crying and leave her much more than I ever did with my son. The problem is she's started crying in such a heartbroken way I don't feel I can leave her. It's not just heartbroken but more she works herself up so much I can't see how she can put herself to sleep. I have left her in the past for 15 minutes before she fell asleep but she never cried like this then.

Basically, I was managing to get her to go down in her bed and fall asleep while she was awake. Yes she complained and wanted to be held but I could resist. Now I don't feel I can. I'm wondering if that is because I feel guilty about having treated my son so differently. Ds was bf and dd is bottle fed. Ds always fell asleep on the boob no matter how I tried for it not to happen. I don't want dd to become dependant upon us nursing her to sleep or just nursing her all day which seems to be what she is doing.

How do you cc a 6 week old who doesn't understand at all. How do I calm her down when I've tried and it just doesn't seem to work (honestly). Should I just let her scream until she exhausts herself or what?

Reason for the title is I always thought girls were more manipulative than boys and I don't know if this is prejudicing my view as well rather than just being a soft touch like I was with my son.

Six week old babies are not manipulative. They cry because their needs are not being met, not to manipulate or make life difficult.

CC is not recommended for use with children under 6months, even by those who promote it.

Meanmum I had hoped to respond first, so that you could be warned to put your helmut on. This subject has caused a big debate in the past.

Personally I think 6 weeks is a little young for cc. I know you must be at your wits end, but try to remember that this will get better. I would just give her the comfort that she seens to want, even if you supply it in a sort of struggling & automatic fashion. In my experience it's the only thing that works with a 6-week-old. The routine can come a little bit later. (I followed Gina Ford, but implemented routine a little later than she suggested.)

As for your more philosophical question. . .I keep hearing that girls are more manipulative than boys but I haven't noticed it yet with my dd (she's 18 months old). At any rate, I don't think you'll see evidence of that at 6 weeks. This is a rough time, but you'll get through it.

Babies aren't manipulative and this is completely normal for a 6 week old baby. The first few months can be really chaotic as you know, but I think perhaps you need to adjust your expectations of your baby. I totally understand how hard it is as I have been there twice. It's sometimes easy to think of them as manipulative when you are exchausted, but they are not. They are just babies. I don't think there is a difference between the sexes. I just think there are different babies. My DD was a lot easier than my DS, but at 6 weeks they were not easy at all.

Unfortunately there are no recipes for getting small babies to sleep. She could be hungry, have wind, over-tired or just needing you. I think if you have a 6 week old baby who sleeps through the night, you have just been very lucky. Routine and the ability to settle themselves comes with time. Can you share with her dad so you can get a break?

I put my dd down alone in a cot when she was quite young but she was always happy to be there (and still is) she only ever maoned once or twice before thumb sucking and sleeping, in this she was much less trouble than my son who shared my bed for 4 yrs. Both were breastfed.
I cannot imagine leaving a baby of that age to cry no matter what the reason, it is too young IMHO
All she knows is warmth comfort food and cleanliness, she cannot provide herself with any of that, the more secure she feels getting all her needs met the happier she will be to sleep alone. I overwhelm my daughter with affection, mostly sloppy, she goes to bed to get away from me!
Good luck

Thanks everyone. You're right about cc not working for a 6 week old. I've never been big on reading loads of childcare books so I didn't know whether you should or shouldn't do it at a certain age but I did wonder how you explained to a 6 week old what you were doing and why.

Today she seems much better (so far). I've put her down this morning with no issues other than a couple of squeaks to see if I would come and get her. I know yesterday she was in a bad cycle because she was over tired. Trying to make her understand that the more sleep she gets the happier she'll be just doesn't work!!!

What's really strange is that at night time when she does sleep well I can put her down after her feed while she is awake and she will put herself to sleep. It's only during the day and evening that she wants to be held to sleep. I don't have a lot of stimulation/noise going on while I'm feeding her during the day so I don't know whey the difference.

OK, at least I know I'm not being a bad mum by nursing her and continuously feeding her (she drinks in excess of 8oz more than is recommended each day). She never vomits the milk up so I figure she must actually want it and the hv said it was OK to feed her this much extra if she wasn't vomiting it up.

I need to get over my preconceived notions of girls being manipulative as that isn't fair on dd and you're right they probably aren't any more so than boys.

I don't think girls are more manipulative, just cleverer

Meanmum, I hope you don't take this as criticism but I wonder if maybe you didn't feel valued as a girl child yourself. It just seems very odd to me personally to have such a negative view of female babies when you are female yourself and I wondered why. And also if there are other reasons apart from bad sleep patterns as to why you want to bring her up differently to your son (again, please don't take this as an attack - I can understand you might be feeling fragile and sleep deprived right now). It is IMPOSSIBLE for a six week old baby to 'manipulate' anyone. It really upsets me when it is assumed that they can. They can't manipulate you because they have literally NO IDEA that you have any thoughts that are different to theirs. My two year old son still cannot really understand that I can't see things that he can see (and vice versa) so if I ask him to show me a picture in a book he holds it up so HE can see the image. When his grandma phones he shows her things by holding the phone up to them! If a two year old is so bad at seeing things from an adult perspective, imagine how limited a six week old baby is. When she cries she is signally distress/hunger/pain/whatever - she cannot begin to imagine or comprehend in any way at all that you might feel guilt/worry/fear/love/whatever as a result. It's as impossible for her as getting out of her cot and flying around the room. She has quite a strong need to be held atm. I don't believe in sleep habits at six weeks old personally. I'd suggest you hold her as much as is possible and practicable, and that you get a sling if it helps and don't stress yourself out worrying about habits with a baby so new.

meanmum, what everyone's said already makes loads of sense to me. a 6-week-old has spent so little time out of your body where everything just appeared without her having to ask for it and where she was 'held' all the time. I can really understand why they want to be held as newborns. I was very very soft with my dd, she usually slept on me or dp in the day and in bed with us at night until she was about 2 months old then I started to gradually transfer her, swaddled, into a moses basket by the bed. In the day I let her sleep wherever she wanted which was usually in the pram or on my breast. She started sleeping in her cot in the day and at night by 6 months without a problem and was sleeping through the night by 4 months old. Just lately, for the first time, as you'll know from my thread that you've contributed to, I've hit my first EVER real problems with her. So all my soft touch didn't do any harm as she's had a year of excellent sleeping habits. Whether her current problems are to do with her being a girl is something I've never even thought about. I know a lot of mothers with boys who've had a lot of sleep / separation problems. The cliche I've always been told is that girls are more independent which would seem to mean they are less manipulative. But I honestly think it will totally depend on the character of the individual child rather than the gender. And I agree completely with aloha that a 6 week old is incapable of being 'manipulative'. I'm not sure yet that my 18 month old is ever being what I'd call 'manipulative.' I thinks she 'tests' now more than she did, but that's all.

It's funny but sometimes now I really miss the newborn phase when you can cuddle them all day! Remember how precious these first few months are and enjoy them.

This might sound strange, but have you tried the hoover? When my dd was that little, sometimes the hoover was the only thing that calmed her down. That, or sleeping atop the washer when it was on spin cycle!

I did the same as you Evita, slept dd in our bed until she was 6 weeks old, then transitioned her to a cot in our room. Let her sleep where she wanted too in the daytime, so she was near me. Whether it was the sofa of moses basket downstairs. Then when she was about 3 months old I got her sleeping in her cot in the day time and started a bedtime routine at night. But did everything gradually and gave her plenty of cuddles so she knew I was there for her. Then put her in her own room at 5 months and she slept through at 6 months and has been a good sleeper since.

Obviously with a bit of a hiccup recently, but she's over that now.

I think meanmum just needs some support and probably a good nights sleep. Just relax a bit, I know you are probably trying your hardest as you say you don't want to make the same mistakes. But things will pan out and fit into place given time. I know that sounds very patronising, but it isn't meant that way. Good luck, I'm sure things will be fine

meanmum, I had some similar issues with my dd2, who is now 15 weeks. We had some very difficult times with sleep with her big sister, and were determined not to go the same way with dd2. When she was 5 and 6 weeks old I felt that I needed to train her to go to sleep on her own rather than by being cuddled or fed. I had a really miserable couple of weeks trying to get her to do this, and it failed completely--she just got more and more upset as I repeatedly tried to put her down awake. I only started feeling better when I relaxed and decided that cuddling to sleep and sleeping on me was fine for now. Then at about 9 weeks I noticed she was sleeping loads better, and started systematically putting her down to sleep after only a few minutes cuddling/feeding, whether or not she was asleep, and it worked. She's now really good at getting herself to sleep, sometimes with a few minutes crying, sometimes with none, and she also resettles herself pretty well when she surfaces. (She doesn't sleep through the night, but I'm OK with that for now ...)

Apparently babies cry the most at 6 weeks, and their differentiating of wakefulness from sleep only really gets established after 6 weeks, so now is a time to just get through as best you can. Good luck. It gets easier, honest (as others on mumsnet told me when I posted about this a few weeks ago!)

Thanks for your messages everyone. I didn't take offence at anything as I was really asking for everone's opinion so I could weigh it up with what I was thinking in my head (but probably didn't convey properly on mumsnet).

I have a niece who used to be very manipulative and a right little minx but she has turned out to be a fantastic child (7 years old). I don't know why I thought girls were manipulative as I'm not overly and I had a wonderful upbringing. I suppose it's just stuff I heard where boys were simple and girls were difficult but all the mums with girls seem to say they are simple too.

I have to admit as well to being a really meanmum as poor little dd was actually ill when she wasn't sleeping well at all. I obviously didn't find that out until the day after I intially posted this when she had a terrible cough which I had obviously passed on to her. Since the cough and cold have come out she is sleeping in her normal pattern and life has returned to normal.

I suppose it's also those comments you get from other mums which aren't meant to be anything other than a passing remark but which you read so much more into. We have a very close network of friends with children the same age as ds and they have obviously all been very helpful but make odd comments now and then that fester in my mind.

My bad habit with ds is that he had bottles in the night time (I know it's not good for his teeth) until recently. I broke him of the habit a few times but we reverted back to the bottles in the night time for one reason or another.

I was just hoping to get her into a good sleep routine earlier than 2 years but you are all correct in saying cuddle her as much as possible while I have the opportunity. I'm enjoying it so much more second time round as I know how quickly this period passes.

Funnily enough a couple of the mums that have made comments about me holding her so much have actually looked after her at odd times and as soon as she squeaks they pick her up.

Anyway, thanks for your advice and feedback. I'm not even considering controlled crying and holding her as often as I can and refusing to feel guilty about it.

Good for you meanmum, though as I've said somewhere else you don't seem like a mean mum to me at all!