Advice and maybe sympathy too please

[finecheese]

Hello, my DS is nearly 6 months and goes to bed at 8ish sleeps for exactly 45 mins then wakes and screams for 1.5 hours. He will only go back to sleep if I cup his face while he's in the cot. Then he'll drop off and wake at 1am, then 4ish then 8ish.
I know this does not sound too bad but finally I'm at breaking point, probably due to lack of sleep. Last night had massive row with DH who can't understand why I have cried three evenings this week and said I quote "he's a baby what did you expect it would be like" and "this is supposed to be fun for us all".

I just feel tired adn stressed at the moment. Does anyone else feel like this and do other women cry sometimes too out of sheer exhaustion and worry that it will carry on for ever?
Thanks xxx

Huge waves of sympathy all round, I remember this stage. Those of you whose DCs are 20 weeks or more, starting to wean might well help (especially if they had been sleeping well and have now started waking again) - best advice on that I got was to give mashed potato mixed with milk (formula or breastmilk if you've lots) mid-afternoon. Don't start solid feeding at bed time or you'll have a windy baby, apparently.
Other thing that's supposed to be good is to get out for an hour or so in the afternoon (even if you feel like S**T) If you're not managing to get dressed, just yank on coat and boots over pyjamas, stick baby in buggy and have a little stroll. Can be ever so relaxing.

Hello Tibsy and Cruisemum,

Just goe back from my mums from the night and DS was great and super all day, went to bed at 8 and then work at 9ish and went hysterical! I cna laugh today but honest to god last night I didn;t know what was up - basically he got confused and wanted home I guess. Mum was super calm though and I ended up putting him back on the boob (stopped feeding a week ago) and somehow he managed to drag some milk up from the depths and drop off..Phew! I totally know what everyone means about the worrying. Always thought I was a chilled lady, but rambled on to my mum for hours about bloody routines, too much food, not enough, is it my fault he doesn;t sleep blah blah.....maybe the moon is just in the wrong place and and we;re all a bit wobbly this week....Hope you and your babes all have better times toniight xxxxxxxxxxx

madam - yeah, the weaning thing. I have started weaning but not to get him to sleep just becuaes the boy is hungry! .You got any good weaning tips? My dd is 9yo and I cannot remember a bloody thing about weaning her!
finecheese -pmsl at your conversation recount with your ma. My Ma has been here for two days and I sound like a woman posessed! Raging on about napping locations/duration, weaning, sleeping, routines. The woman must think I am on the brink of a nervous breakdown . Thankfully MN has dragged me back from the edge and I have lived to see another day (albeit rather short on sleep....)
I wish you a long and restful sleep ladies

Cruisemum: what I was advised (and DS alive, thriving and eating a pretty good varied diet at age of 2.4) was to start with mashed potato mixed with milk given late afternoon, then after a week or so of that, try another mashed veg late afternoon, then the next week try a bit of baby rice with milk in the mornings, gradually working up to 3 'meals' a day depending on how ravenous your LO is.
Oh, and jars of baby food. Once your DS is accepting spoonfuls of gloop, even if you are lovingly hand-preparing most of it, try him with the occasional helping of Hipp Organic or similar, so you know what he'll accept if you are somewhere you have no access to a kitchen if you get my drift.

madam - thx 4 that. I am getting cnonfused over milk feed during all this. ds waking thru the night and feeding so he is not wanting much milk in the day. Utterly bewildering and making me feel overwhelmed . Making such a hash of things i feel. yuck

hi finecheese, sorry to hear your little one was upset. they certainly get to like their routines dont they? glad you can see the funny side now, its distressing at the time though. ditto with mum situation, mines eyes tend to glaze over now, although i do see her most weeks so after 5 months, shes probably bored rigid! hows the baby whisperer book going, any results when you've been at home?
madamez and cruisemum1, sorry to jump in but having the same prob re. feeding in night. dd was just waking in night for a nibble, but seems to be taking more milk since introducing solids (rice and pureed veg) more like a proper milk feed if you like. is she filling up on too much rice do you think? i know its harder to digest. m, did you give your ds a full milk feed before giving solids or half? or did you give solids first? spoke to hv at bfing support group and she said just a little milk to take edge off. any advice welcome please.

tibsy - confusing isnt it? i'm gonna ring hv today and seek advice as i am utterly confused with ds's eating/sleeping schedule rught now i will pass on wot she advises if you like.

that would be great ta! have just had leaflets sent through from mine, they arent much use at all, just says make it runny initially and thicken it up as they get older...probably not quite that basic but as good as, no guidelines as to what times of day etc

tibsy - this is what I do so far

started weaning at 19 weeks ds now 21 weeks

Week 1 - started off giving babyrice at around 4:30ish after bf
bf around 6:30ish before bed

Week 2 - bf around 4ish,
mashed veg (potato & carrot so far)
bf around 6:30ish before bed

Spoke to hv about ds not seeming to have enough milk during early part of day and she suggested that since ds is taking well to solids I could introduce another solid meal of pureed fruit/jar at lunchtime bf around 1pm. She said I should offer food first then milk after.

tbh I am still confused as I thought milk was more important than food at this age. You get such contradicting advice that it is no wonder we are stressed out and confused! hth

i feel so useless sometimes. i mean it cant be that hard can it? its not rocket science. just sat crying this a.m cos it seems one thing after the other at moment. everyone says something different and we're supposed to know whats best for our babes. ??? it seems a bit overwhelming sometimes and i thought i'd have it sussed having a 12 year old. most of ftm's at groups i go to seem more confident than me. sorry, just having one of those days i guess

tibsy - i am exactly like you and ended up crying this a.m. which is why i called hv. i even thought i had pnd this a.m. I am sure it is just self doubt though . the hv visited just now and was so very reassuring. she cant make ds sleep at nite but did make me feel better . i feel utterly stupid as i have 9 yo dd and have done this all b4 too. take heart tibsy. i am sure we are doing a fine job.

Tibsy and Cruisemum, it'll be alright, its silly that we all get sad and worried as I bet you are all the greatest mums. God, so wierd though as I have been thinking I am the only one with the low confidence. I go to mum and baby yoga once a week and although I love the strectching part, I come home feel all sad and anxious as I am the quietest there and all the other mums are being yummy mummy and acting like they all bloody know what they are doing and are fantastic at it - it makes me feel craaaazzzzyyyy.

It sounds like you're all doing great on teh weaning, I just think if you're baby is happy and contented and growing which sounds like yours are, then we must be doing it right xxx

Just wanted to add some extra sympathy as you can't have too much.

kathy and finecheese - thanku . if only dh were as sympathetic

cruisemum1, finecheese and kathy, thanks so much. feel better this afternoon cruise, sorry you had a crap a.m too and hope your dh bucks up a bit. finecheese you sound absolutely lovely and am sure your ds is loving the baby yoga. know what you mean about the yummy mummys tho, not too good for self esteem when feeling a bit of a dunce yourself (me, not you!)we ARE all great mums!

Awww, HUGE hugs all round. Cruisemum, sounds like you're doing Ok to me. I didn't BF (long story involving induction, beta blockers and flat nipples) but what I remember is aiming to schedule 3 meals a day and feed (in our case it was formula) milk on demand. I tried DS once or twice on babyrice at bedtime and he ate it but was then windy and reluctant to settle, then tried the mashed potato mid afternoon for about 5 days, moved on to mashed veg then, after about another 4/5 days, rice in the morning, then saw a different HV who said, oh if you've got that far, give him 3 meals a day.
Have just dug up a timetable of feeds etc saved on my computer from when DS was about 6 months and spending the weekend with my mum - roughly 6 milk feeds in 24 hours and 3 meals a day: baby rice/babyfood breakfast in a jar for breakfast, mashed veg (or jar of stage 1) at lunch time then the same at tea time. I always did food first, then milk, but he would have milk mid-morning and mid afternoon, roughly, when he seemed to want it.

Remember, when it gets too hard, the words of Roseanne - look, if the kids are alive at the end of the day, I've done my job. And we all survived various well-meant but completely mental parenting fads in our childhoods...
Best of luck.

mower - am considering sending dh into settle lo when he wakes at night armed wth bottle of formula - wish me luck!!! Are your nights still good?

cruise, hope you dont mind me butting in but thought it might be relevant as had a reasonable night last night. might be coincidence but dp was home earlier last night and so i asked 'read, begged' him to get dd to bed. she cried for 15-30 mins on and off, despite him walking her around and it took all i had not to race up the stairs and rip her out his arms, but she eventually went off. she woke after an hour at 8.45 but just shushed her back to sleep, did the same again at 10.15, then slept til she wanted a feed at 2am!! unheard of. she did wake again at 5 for another nibble then up for day at 6.30am, but that was a VAST improvement. may be the fact that she had organix banana and apple muesli for breakfast, petit filous yoghurt for lunch and baby rice with pureed carrot for tea plus usaul milk feeds, god knows, it seems to me its all hit and miss at the mo. have decided not to fret so much re weaning after going to bfing support group where a mum was letting her 4 month old dd suck on o ginger biscuit, she'd had about a 1/4 of it!!!