Advice needed

[kbaby]

wonder if anyone can offer some advice.
DD is 8 weeks old and has been a terrible sleeper. She is really bad at naps, and will only sleep on you[she wakes not long after being put down]. occasionally I can get her to fall asleep on her own in her moses basket but she will only sleep 45 mins. she was ok at night time ie going down and only waking for feeds. Over the past few weeks her night sleep has been getting worse. She goes down ok but wakes after 3 hours, from there on she is constantly restless, shes not quite awake but makes loads of noise and thumping about etc. Last night she was like this from 1am until 5am where she decided she was definetly going to wake up. This means that she only had approx 4 hours of proper sleep.
ive added up the total she sleeps for during 24 hours and its really only
6-7 hrs at night and 2 hrs during the day most of this is broken into 1 hour slots.

Do I ignore the restlessness and wait for her to cry before I feed/do anything?
Move her to her own room and hope that without me there she drops back off to sleep? what do I do if she doesnt?
Take her out of the moses basket when she starts getting restless and see if I can rock her back off to a deeper sleep?

I'm no expert at all but just a few things that you might not have thought to think about if you get my drift...

what's the temperature like in the room? Could hs ebe too hot/too cold?
Is the moses basket big enough?
Perhaps she's just going to be a figgety noisy sleeper.
If she's in another room you might not hear the tossing and turning, you'll then stay asleep until she does wake up properly for a feed.

We were advised by the health visitor to move DS out of our room into his own for these very reasons. He was such a noisy sleeper (isn't now thank goodness) and I found it hard to tell if he was awake or just snoring! (okay, at 6 weeks it wasn't quite snoring but he did used to make some funny noises in his sleep).

Personally I would put her in her own room as that way you will get some sleep and can go to her when she needs a feed, rather than at every stirring.

I wouldn't get into the picking her up and rocking her as this will only lead to more trouble further down the line IMHO - others may well disagree! It may be that she dosn't need a lot of sleep - some babies don't. However, she does need to learn to go to sleep and stay asleep on her own. I speak from experience as my DD also only ever napped for 40mins at a time (her sleep cycle) and only ever in the pram or car. It was only when we did CC at 18mths that she started napping in her cot at all and now goes down for an av. of 2hrs at 2.2yrs and sleeps MUCH better at night. I look back on the months we spent pushing her around and around the park for HOURS in all weathers, just to get 40mins out of her! I feel I made all the classic mistakes re: sleep and if I did it all again, I would do it very differently!!

HTH

Oh, bootsmonkey, we did exactly the same with dd - pushing her endlessly round in the pram. I think we were nuts now I look back. The moment we stopped pushing she'd wake up! I never had a moment's rest. But we got her sleeping in the cot at around 10 months so didn't endure the pushing for quite so long .

kbaby, dd was a very noisy sleeper at that age. From about 4am til when she got up for the day she'd do this horrible grunting noise. I used to wear ear plugs. She grew out of it by around 4 months I think. I can understand totally your concerns that your dd seems to sleep so little but if she's anything like my dd was then even though she'll be making loads of noise and shuffling around she's probably asleep at the same time. And in terms of thinking of 'proper sleep' imo newborns take a while to settle into having long deeper sleeps like we do. My dd is 21 months now and still shuffles round in her cot, talks occasionally etc. which still always wakes me up when I hear it down the monitor but if I've ever gone to check on her she's always fast asleep.

Sounds like my DS2, he's settled down now and, in fact,we've had a whole week of 12 hours sleeps this week. He's 11 months now....... (i.e. took a bit of time ) But...moving him into his own room did help. He seems to be a really light sleeper and I'm sure he would hear (or smell?) me when I came into the room. he also didn't nap very well during the day unless in the pram or car. I guess some of them are just like that. My SIl has an 8 week old and sdhe said to em the other day "You know when they sleep for like 3 hours during the day?" I said "No.... can't say I do" Good luck kbaby!

I'm no expert but can share what I did. However my DD was already a good sleeper, but she always slept in her own cot. Moses babsket inside cot then into cot when out grew moses babsket. Daytime naps I would play her classical music or Cd like chilled ibiza etc and would leave ona lava lamp at night.
Nothing amazing there just things you might like to try.

Have to say think picking her up and trying to get her into a deeper sleep really doesn't seem like a good idea as she'll just get used to be held to go to sleep and you'll make a rod for your own back.

If it was I'd ignore restlessness and only go in if she was really crying.
Have her in her own room.

dd1 was a poor sleeper during the day until she went to nursery at 7.5 mths, when i returned to work. they got her into a routine for me and she never looked back. i've been much more of a routine person since dd2 arrived and it does work. is the bedroom dark? they have to get used to that feeling of falling asleep & all the associations with it - quiet, dark, warm and dry etc - the earlier, the better. 8 weeks is still v young. try letting her grizzle for a short period and then settling her again in the dark. we rocked dd1 to sleep most times she woke and in retrospect this was a mistake. friends who have twins were (obviously!) much less likely to do that and their girls went to sleep on their own much earlier than mine - and slept through the night v early too.

My DD was and still is a very light sleeper - so putting her in her own room at 8 weeks was as much for her as it was for us. I couldn't turn over in bed without waking her stir. She also did the grunting and farting in the small hours and if you looked in her cot her arms would be going like windmills, but she was still asleep. I of course was not...

I picked her up every time she cried as well - big mistake. Never gave her the chance to settle herself. Sometimes they cry as they are coming into light sleep and will go back down again of their own accord. DD never got a chance as I scooped her up at virtually every whimper and consequentially woke her up too.

I look back now and wonder what I was on!

kbaby - try and ignore the resless sleeping. Do not feed her at night until she is actually crying - babies move into varies levels of sleep and although you think she is not sleeping well, she probably is. You need to learn to switch off to the noises she is making. It might be that you just can't and therefore she perhaps should be in another room. I remember it did take me a while to switch off but I did manage it. Perhaps if you are reassured that you should just ignore her till she lets rip, then you might relax. Do you take her out for walks during the day? Will she sleep in the pram? Can you leave her outside safely in the pram if she is sleeping? I really think babies sleep so much better out in the fresh air but mums tend not to do that anymore. Where does she sleep during the day?

Mears yes I do take DD out in the pram as she loves looking around and then nods off to sleep really well. I have also started leaving her in the pram in the garden when we get back if shes still sleeping. Ive bought a insect/cat net that I put over the pram and leave her by the back door where I can see her. Ive done this once and she slept for 1 hour on her own.