Day and Nights mixed up

[KB1989]

My 4 week old baby has suddenly started being wide awake from 8pm til 2/3am. Is there any way of changing this? My boyfriend goes back to work soon so can't expect him to stay up with her like he usually does. I'm not a great sleeper. I can't lie in or nap during the day so i physically don't have the energy to stay up that late with her. I do the night feeds and get up with her in the morning and my boyfriend stays in bed

That is a very long time for a small baby to be awake, usually their wake windows are about 45mins/1 hour at this age (from memory!)

Babies do get day and night confused to start with but they do grow out of it.

What is keeping baby awake? What are you doing to try and soothe baby to sleep during this time?

Yea, so she is getting herself overtired so it makes it harder to get her to sleep. We have tried lots of different things:
•bedtime routine including a bath and feed and similar times each evening
•white noise
•Keeping her awake a bit longer before her bedtime feed.
•Shortening her afternoon naps
•Giving her one big feed before bed time
•Giving her her smaller feeds more often during this time hoping after one she will soothe herself to sleep.
•Putting her in her cot half asleep
•Rocking her in my arms (stood up and sat down.)
•Lying her next to me
•Swaddling
•Going out for a walk in the pram
•Going out for a drive.
•Try to keep as calm as possible so she can't sense my stress
•making sure she knows the difference between day and night by keeping the lights on and making noise during the day and quiet and dim lights on an evening

Nothing seems to work, like I said I'm not a good sleeper and I can't nap during the day so I'm just exhausted 😴

At 4 weeks I wouldn't mess with her naps during the day - they need as much sleep as they can get. You might find that it's stretched too far and she's not sleeping because she's overtired.

Has she got a dummy? That helped mine with settling.

Oh bless you, it sounds like you’ve tried lots!

In all honesty, there’s not a great deal you can do. Just let baby sleep when they want, don’t withhold feeds (feeding on demand or whatever it’s called these days!) and be kind to yourself.

I could never nap in the day and it was awful. But it did pass!! Even if you can’t nap, rest.

It is worth remembering that baby having difficulty sleeping/no routine is normal at this age. It’s bloody hard work but you’re doing an amazing job