HELP! He's been awake for 6 and a half hours

[jessieb90]

Help! My 6 week old has been awake for 6 and a half hours with the expect of 2 x 10 min "naps" when I natively thought he'd gone to sleep!

I would go for a drive but I'm shattered and don't think it would be a good/ sensible idea and we already went for a walk in the pram about an hour ago. Any other tips please!

Is he upset? What normally gets him to sleep?

Is he crying?

My DD is 5 months old now and apart from the first 7/10 days she has never napped longer than 30 minutes. We regularly have days of 2-3 10 minute naps. She’s a very content baby and very rarely fusses.
Unless your LO is crying constantly and seems fine in them self I wouldn’t worry

Hi all,

Sorry I eventually managed to get him to sleep (or should I say my partner did). He wasn't crying constantly for those 7 or so hours he was up but he was fussing for some of them as I think he was overtired and then needed feeding at a few points!

Is there anything that got your LOs off to sleep?

Hiya, my eldest was a tough baby to settle. I always found the baby carrier really helpful. Sometimes when my son was having a rough day, we'd have a quick bath together to break the tension, then try again. Some days after fighting me all day, he'd collapse onto his dad's chest the minute he got home. Singing really helped calm him down and helped us reset a bit. I sang inch Wincy spider so slowly I drove myself crazy but it really calmed him.

Have you tried dark room, swaddled, white noise/music, feed to sleep and/or rocking?

I'm sure you guys will figure out what works for both of you soon. Try not to stress, they're changing so much at this age that no problem is permanent.

Good luck!

Ahhh we had so many evenings like this in the early weeks! We ended up on a drive a couple of times in desperation but what ended up working for us was rocking / bouncing in the dark in a baby carrier with white noise blasting on YouTube. It won’t be like this forever, promise! My 5 month old goes down for the night now with just a dummy and barely any fuss... did so from about 12 weeks. Hang in there!! You’ve got this mama x

White noise or if that failed standing up 'dancing' or at least swaying with some of our laidback songs on and singing to them- worked everytime for ours. Also I found a bath helped to calm them if they got really upset with themselves and then whilst drying afterwards we did some baby massage and cycling on their legs in case of any trapped wind.

Is there anything that got your LOs off to sleep?

The 5 S's of newborn sleep:

○ Swaddle
Giant muslin is an ideal swaddle in this weather. Or half a cot sheet.
○ Sucking
Dummy
○ Sideways
Cradle hold, facing you or away from you, head above stomach
○ Swaying
Keep baby in same position relative to you. Sway your body. Bouncing works too.
○ Shushhhh
White noise do the same as shushing

Thank you all so much. All the suggestions are super helpful and just been singing hush little baby over and over again for the last 20 mins - oh and ordered a white noise machine. Did any one have issues if their LO getting off and sleeping for 10-15 mins before waking again? So nice to know this won't last forever x