How to get newborn to sleep in crib

[dg93]

Long story short, baby is 9 days old and has been in intensive care for 9 days. Tonight we are staying in the hospital flat with baby, if no medical issues tonight we are taking her home tomorrow!

This is the first time we've had to settle her - how on earth do you get them to sleep in there cribs? 🙈

She had a good feed at 8:30, not allowed to feed her now until 11:30 (hospital rules, 3 hourly feeds)

We have white noise on
She is so happy asleep on us, put her in the crib and about 30 seconds later she starts crying. I've tried settling her in the crib after this but nothing is working 😭

Any tips/advice?

I generally think she's hungry but the nurses won't hand the milk out until just before 11:30 - it's breast milk, but they have it stored in the fridge - I tried to express more but they heard the noise of the machine and when the noise stopped they knocked on the door and asked for it, so they could put it in the fridge for later 😡 baby won't take feeding from breast (because we weren't allowed to try and feed her until she was 6 days old due to oxygen masks she was wearing)

Any help/advice welcome please!!! X

I'm sorry but it's ludicrous that they say you can't feed unless 3 hours have passed. That's not how feeding a newborn works. Could you try hand expressing or try putting her to the breast? Or just hold her if that's what she wants

@dg93 is there a hospital lactation consultant? My baby was in hospital also and they had consultants available to help with feeding for afterwards. Despite days on the bottle while in, he can breast feed now. Yes to the three hour hospital schedule also, now we've left he feeds every hour and a half. I found I could hand express about 40 ml at a time, or if you are in longer, something like a Haaka pump is silent

Oh also my baby really liked the tilted warm incubators - he's been home for a couple weeks now and still won't sleep at night in his flat cot. He does daytime nap in there but otherwise wants to be with/on us at night. Health visitor has promised this will resolve at six weeks when they stop mixing up days and nights

They don't sleep in cribs. It's all a huge lie. Anyone who has ever managed to get their 4th trimester baby into a crib is probably a witch.

You have to do shifts of sitting up with them and breastfeed a lot, could be every 30 mins depending on how long your feed time is.

Worry OP like PP I found it’s a massive lie they don’t sleep in cribs. I’d read about the 4th trimesters DH and I I took shifts staying awake with baby sleeping on us with Ds2 and dd. Lasted about 4-6 weeks before we successfully got small stints in the crib

How come you're only allowed to feed every six hours? Newborns should normally be fed on demand.

My son was premature and wasn't stong enough to feed from a bottle for the first month but I kept on putting him to the breast and eventually he got it so if you do want to breastfeed keep on putting her to the breast and she might just latch on.

As for putting her in the cot, I don't really have any advice. She's only ever known your warmth or the incubator so I guess that's why she's waking up when she's placed in a cold cot.

My baby has just started to sleep in his crib at 3 weeks old, so it is possible, unlike what PPs have said! But it isn't instant. I didn't do anything special, I just randomly tried him every now and then. That night I tried as I always do, after a feed, with him being sleepy, and like magic he stayed. I couldn't believe it. Now he's done 2 nights in there! After every feed he's now happy and must feel comfortable in there now to go back to sleep in his crib. Good luck. Like I said, it won't be instant, but one day your baby will hopefully feel secure in there and it'll just happen.

Keep offering breast. She will get it. Try and hand express a bit into her mouth. Also, she's your child and you have every right to feed her when you wish!

Thanks everyone! Successful night in the end, I managed to get her to lie in the crib for a few hours, with her eyes open the entire time! She wasn't crying or upset, just interested in looking at mummy and daddy and keeping us awake!

I know the 3 hour feeds are really frustrating, and I'd been asking to allow her to drink more milk, as if I was able to breast feed she could drink as much as she wants, but they weren't keen on doing it this way. It defiantly sounds like we're going home today so she will be able to drink as much or as little as she wants from now on! 🤩

We have someone from the breast feeding team coming to our house on Thursday to see if she can help us start breastfeeding. We had tried straight after she was born, but she was grunting and rushed to NICU, she wasn't allowed to eat anything until she was 6 days old, so we tried to breast feed days 6 and 7, she will latch herself but won't actually suck /drink anything so hoping it won't be too challenging to get her to feed properly as she is half way there!

Thanks again everyone, appreciate the honest replies as I always thought they slept in the crib literally straight away 🙈