3 week old apparently nocturnal?!

[Superunknown1]

Posting looking for advice if anyone has any!

Baby is almost 3 weeks old, starting to have more wakeful periods of the day - however these tend to be at night. 🥲 He’s been asleep all day today, so super zonked-out that he has had nappy changes he has barely woken from.
In the past week he’s become a lot more active at night, and won’t sleep unless it’s on me which obviously isn’t safe as there’s only so long I can stay awake with him over my shoulder or on my nap!

Tried bathing before bed, waiting until his arm goes floopy and then putting him in Moses basket, but he wakes straight up. He seems like he’s asleep sometimes, then he starts making funky grisly noises and wakes up.

Any ideas appreciated! He’s perfect in the day but spends most of it sleeping, but at night it’s getting tricky!

Try and encourage him to be awake a bit more in the day. Make sure he's feeding well in the day. They sleep about 18 out of 24 hours at that age, you want as many as possible of the wake hours to be during the day and the sleep hours at night. There's not a huge amount you can do other than gently nudge them in the right direction.

So during the day you need to have him in a room with daylight and daytime nosies like the radio/tv, hoovering etc no tip towing around. At night you need to dim the lights and be much softer and quieter. Be consistent and he will get the idea!

Completely normal - I know it’s not helpful but this is what tiny babies do. He will figure it out - lots of time outdoors and exposure to light in the day. Keep it dark at quiet at night. Me and DH used to take shifts sitting downstairs with baby asleep in our arms while the other slept - we found it was the only way we got any sleep in the early days. Maybe this is an option for you?

While you’re in it, it feels like it’ll never end and you’ll never sleep again, but it does get better, promise!

Thank you for all the advice 💕 It’s massively appreciated. Will get him out in the garden tomorrow for a bit, our living room isn’t the most naturally lit room so may start opening our curtains more (we have bad neighbours who look in so they’re usually shut). Tonight have done his little bath, a big feed (9oz of formula and some boob for comfort after). He was awake for a bit so I told him a story with actions, holding his hands and feet etc. so kept him engaged and now he’s on my lap in bed while I wait for my chance to pop him in his basket.

i think it may also not help that he’s not in is basket much at all even to sleep in the day, he tends to get held. So may be crap for him being expected to sleep alone at night?

No advice other than you're not alone... currently cradling my 2 week old trying not to fall asleep. He also wakes up as soon S he's put down anywhere!

Have you tried swaddling?

Dont have a radio or TV on around a baby, it prevents their language development, it just relegates human voices to simply being unresponsive non-interactive back ground noise

Dont have a radio or TV on around a baby, it prevents their language development, it just relegates human voices to simply being unresponsive non-interactive back ground noise

It’s perfectly fine for OP to watch TV while feeding and cuddling her baby or while her baby sleeps. I was stuck on my bum feeding mine for hours and would have been bored stiff without the tv to alternate with a book. If it stunted their language development in any way then thank god it did, I dread to think how I’d stay sane if they talked my ears off more than they already do.

It’s pretty normal OP. Shattering, but normal. It does improve once they start to work out the rhythm of night and day. You can help them like PP say, but it’s also developmental. Also, don’t beat yourself up that you’re holding him too much. My second would quite happily sleep in her basket from day 1, but DD1 absolutely wouldn’t be put down asleep (or awake!), night or day, despite my best efforts. Holding her wasn’t a choice, it was that or she screamed.

If you’re worried about falling asleep holding him then look at the safe bed-sharing guidelines. I really didn’t want to do it with DD1 but the lack of sleep was becoming dangerous and it was far better to choose to do it safely than to do it in safely through exhaustion.

Congratulations on your baby, you sound like you’re doing great.

Congratulations! It's pretty normal to feel they are nocturnal. It's also worth looking up the fourth trimester. The idea is that they may be out but still very much attached to you. You are their safe space, your heartbeat is familiar and comforting in this new big world. They will get the hang of day and night. With my first my husband and I worked in shifts, so he took til midnight, then I took over.

9oz seems a big feed. My lass is 6 months and takes a 7oz feed.

Congratulations.

As above said you need to make day times, normal life even when they are alseep. And nights the quiet time. But being only 3 weeks old, this is going to continue for a while yet. They will start changing soon but babies just don't sleep! It's exhausting. And their patterns change often.

It's not about how much milk they consume.. 9oz is a huge feed for 3 week old. My 1 year old that's walks has 8oz max. I'm sure it's about 3oz at newborn stage.

Congratulations

Completely normal and unfortunately you just have to go with it. I promise it gets easier.

I have a 10 week old DD2 and she's just slept from 10:15pm until 3am. So 5 hours and was 2 hours over her feed.

Had her milk and had a wake window of 1.5 hours and has fell back asleep.

About to try and do the transition back to the moses basket😂🤞

Lots of good advice here. Equally though babies are all different and the magic bullet for one baby, won't be for another.

Google dr Harvey Karp the 5 S's. Swaddle, suck, side, swing and shhh. Supposedly, if you do this, then you tick every box, and baby will sleep 🤔.

You're also right about being held all the time. A baby who falls asleep in arms will expect to wake up in arms. Imagine falling asleep in bed and waking up in the garden, it would be quite confusing. However, this is the third trimester, and babies want to be held and get great comfort from it. The 5S's are a good way to recreate that for baby. I used a swinging crib with mine, swaddled (you can get these great swaddle bags), switched to a dummy and swung the crib gently while shhhing. It worked very well. It wasn't 100% reliable.

Hang on in there and take it in turns when you can.

Thank you the the advice everyone, it’s very much appreciated as the run-up to night time is starting to get quite anxiety-inducing unfortunately. Will definitely get curtains open, regarding feeds the 9oz is definitely a lot but multiple health visitors have reassured me and told me that basically the bottle should always have some left in after he’s fed- so if he drinks 9oz then that’s the amount he needs: he was born 9 pounds 12 ounces so a big fella and strong to boot! Was another issue I’ve encountered, I wanted to exclusively breastfeed but can only pump about 2oz a session so he’s definitely getting through some formula! The massive feeds he had msybe 3 of in 24 hours, interspersed with small feeds of 3-4oz x

However, this is the third trimester, and babies want to be held and get great comfort from it.

Fourth. ;)

3 weeks ago he would have slept most of the day because your movements and the sound of your voice, heartbeat and tummy swishing soothed him to sleep. He was snuggled up in your tummy being held 24/7. He probably got more active just as you settled down at night and had some sort of rave in your tummy.

Human babies are likely born 3 months premature due to the size of their heads and the shape of our pelvises due to walking on 2 legs. This is why the first 3 months are known as the Fourth Trimester.

So this baby, as with the vast majority of newborns, wants all the things they had whilst inside you, not to be alone, flat on their back, in a Moses basket. Night time will be dark and quiet and therefore time to be awake.

Mine had the addition of 2 sets of night owl genes so would never sleep before midnight. Once she cracked nighttime sleeping it was midnight till noon, which actually suited me. A baby that goes down at 7 and wakes at 5 wasn’t for me!

They're meant to wake regularly for lots of reasons so I’m not sure you’ve got reasonable expectations here!

Are you judging your ability to breastfeed by your ability to pump? These are not connected. I struggled with pumping but fed two babies perfectly well. Young babies are also programmed to feed more at night. Breastmilk becomes thicker and more nutritious at night, compared ti thinner and more fluid during the day. Just saying this as I didn't want you to feel you needed to supplement with formula unless you need to for other reasons or want to. Agree with others about getting out and about in daylight. You could also look into safe co-sleeping.

Health visitors do indeed have extensive knowledge around infant feeding.

9ox of formula is a lot. At 3 weeks old regardless of birth weight, baby’s tummy is still very small.

Look up paced feeding for bottle fed babies for further advice.

Maybe try him on the hungry baby formula if he has that much.

You sound like a really lovely mum @Superunknown1 :)

Only one thing to add - if you have a garden and while the weather is nice, try spending time in it every day with your boy.

My tip is to try and get him to fall asleep in his basket, rather than fall asleep on you and then transfer. I did what you're doing with DS1 and he never, ever learnt to settle himself off to sleep and would wake up whenever I put him down like your baby is doing. With DS2, who is now 6 months old, I've always waited til he's sleepy and about to drop off and then put him into his basket at that point. I then play white noise and he settles off to sleep. It then avoids the waking up when he realises where he is and he sleeps SO much better than DS1 ever did.

However, I will say that I don't think I started doing this til he was about 4 weeks old. For the first few weeks I did just let him sleep on me, then graduated onto having him on the bed next to me (hubby went into spare room at that point) and then at about 4 weeks I started putting him into basket while still awake. Your baby is so young you can gradually work towards what you want in stages!

Input on feeding advice was from health visitor and also midwife, as I asked when we took baby in to have the blood tests for rare diseases when they ask how many dirty nappies baby has in 24 hours. It is a massive amount for a young baby j agree, but as he was having a lot even at the point of that appointment and as he was only just getting back to birth weight they weren’t worried, I think he’s just a strong big baby honestly! Trust me I’ve tried smaller feeds but he gets upset if he isn’t full after his feed. 😬

Curtains open and will try and tire him out with excitement when he’s awake in the day today.

With regards to breastfeeding/supply etc. I’m sure my body would manage it supply wise if it was my choice of feeding (it was initially but quickly realised I’m not cut out for it mentally) so pumped and bits of breastfeeding topped up with formula is how I’m doing it.