Baby and sleep

[Hilda23]

Hi everyone
just looking for some advice/ reassurance from other mums who have had similar experiences.

I have a baby girl ( 9 weeks). Since birth she has not slept for long periods/ many hours and this has been consistent. I have had people tell me that their newborn sleeps/ slept all the time so they are ‘ a dream’ or ‘ Easy’. I read that newborns typically sleep up to 18/24 hours a day ( though I am aware this is not all babies and not all the time).
My LO has been exclusively breastfed from week 3- I had to triple feed initially. She has no problems with feeding at all and there are no issues with milk supply. No other issues. She has always struggled to sleep with only a few hours in the day and a few at night. One day she slept for 2 hours in total /24.
currently she will sleep for 1-3 hour chunks IF and only IF she is in a carrier or sleeping on my partner. Also, we recently started co sleeping and she will sleep for two hour chunks next to me. We had to do this due to sleep deprivation.

On a typical day:
baby will fall asleep at breast when she is tired . I try to put her down in the bassinet but she will immediately wake up OR will stay there for 10 minutes before she wakes up fidgeting or crying. She frequently wakes up having startled herself.
Baby will not sleep in her bassinet in the day or next to me at night.
I have tried to settle her by rocking, music, dummy, singing, hot water bottle to warm bassinet, background noise, no background noise, light room / dark room, massage, bath before bed at night, swaddling, car journeys,
walks out in the pram..
It gets to the point where she is so overtired that it is even harder to help her fall
asleep.
I put her in a baby carrier and go for a long walk and keep her in it at points in the day and she’ll fall asleep. My partner does this with her at night when she won’t settle next to me or in the cot.

I know that some of this is normal for newborns ( wanting to be close to mum, contact napping) but I am concerned at how little she sleeps and this has completely exhausted me as I struggle to get a free
moment. I have no family nearby so home alone all day.

does this get better ?

Newborn sleep can be quite unpredictable and that’s why we usually talk more about surviving during the first weeks.
Then, at around 12 weeks you can try to start stabilising a routine.
Having said that, you can foster some habits leading up to that stage to make your life a little bit easier by introducing a routine and good sleep hygiene.

From your text, it seems your baby is probably sleeping on the breast.
Coming from personal experience, you may also be misinterpreting your baby signs and unwillingly keeping her awake when she is tired (by feeding, playing and stimulating her instead of putting her to bed)
You can try following an Eat Pray Sleep routine or E.A.S.Y (Eat, Activity, Sleep, Your time)
Try to keep your baby awake during nursing sessions. You can tickle her hands, undress her, talk to her, etc to make sure that she is having a full feed, which can take up to 45 minutes.
For 9 weeks, usually the wake window is around 60-90 minutes (including the nursing time). So, if your baby wakes up at 9 and nurses for 40 minutes, maybe it will take only 20 minutes before she starts showing sleep signs (yawning, not engaging, sucking fingers, irritability, etc.) By 10:30, though, she will be overtired and it will be harder to settle her.
Pay attention to your babies signs and once you notice then, try to put your baby to sleep. Take her to her room, swaddle her, close the blinds, speak quietly, sing a lullaby… create this small ritual that helps her settle and understand that it’s time to sleep. You can try putting her on her crib and settle her by patting and shushing (you can see how to do it on YouTube or read Tracy Hogg’s books to understand more about it).

Newborns do want to stay close to mummy, so I did allow my baby to sleep on the carrier during day naps up to 3 months, but I drew a line when it came to the night, as both co sleeping and sleeping on the carrier/sling when a parent falls alkeep can be dangerous for the baby.
So even if it took me lots of attempts to settle her, I would be consistent.

Good luck!