Help - our new baby sleeps in the day but something changes in the evening - what to do?

[newtoitallmummy]

Can anyone help us with ideas to help our new baby sleep in the evenings? Our little one is only 2 and a half weeks old however she is a very contented baby generally, and has consistently been happy from her feeds in the middle of the night through to early evening since she was born. She feeds and naps well during this time and seems to have adopted a fairly consistent three hourly cycle of feeds during the day without the need for much guidance from us.
We have read the baby whisperer book and like the idea of the EASY three hourly routine they describe as this seems to fit our baby?s predisposition so we have been following this with her. However from after her early evening feed around 7 or 8 she does not want to settle to sleep at all and for the last few days has been staying awake for hours crying and crying ? last night she did not actually get to sleep until around 1.30am - obviously she is terribly overtired.
We have tried putting her down straight after a feed and also after a bath. We have also given her a little time to see if she will settle herself as she does in the day but she just gets really worked up and upset. We have been swaddling her and rocking and shushing and patting her like the book suggests however although this might lead to a break in the crying she will not go off to sleep. If she does calm down long enough for us to put her in her moses basket she starts up crying again shortly after and goes straight back to the stressed out level of cries. We have left her to cry for five or ten minutes to see if she will settle herself but she just gets more and more stressed
I know its early to expect a baby to get themselves off to sleep but we want to know what we can do to help her - especially when we know she goes off to sleep on her own in the day for her naps.
Tips? Advice? Help?! Thanks!

How often are you feeding her in the evening? My DS happily went 3 hourly from a young age, but cluster fed loads in the evening (literally pausing for 10-15 mins before demanding another feed) until he was 5-ish weeks old. I figured he was making up for the long gaps during the day!

My 2 Dcs seemed to take a few weeks to get the whole "day" and "night" idea. You have to remeber that although we know it's 1.30am bby has no idea what time it is!!
My midwife did advise more shorter gaps between feeds during the day and that would give longer nights?! But they both seemed to settle into their own (very different0 routines.
ow are you feeding? FF or BF, could you try co=sleeping? A friend of mine swears by it

Also, try not to get too caught up in what the book says, xx

when the baby is inside you,s he is lulled to sleep by your moving around, and wakes up when you stop; ie, when you go to sleep at night.

It just takes a little while for them to adjust, but she will soon settle into her new routine.

And I second not taking too much notice of the books.

Hi, congratulations on the birth of your dd. The first few months are extremely tough, but they do get easier as time goes by.

'However from after her early evening feed around 7 or 8 she does not want to settle to sleep at all and for the last few days has been staying awake for hours crying and crying ? last night she did not actually get to sleep until around 1.30am - obviously she is terribly overtired.'

I'm afraid it sounds more like she is obviously terribly hungry. It seems impossible I know but babies are programmed to cluster feed in the evenings and the best thing you can do is not fight it, but sit on the sofa with snacks, tv remote, phone, novel and feed feed feed feed, - OR lie in bed and do it. It is EXTREMELY important that you do do this as you are currently building your supply (assuming you are bfing) and your hormone levels are set in a way that makes this whole thing happen in the evening (unhelpfully I know).

Please listen to your baby and don't try to interpret whether they are tired or their needs. They managed to satisfy their basics biological needs in the womb.

There is time to get them into patterns and when they become a bit more involved and engage in the world around them then it can start to be argued that they might need help to 'fit' into it.

But for now, just feed whenever she looks like she's about to start getting grizzly.

hth

oh, gosh, I totally forgot to congratulate you on your new baby!

congratulations

Hi - my DD is 3 and a half weeks old, and we had this exactly - but as the other posters have said, it was definitely hunger, and I now feed feed feed her in the evenings from 8ish until 10.30 ish - pretty much every half an hour. I do it in the bedroom, with a book, and she is much much better - very relaxed and calm - just cluster feeding (so glad when I found out she was normal!). We found it far less stressful just feeding her rather than trying to shoe-horn her into a 3 hour routine that doesn't work for her in the evenings. She's on a four hour routine during the day (her choice - she's a big baby!).

No idea how long she'll carry on feeding like this in the evening, but I feel far more relaxed now I know what it is, and she is far more relaxed now she's getting the food she wants - I found myself for the first few days thinking 'she can't be hungry...', but she was!

Good luck with it all.

Thank you all for your good wishes and helpful positive responses! Yes I am bf and it is going well so far in that she has regained her birthweight and is putting on weight well. I am feeding more frequently in the evenings but I will certainly try to take the cries more as hunger than tired and keep feeding her as you suggest. Like you say I just want to know how to comfort her the best

Sounds like you're doing fantastically. Tough though isn't it?

You probably need to (And will) find a strategy that gets you more sleep. I used to go to bed pretty much when my DH came in and he would bring the baby to me for feeds and then take him away again. I'd get a few 20mins slots of sleep that way which all helped.

Eventually, I expressed and my DH would protect me from one or two feeds at this time so my sleep became longer periods.

I would always take over at midnight though, so my DH could get a decent 6 hours before work, but on the rare occassion I would give up and he would take the baby away.

I hope you have support. It's invaluable at this time.

my new baby is just 3 1/2 weeks old but is my 3rd so I kind of knew what to expect this time round! Doesn't make it easier though, it's all very tiring, but this time round I'm not strssing in the least about the sleeping - this time will pass - I seem to remember that at around 6 weeks things start to change and you'll hopefully notice less, or shorter periods of sleep through the day and longer stretches at night.

Forget about routines just now, and please don't leave your baby to cry -she's so tiny and she needs you! This is like a 4th trimester...let her feed as much as she wants, cuddle her, co-sleep, do whatever it takes to get through this part.

It's all a shock to your system, and you will come through the other side, I promise.

Congratulations, btw!

we have a 3 week old who has a similar thing: nights where she just won't settle and screams and screams and screams. we try to feed (bf) when she appears to want it, but she then vomits the whole feed up again. we have had 3 good nights, but tonight (and a few other previous ones) she has basically been awake from 5pm onwards. she may fall asleep, but 5 minutes later she jolts herself awake and screams and screams.

we just hope she isn't doing herself an injury.

Congrats on your new baby!
I haven't read TBW myself, but I do recall that some other, very seasoned mumsnetters have advised caution regarding her bf advice. I know she talks utter cobblers about bf in parts, ('quencher' milk??? what?) and for some mums and babies, following her advice would actually bring about an early end to bf. Certainly a 3 hourly routine would have diminished my supply and caused a premature end to bf. Many, many babies need feeding more frequently than this (although some are fine obv!) and cluster feeding is how they build up your supply in the early weeks. A MN poster called Tiktok is the first and last word in all things bf, she is a breastfeeding counsellor with NCT and her knowledge is enormous and faultless. If she has concerns, then you can be sure something is amiss. see here and here

Please don't let anyone worry you about picking up / cuddling / feeding / rocking your baby 'too much' - it is not possible. If your baby is telling you she is stressed, then trust yourself to respond the way she needs, and just cuddle her and / or feed her until she is comforted. Some babies need that reassuring closeness with their mummy and simply can not fall asleep without it.

Good luck, and let us know how you get on!