Gina Ford Contented Little Baby - please can I have your opinions/experiences

[Jack2601]

I have posted another thread on here very recently due to nightmare night times and touched on this, but thought I would start a new one as am desperate for replies.

After almost losing the plot this morning after a week of little/no sleep due to DS not settling at all between 7pm and 7am I have decided that I am going to give the Gina Ford routine a bash.

My DS is 10 weeks old (although 3 corrected) because he was 7 wks prem. He has gained weight brilliantly and now weighs around 7lb (getting him weighed 'officially' on Tuesday). I am going to start at the 2-3 weeks old baby routine due to corrected age and I would really like to hear your experiences or opinions. I know that it is not for every baby, but I am so shattered I want to at least give it a try.

Thanks for reading.

Firstly it sounds as if you need to look after yourself as you are really exhausted and not get too stressed by what anyone says about your baby on an internet forum! Try to rest whenever you can, not worry about anything else other than you and your baby if you can and get other people to do jobs for you, including look after your baby whilst you nap.
Lots of people find GF really helpful although people interpret it differently, whether it is using the general principles or following it to the second / minute (think this is a personality thing). I think if it clicks with you then it may just be the thing. Her general principes such as not letting the baby stay awake too long are really useful (my first baby was awake for about 8 hours howling fairly regularly until a GF friend pointed this out!)
as people have said the 'baby whisperer' approach is a bit less prescriptive.
And the carrying your baby around / co-sleeping type stuff is softer still.
Which ever you go for i expect your child and you will be just fine in the long run. Don't be forced into doing anything you are not comfortable with just becauase someone or a book tells you it is the right thing. Don't worry about what is the right or the wrong thing, do what suits you as a person and you will be comfortable with it. If GF suits you that's great. And remember that although it seems like a long time off now, in a coupe of months things are bound to have improved.

I really want to thank everyone for taking time to reply. I think I shall give it a bit of a go, purely to follow nap/feed times just to see if it settles DS, obviously I can't promise Ms Ford that I shall eat my cornflakes by her timings!! I have spoken to hubby about it and I think that at the minute because I am so shattered and weepy his would support me if I thought taking DS bungee jumping would settle him!! He is incredibly helpful and supportive but I have (against his protests) been doing the night feeds/night settling/wakings etc by myself because hubby is back at work and his job is really stressful, I can't worry about me, DS and DH all at the same time - I really would go insane!!

I'll pop back on this thread in a week or so to let you know if I've gone routine-friendly or my head has exploded!!

Hi Jack

Apologies if you have done all these things but these were sleep 'cues' used with our two which worked.

• Dh's t-shirt in cot for familiar comforting smell - the more 'worn' the better.
• Warm the moses basket with hot water bottle before to make it warm and cosy - remove hot water bottle before putting in baby!
• We always used to put baby down asleep; they are not old enough yet to self-soothe.

-Although not particulary pro-dummy, dc1 was a sucky baby and it helped him nod off.

DC1 prefered sleeping on our chests in the evening and would go to his moses basket when we went to bed. DD would happily go down in her moses basket in our bedroom at 7ish but would wake again for a feed at about 10/11.

Because your ds is prem, I would also still have him in your room personally, as you can sometimes just soothe them back to sleep or just drap an arm over them and they are comforted. Once they start going for long stretches of sleep then I'd move them. There are also theories of how listening to your breathing helps baby sleep/prevents SIDs.

One aspect of your post also caught my eye - you said your milk never came in. I had similarish problems with very late milk which can be linked to an underactive thyroid. Just wondered if it would worth getting yours thyroid levels checked?

ooo yeah hot water bottle in moses basket - we thought our mw was off her rocker when she mentioned that but it seemed to work for us with dd. If notit gave dh something to do while i was getting up to feed her!

Good luck. Let us know how it goes.

Just wanted to add that you and your baby have had a really tough start. Being in scbu is traumatic for both of you . He may need a bit of extra care and reassurance and that may also be why he is so unsettled. It is tough and exhausting but I think you need to remember that you've both been through a lot and so things may take a bit longer to settle.

Hi jack

My DS was born in November and after a week of not having a clue what I was doing and getting very stressed in desperation I went out and bought the first book I laid my hands on which happened to be GF. Her routines have saved my sanity and my DS is a very contented little baby but I do know routine is not for everyone.

IMO it could be for you if you want an owners manual like I did, to tell you what to do and when, because I hadn't a clue what my DS really needed or wanted as I didn't know him well enough at the beginning.

Whilst the GF book is very prescriptive after following it quite rigidly for a few weeks (and yes I didn't really get out and see people during those weeks, but I was feeling so stressed and didn't want to anyway - not because of GF as she gave me hope) I then was able to tweak the routines to work around my DS and our days.

As a first time GF mum I have lots of other things to say on it but won't go on anymore - if you want to talk more about it let me know and I can e-mail you. HTH

ChocOrange05 feel free to email me, I would be really interested in what you have to say as I am giving GF a go. You should be able to contact me, I've adjusted my profile email settings.

Thanks.

I couldn't take seriously advice from someone who told me when to have breakfast and what to eat for it. I think it was "8am one piece of toast". I might want yoghurt and a banana this morning, thank you.

The usable stuff in the CLBB is just common sense you can work out for yourself in seconds if you just trust yourself to respond to your baby. He's crying after being awake for three hours? D'oh, needs a nap. You really don't need a book to tell you this.

Far better to trust your own instincts and get to know your own baby and their patterns. All babies are different. My DS1 was a nightmare to get to sleep as a baby but drops off in seconds at five. My DS2 self soothed and could fall asleep only on his own until he was two. At nearly three he can now take an hour to go to sleep and screams blue murder if we leave when he is awake. So I really, really don't buy this myth that what you do when they are babies sets their sleeping patterns for ever.

GF totaly destroyed breastfeeding for a friend of mine who did it. as she tried to feed in the routine given, and as gina ford doesnt really know her stuff on the bfding front, she doesnt get that you cant routine feed a bfed baby exclusivly, and no one has the time to express as much as she says too.
i however bypassed gina fords feeding ideas and bfed exclusivly for over a year.
however, she does have the sleep timings right i feel. ie nap's at the correct times, and bed time at 7pm. however...i am not a big cry it out fan.. there are better ways imo to get baby to sleep.
good luck with whatever you decide!

Gina's great. There are a lot of opponents on here, and I have to say you need to take from it what works for your family (eg world won't fall about your ears if you haven't eaten preciely 2 pieces of toast by 7am, and frankly the idea of being showered by then was never going to happen!).

Maybe it is not down to Gina, and maybe it was just the case that my children would have followed those sleep times of their own accord, but the sleep routines worked a treat for both of mine. Neither slept through the night by 12 weeks ( going to a different time zone at 10 weeks probably didn't help) but the day time routines seemed to be written for them, and their night sleeping definitely improved.

Final caveat, I didn't express etc, just bf, so again didn't follow The Written Word, but the sleep routines were fab for us.

I followed it and it worked very well. I did think that the nap times that she suggested were just the times that a baby of that age would naturally want to sleep, I don't think she was coming up with anything new!

We could still leave the house because ds would sleep in his pushchair, I actually preferred to stay at home though and it gave me a useful excuse to avoid certain people.

Well, that's what she says herself really - the sleep times are based on the babies she has worked with, and she noticed the times that they were more likely to need sleep etc and developed the book around that.

I think when you feel desperate it helps to follow somebody elses advice.Doesn't matter whether its GF or BW etc.

definitely don't think its a good idea to follow something to the letter though as some DC's have a mind of their own,and don't respond so well to routines.

IME/IMO Most do though.I used bits of GF,and bits of BW.Definitely would recommend BW though as she has a more gentler,hands on approach.

Good luck

Jack2601 I haven't read the thread as I know how GF threads tend to go however I will say I was in the same position as you when my DS was 8 weeks and at my wits ends over the evenings, I read GF and implemented her evening routine which was feed 5pm, bath 6pm, feed 6:30pm bed 7pm. The first night we implemented it DS slept 7pm-10pm instead of spending the evening being grouchy on our laps, I could have cried with relief.
I tried to implement the daytime routines but our DS wasn't interested and he is still having a 10pm feed and 5am feed at 9 months It wasn't instinct I need someone to tell me what to do with the evenings and it worked for us. All I can say is give it a go and see if it works for you, but if it doesn't it's not a failure on your part it's just your baby is not the routine sort of baby.

As daft as this sounds - and it may be a complete fluke, but we tried the GF feed/bath/bed routine on Saturday night and last night. However, we didn't put him down awake, he fell asleep having had a cuddle after his feed (which is going against GF's grain). On Saturday DS slept from 7pm-9.30pm when he woke up for a feed. He then woke at 1am and 4.30am but was totally settled and asleep in between.

Last night he slept from just after 6.30pm - 10pm, again waking for a feed. He then fed at 1.30am and slept until 6am!!!!!!!!!! I couldn't believe it. I was actually awake from about 5am though convinced that there was something wrong with him because he was so settled!! The day routines are going a bit tits up, for example, because he was fed at about 6.15 this morning, he was not interested in any kind of top up feed/extra feed at 7/7.30 (obviously) but was then hungry at 9.15, which I would expect. However, if I can sort his naps out in the day it may (she says tentatively) just work that he is more settled between his feeds at night....................maybe.....hopefully.......

I would let him guide you (within reason) during the day,and guide him through early Evening and night-time,as when he has his growth spurts,he will want to feed more frequently,and you will want him to do this during the day and not Night-time preferably

Sounds like he is going great guns at Night already,because normally it may take up to a week for some babies to respond to a "change".

Glad things seem to be getting better for whatever reason

Glad you're having a better time with your DS.

You have to do whatever works for you, DS and DH. Your health and sanity are just as important for DS. I am thinking of getting the book for some tips as well.

I really believe that a happy mum = happy baby.

I dunno whether getting better is the right phrase - may be he just knackered himself out all week and needed Saturday/Sunday night to catch up on his own sleep - little tinker. He is probably very refreshed now and ready for another week of nocturnal activities..................... God I am dreading the evening, if I think about it I actually want to cry!!

I followed GF (still am) but I did cuddle my DS to sleep for the first couple of months before following the BW advice on encouraging him to self settle.

But why does everyone think that if you follow GF then you must leave them to cry? Ive NEVER left DS to cry and she says several times in the book 'if hes hungry before the times given then feed him'.

However I think her tone is annoying and her advice on breastfeeding I found terrible, the timings were good which is what I took from it.

worked for us! It seems that most babies/toddlers that are not good sleepers are the ones that are not in any kind of routine, but as ever, it's different strokes for different folks

Agree with moomer....different strokes for different folks and no mother should be made to feel guilty or ridiculed for trying to find a way that works for her and her family.