Help! Non sleeping newborn

[~Bec~]

Today DD has napped probably 3 times for about 20 minutes at a time which is pretty average for her. Is this normal? She is 6 weeks old today and fully breastfed. If she doesn't sleep during the day she does pretty well at night with a 5 hour stint and another 2 or 3 hour stint after a good feed. She's quite a perma feeder during the day and would feed for hours if she could. She has calmed down a bit with that, a few weeks ago it was quite normal to have up to 6 hour feeding marathons (on one occassion it was 9 hours!!). At best she feeds every 2 hours for about an hour to 90 minutes. Unfortunately this means that when I'm at home with both DD and DS it's very tricky as DD gets all my attention and DS watches way too much TV (when I'm feeding DD). I've tried slings, swings and a dummy. She insists on being held. If by chance she does have a day sleep it's usually only in my arms and will wake up the moment I put her in her bassinet.

When do breastfed babies start to fall into some sort of feed, play sleep pattern or at least become a bit more predictable? Gahhh, I'm so tired and worn out

[bookwormmum]

I have no advice because I am in exactly the same boat as you, but I know exactly how you feel.

[MicE]

Oh sweetheart take a deep breath. Most of us have been there. I was even at my nursing sister in tears when my son wouldn't sleep. My husband was no good so I took all the burden by myself. Finally a friend sent me a book called baby sense and after going through that things started easing up. A few things that I got out of that book.

Babies need a lot of sleep. At the age they should be awake for a max of about 45min - 60min. This should cover a feed, a wind, a nappy change and a cuddle. Then back to sleep. Too much stimulation causes cat napping so at this age try keep it to a min. At about 3 months you can start extending their wake time as they get more active but for Now focus on getting sleep routines in order. I can assure you if you put in the effort now it will pay off later. My son is just over 2 and he is so aware of the routine that as soon as bath is over the eyes are already closing.
Wake baba up at7am and make sure bath and bed is about 5-6pm depending when the feed is. Don't let her miss her day feeds so slowly wake her up for those and leave her to sleep at night.

This book also discourages long feeding. In otherwords an hour is too long and of course exhausting for you. Give yourself a cut off, in otherwords half an hour. Then burb and bed.

When baba wakes up, change, feed, burb then back to quiet area (although mid day sleep is encouraged in the darkened room but depending on your schedule) and cuddle till just before babas settled and slowly place her in cot. If she fusses stroke her and shhh a bit. If after about 10 sec she has not calmed down and is crying pick her up again but try not fall into the habit of waiting for her to fall asleep in your arms. This may take a few days but persevere. Try one sleep first to get used to the idea and move to other sleeps and soon she wont need you to do the work.

Then try the dummy again. We persevered for 2 weeks and when my son finally took it... OMG what a pleasure. Make it a sleep comforter though if you are worried about addiction to the dummy. In other words if she us not about to sleep no dummy.

Good luck and know you are not alone! There is no quick fix but if you put in the time now it will pay off in the long run.

[Merla]

Do you have any support? Friends? Family? Local community?

It's hard, but it is pretty normal. Your DD sounds very healthy and attached, feeding lots at that age is completely normal as is wanting to be held.

Have you tried an upright carrier like a hug a bub instead of a sling? My DD as a newborn hated the ring sling but would almost always sleep in the hug a bub.

Can you organize people to come over during the day and hold the baby for a few hours? I know it can be tiring to have people around when you have a newborn, but being able to have people who understand around who are more than happy to hold your squishy baby whilst you have a cup of tea (or a shower!) and a bit of space can be invaluable.

[narribri]

This sounds suspiciously like the 6 week growth spurt to me. What was her sleeping like before?

My T went through about 4-5 days of near-constant feeding and no day sleeps. It is very hard, but it will pass and take heart that she's sleeping well at night still.

[TeamAwesome]

This sounds suspiciously like the 6 week growth spurt to me. What was her sleeping like before?

My T went through about 4-5 days of near-constant feeding and no day sleeps. It is very hard, but it will pass and take heart that she's sleeping well at night still.

this all 4 of mine have done it, will also happen at about 12 and 18 weeks then 6 months.

[Faithy]

Hi, my 6 weeks old DD is EXACTLY the same. Yesterday she slept about an hour in total during the day, but did 5 hours and 4.5 hours over night. To be honest she's never been a great day sleeper but has gotten worse over the last few days. Perhaps it's the growth spurt effecting us all.

Luckily for us, and hopefully for the OP, she doesn't cry. Just lays there and plays or wants to be picked up, but no ongoing crying.

[flicker]

must be so tiring, especially with other LOs to look after.

My only question is, with the long feeds is she getting enough milk. I know my milk supplies were not enough for my ds at that age so he would try his little might to get as much out of me and was on for hours. it is then that i found i had low supply and his main problem was he was starving. on advice from the bf consultants i would limit feeding for 20 minutes on each side. then i had to give him a formula top up. he was a much happier baby once that happened and it allowed me to produce more milk.

just a thought.

[KSC118]

I could have written this word for word right down to DS watching tv. My DD is 8 weeks tomorrow but I am going through the EXACT same thing. No advice but I feel your pain. Hope it gets better soon.