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Still having trouble with independent sleeping

I know he's only 10 days old, but I really hoped by now he'd be settling a bit better. At night we're lucky if we get an hour unbroken of him sleeping on his own. He's a little better during the day and will generally sleep for 2 to 3 hours at a time. I'm starting to lose it now!
Just wondered if any of you could share any tips to try and get his body clock in tune with ours, as I could cope if he slept at night like he does during the day.

H and LJ xx

Replies

  • Hi H. I know it goes against some recommendations but we don't really put Matilda down properly in the day. She tends to nap in the lounge where there is obviously a bit of light and a bit of activity (we do go back on this if she is clearly very tired and we will then put her in her darkened nursery properly). At about 7pm she has a bath (which she hates but I am perserving in the hope that she will soon love it and it associate it with bedtime). I then feed her in our room in her pjs, in the dark and put her in her moses basket. I feed her again about 10.30, really quietly and she generally sleeps until about 3am.

    It's really hard to get them to realise that it's night time, isn't it? I have to say, this does not work every day but we are sticking with it as the days it does work are brill!

    Hope he settles soon X
  • Mmmm. Reply not showing...
  • Us too renri!!

    Grace will usually have one decent sleep from about 8.30pm-12.30am but after that we're lucky to get her down for more than 45mins-1hr by herself so I'm inevitably giving up most nights at around 4.30am and taking her into bed with us for a couple of ours just to get more sleep. In the day it varies - some days she'll sleep for an hour or 2 in her basket or pram but others (like today) she'll only sleep if cuddled. Were currently keeping her with us day or night and I've not noticed her being affected by light or noise - if anything I think it soothes her to know she's not on her own. Apart from being shattered I'm not too worried as she is gradually getting better at sleeping by herself (she wouldn't sleep on her own at all for the first week) and I did find swaddling helped in the very early days. Will lucas sleep if he's in bed with you? I know its not ideal and a bit controversial but if co-sleeping is the only way to get some rest in these early days it might be worth trying? Xxx

    [Modified by: Feebs76 on May 02, 2010 09:44 PM]

  • Like Kayecee, we only put Ethan down in his moses basket in a dim room at night - during the day he sleeps in the living room, in his pram or a lie-flat bouncer type chair. We also swaddle him at night, to help give him cues that this is when he snuggles down and has a nice loooooong sleep! We use the SwaddleMe swaddling wraps and have found them brilliant.

    I also find that keeping him up with us until we go to bed helps him get a longer stretch of sleep in. Basically, he stays downstairs with us, either snoozing in his bouncer or having cuddles, and doing lots and lots of feeding - he cluster feeds from about 6-7pm up to about 10 or 11, I have no problem with this as it's filling his tank up for a long sleep! We then take him up with us when we go to bed, anywhere between 10-11.30. He'll sometimes take another feed upstairs, then we change his bum, wrap him up in his swaddle wrap and put him down. Typically he'll sleep till 4-4.30am, wake for a feed then goes down again till about 7.30-8am. He seems happy with this setup as he has a few hours of awake, alert time in the mornings after his morning feed and is always very chilled out and happy.

    If he's sleeping well in the day, can you get some naps in whilst he's sleeping, it might help you to cope? When people say "sleep whilst the baby sleeps", they MEAN IT! Don't worry about getting stuff done around the house - sleep. Seriously.
  • Sounds like you have a baby who is confused over daytime and night time. Make sure you keep up regular noise during the day and don't let him sleep for more than an hour and half in one go. Then try to get into a night time routine i.e. bath, feed, story/lullaby (keep the lights low and limit talking).

    And MrsSetters is absolutely right - make sure you get at least one nap during the day to get you through the night.
  • We're having the same problems. We keep Daisy with us downstairs during the day, she'll happily sleep in her pram or bouncy chair for 3-4 hours at a time. We keep noisy levels normal, we've made no attempt to tiptoe round her.

    We take her up with us when we go, change and feed her and put her in moses basket then. However, she doesn't seem to really settle until the early hours, sometimes as late as 6am! The rest of the night she feeds every 60-90 mins, we wind her, have a cuddle and then put her down. Within a minute or two, she is bawling again, and quite often gets really bad hiccups which seem to unsettle her aswell.

    She slept from 3am - 7am and then 8am - 11am this morning so we just didn't get up until really late! I am trying to nap during the day if possible but the first part of the night is becoming a real trial.
  • With Fraser I'm with Kayecee and Mrs S - we have him sleeping in his pram in the living room during the day and sleeping with the curtains etc open. Then he cluster feeds from 7 - usually dropping off about 9ish - we go up to bed at about 10.30 so I change his bum before we go up, then give him a big feed when we're in the bedroom with just a low light on (can't feed him in the dark as he's got a habbit of putting his hands in front of his mouth when he's hungry and I can't see if he's latched properly) then he gets swaddled and will sleep through til about half 2. I find also that feeding him til he comes off the breast, giving him 5 mins and offering him again usually gets somewhere otherwise he tends to just wake up 20 mins later grizzling about being hungry. After that he's up every 2 hours pretty much regular as clockwork... but it's working as I can get about 6-8 hours sleep (admittedly broken but it's sleep) and my midwife keeps telling me how fantastic I look!
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