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Sleepy partner not waking to help with new baby
my baby isn’t barely 2 weeks old and it’s taking some time for my partner to wake up to him during the night. Im breastfeeding so I have to attend to him for his feeds, but my partner refuses to wake up to change his nappy or comfort him when he cries. My baby feeds for around 45 minutes at night, with around 15 minutes of comforting inbetween and he wakes up around 4 times a night. I manage to just get around 4 hours sleep on average now while my partner is clocking nearly 7. Any advice on honle I can encourage him to help out more through the night? I’m starting uni again soon and the 4 hours being more would really help me out.
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Probably not what you’ll want to hear but if you’re nursing then there’s not a huge amount your partner can do for you... I know you say he could get up to comfort / change baby at other times but honestly in my experience when our first son was born even if hubby did try to deal with him in the night I would be awake and listening out anyway (Mother Nature I think makes sure we wake up at the slightest baby noise!) so even when he tried to help, I wasn’t actually getting any more sleep so I told him not to bother... I let him sleep so at least one of us was having a rest!
Perhaps your partner could take over for a couple of hours in the early evening so you could have a nap before properly going to bed? Bearing in mind as your little one is only 2 weeks old & you’re nursing you’re probably only getting 2-4 hours between feedings... but a couple hours to nap and rest in the evening (or whenever he’s free to help out) could help you feel a little more rested.
Hang in there! The first few months are tough going with mighty feeds etc but it does get better and you’ll start getting some longer slee stretches and feel more human again! ☺️
I agree with above when breastfeeding there is not a lot your partner can do and if he is working full time I would just let him get the sleep he needs for work. My husband did the night feeds and we have 5 kids. He needed his sleep due to work and the nature of his job.. Hugs hun its hard work try and get some sleep day time when baby sleeps it does get easier
Firstly, congralutions on your new arrival! Well done for breastfeeding! You are doing a great job!
My hubs also didn’t know what to do at night when I was breastfeeding, and I found mYself always asking him to do stuff for me, get Me water, cook me food etc. He did everything else around the house and I was solely using my time for the baby. We slowly introduced a bottle of expressed breastmilk at night which meant hubs could feed this. But there are other stuff he can do to be involved. After bath massage hubs did with the baby.
I agree with all the above comments. We bottle feed but still if oh took over night feeds I was up anyway As couldn’t switch off so now we basically have a rule that anything after 6am oh gets up with her, before that we treat as a night feed and I get up and settle her back to bed.
This would work if you were expressing or if baby starts waking up but not to be fed. My lo is now older but often now she wakes in a morning just because she is up not because she is hungry.
Is your partner working? If so and as much as you may not like it i dont really think he should be getting up in the middle of the night if he has to go to work.