How are your DH's helping at night?

jj0313

After a small moment of annoyance with my husband tonight...I'm wondering how everyone's partner is or is not helping at tonight? Do you try and divide anything up? Are weekends different of Dh isnback at work already??

sweetbabyrahe

DH has been back to work since a few days after Eli was born and Eli struggles to sleep
In the cosleeper and is a noisy squirmy sleeper. Also I EBF. So DH takes the first shift usually between my 9ish and midnight feeds. So that means usually 2.5 hours of uninterrupted sleep for me alone in the bed-often the best sleep I get. On the weekends, sometimes he takes another chunk between feeds or just if he gets fussy in our room but isn't ready to eat,

pixie523

We're working towards EBF so the majority of night waking falls on me. Our LO is having issues sleeping anywhere that isn't in our bed with us right now. When she's cluster feeding (typically between 11-3:30) she and I move to the couch so H can sleep at night and give me breaks during the day.

If LO is really losing it and nursing isn't soothing her H will come out and give her a bottle of pumped breast milk to help get her full and back down.

So basically, yes when he can.

CarrieAnne09

DH isn't back at work yet. He usually will get up and change her once in the night in between boobs. Sometimes he'll wake up and burp her when I'm done feeding her and let me go back to sleep. He helps way more than I ever thought he would but it's only day 5 so who knows what could change.

shan24

I have low supply, so I pump at every feed and supplement with formula. When LO wakes, SO gets the formula ready while I feed the expressed breast milk. He also makes sure my pump is ready to go and cleans it when I'm finished. In between needing him, like when LO is eating the formula, he'll doze.

runningmama14

DH doesn't do anything at night. LO is still exclusively on the boob, so there really isn't a reason for him to get up too.

turtles7

DH helps with her as soon as he gets home from work to give me a break. He will give her a bottle around 11-11:30 to give me ahead start on sleep. Back when I was pumping in the MOTN during the first two weeks, he would help by feeding her the expressed milk after i pumped and clean the pump parts.

carafern

We are on day 8 and dh gets up for almost all motn feedings. We have a pretty good system now, where he changes diaper while I get set up and go pee. He is also the one who swaddles her back to sleep after a feeding. We made a deal that he handles output and I do input (ebf). This might change when he goes back to work, but by then maybe, hopefully, possibly...She'll be sleeping for longer at night.

ssstephanie214

He usually changes diapers and brings her to me to feed and I'll put her back down. Who knows what happened to this plan last night???? He didn't get up once. Sometimes I think it's ok, he has a full time day job, he needs his sleep at night....i don't know why I discount how hard it is for me to take care of a newborn 24 hours a day.

JamieK1882

I've been super spoiled.
DH had 2 weeks paternity so he's been doing the entire night. I set my alarm for 6am and take it from there.

He goes back to work Monday, so I only have one more night of this arrangement. I'm afraid.

AnnieRoo13

DH works crazy shifts so he's often not home in the night or he's sleeping for a 12 hour shift the next day. In general I let him sleep as I don't see the point in both of us getting up as I'm nursing. I do pump, but by the time Will needs to eat again my boobs are killing me so I wouldn't want DH to feed him a bottle.

When he is home he will often do the last feed from a bottle and put LO to bed while I get some sleep. Those are my favourite nights.

gldnbearz

DH is back at work. He's been taking the 0500-0600 feeding. I get the MOTN and we split the 11pm - midnight feeding.

tigerpawie

I mainly BF with an occassional bottle of formula. The formula seems to be phased out as we get bf'ing established. I let FI sleep thru the night if I feel like I can handle LO On my own but sometimes if I feel too tired, I'll wake him up and ask for help. LO seems to be doing 2 to 3 hours sleep in between feedings so I can handle it for the most part and make sure I get in at least one nap with him during the day.

If FI is home in the morning, I'll ask him to take LO after the first morning feeding so I can sleep in peace for another 2 hours.

He works 70+ hours and does all the cleaning and cooking. This is the least I can do to shoulder the responsibility of a newborn.

ETA: adicentally clicked 'reply' before done.

lizgrace03

He's been pretty helpful especially on the weekends when he doesn't have to get up for work. He will take at least one feeding while I go pump and has been nice about getting up in the mornings so I can sleep extra. The weekdays are different with his work schedule- I usually let him sleep but he does get up and help quite a bit then as well.

Ineedmorecoffee

He will wake up and hold her or get me a clean diaper if I ask. We EBF so there's no point in him waking up.
He helps a lot during the day though. Bringing me water, making dinner, cleaning up, playing with our older child.

torontokim

DH is back at work & I try to let him sleep through the night. However, whenever the LO starts to cry DH bolts up and into action. Even if I tell him to get back to bed, he usually ends up changing a diaper, swaddling or rocking baby back to sleep. 

staugustinewedding

carafern said:

We are on day 8 and dh gets up for almost all motn feedings. We have a pretty good system now, where he changes diaper while I get set up and go pee. He is also the one who swaddles her back to sleep after a feeding. We made a deal that he handles output and I do input (ebf). This might change when he goes back to work, but by then maybe, hopefully, possibly...She'll be sleeping for longer at night.

This!

sparklingwhit

DH has 12 weeks paternity leave and we ff so we take turns throughout the night for the most part. I may get up a bit more often just because I'm not a very sound sleeper and DH could sleep through a train wreck in our living room.

dr_pr

Ineedmorecoffee said:

He will wake up and hold her or get me a clean diaper if I ask. We EBF so there's no point in him waking up.
He helps a lot during the day though. Bringing me water, making dinner, cleaning up, playing with our older child.

This! He's back at work and I EBF, so there's no point in him being up at night. He does everything with Gabby during the day, though, which is a huge help.

BridgetThoams

EBF so he can't do much. Plus he is really struggling with the cloth diapers so the middle of the night is probably not a good idea as he would get really frustrated.
If LO gets really fussy H will put him down for me. I think LO gets frustrated with me sometimes because I smell like milk.

Carebella

We are EBF but DH has wanted to help out at night so he has handled a fair amount of the MOTN diaper changes. If he's been asleep I've let him keep sleeping except for one night when I was exhausted.

Once he starts going back to work though I'll probably out my foot down on him helping with the MOTN diaper changes and just ask him to take over morning pet feeds and pup potty breaks. And bedtime pup potty breaks. Except on weekends. I will probably wake him up on weekends if I'm exhausted.

AnnieRoo13

Ah @Carebella‌ reminded me! DH does a lot in the night by letting the dog out. If out dog hear Will crying he often wakes up and gets restless. DH often goes downstairs and puts him out and settles him back down while I'm nursing. So helpful!

mander82

Um....I guess he keeps the bed warm in case I get to go back to it. He hasn't gotten up once in the middle of the night. He has woken up but not gotten out of bed. He helps a ton during the day though. He had 2 weeks off but goes back to work on Monday. He works swing shifts too, 12 hour shifts....so I will have to try to keep baby quiet while he is sleeping. Not looking forward to that.

jessa1228

CatLady22 said:

DH changes MOTN diapers but I do all of the feeding.

This exactly. Also if DS is being particularly fussy and having trouble falling back asleep after feeding, H will take him for a little bit.

morrkim

DH usually works nights and will get home between 2 and 4 am. When he gets home he will usually help until he goes to sleep 2 to 3 hours later. Mostly what he does is hold them if they are fussy and not hungry or hold one while I feed the other. Sometimes all he does is get them for me.

MuchlyGen

LO is EBF, so fella doesn't do much with her in the night. We have a crib sidecarred, but Ellie pretty much sleeps with me and the crib is primarily seeing use as a changing station so I can change her without getting out of bed, haha. With her, mainly, he provides an arm for me to nestle her into while I get up to go pee, if she's not sleeping deeply enough for me to disentangle myself without waking her. However! Fella has taken over respondingn to our older kids. James has nightmares sometimes and Charlie needs help going potty a couple times a night, or occasionally they need water or lose their blanket or something. He handles that, for which I am endlessly grateful. While off work he also got up with them in the morning so I can get a little extra sleep. He goes back to work on Monday, so. That will be interesting!

absolutelymaybe

DH went back to work a couple weeks ago. Sunday through Thursday nights he helps me with the 11pm-ish feeding and then I'm on my own. On the weekends he gets up with me throughout the night. We each get a baby to feed (they're FF).

ShelleyElla22

DH has never helped at night because I EBF and don't see the point in him being awake too. He also works in construction so he needs his rest so he doesn't make a mistake and hurt himself! If I am nursing the baby and one of our other boys wakes up he will go deal with them but otherwise it is so much easier to do it myself!

meeshybee

Not quite applicable now, but with our other kids we split night duty. DH gets up insanely early by choice so the easiest thing for us to do was have me take the late night feedings (before midnight) and he took the pre-dawn feedings (after midnight). That way even though he left for work at 6am, I had at least 4 or 5 hours of continuous sleep. Sometimes if it had been a really bad day he would let me nap when he got home from work, too.

ccam

DH will get the DD out of the bassinet and changed and will hand her off to me. After I'm done feeding/pumping, I wake him back up so he can put her to sleep. It works well now since he's still not back to work yet plus he wants to do it so I'm not going to turn him down.

AlliJeee

The variety of answers to this is making me feel better... All nights are now on me. Tomorrow LO will be a week old. The first couple nights home we split the work and DH got up. Two of the three nights I caught him asleep with LO swaddled on his chest. He's a big guy and I worry something terrible could happen, this leading to me not being able to sleep when DH offers to help out. The last two nights I've done it all and feel better knowing all is well.

janadeek

Switch shift at 2am.

mslynn2012

DH is still on paternity leave (this is his last week, DD was born 11/18). I'm trying to act like he is back a work, so he keeps her awake from 8-10 while I rest/sleep. Then I nurse her to sleep and let him sleep until around 2 (her only diaper change) where he gets up, changes her and burps her. I nurse her back to sleep and she's out till 5/6ish.

JFH2010

I usually hand LO off between 5:30 and 6:30am so I can get an extra 1.5-2 hours of sleep. I keep a bottle of breastmilk in the fridge in case he needs to eat during that time. That has worked for us so far. DH also takes care of everything relating to DS1 - bedtime, wake-ups, preschool prep, etc.

When DS1 was a newborn we did split shift (still BF, but I pumped for DH's feedings). I slept 9pm-3am and DH slept 3-9am. DS1 was a much worse sleeper so we really needed to do it that way to survive.

I'm surprised by how many people say their DH can't help because they're EBF. Neither of my kids only woke up to eat - sometimes they just needed to be soothed or burped or whatever. So for me it's very helpful to have someone else stay with LO and just bring him to me to nurse. My mom did that last week while she was visiting, and it was amazing to be able to sleep solidly between feedings.

highbornhunter

DH usually changes diapers at night prior to a feeding. (I'm breast-feeding, and haven't started pumping regularly yet)  He's also taken William and walked with him or taken him to the nursery to rock him in the rocking chair if William won't go back to sleep and I'm exhausted.

missnacholover

I'm pumping and doing formula so DH is able to help a lot. LO usually wakes up once overnight and DH does that feeding most of the time. I get up with her in the morning when she wakes up.

I keep telling DH to wake me up for the overnight (I sleep with ear plugs bc he snores and usually don't hear her over the monitor) but he hasn't yet. I get up when I hear her but that's rare.

He's been back at work for 3 1/2 weeks now. She'll be six weeks tomorrow.

MissN06

It depends on the night. Most weekend nights he'll get up and change DD's diaper while I pee and get her bottle ready. I've just started doing it on my own especially now that she's only getting up 1-2 times a night and he's back at work. Not to mention DH is one of the slowest diaper changers in the world. She sleeps on my side of the bed in her pnp so it's easy for me to get up and get to her.

soulcupcake

I EBF, and at this point she really only wakes at night to nurse. There isn't a whole lot he can do.