Sleep Support Thread

slr1229

I feel like I’m hijacking the nursing thread with my child’s lack of ability to transition to sleep after feeding at night, so I’ve decided to start a sleep thread (even though everything is intertwined at this point).

Any struggles or wins you’d like to share that could help others?

runsoncoffee

I know it may be controversial but I decided to get a dock-a-tot this time around. I wasn't skeptical but I am definitely a believer. We've used it both for cosleeping and in the pack and play next to our bed. 
Other things that have been working for us are getting a really tight swaddle (I love the copper pearl blankets... they are stretchy so you can pull them really tight!), gas drops on occasion when gas seems to be the issue, and I usually feed him, change his diaper, then swaddle him up and feed him again if he wants to or  just hold him... this way when he does fall asleep he's already swaddled up so laying him down  is easier/less wakeful. 
My first was not as good of a sleeper and the only thing that worked for him was the rock and play (we didn't try the dock a tot with him).

mdfarmchick

This is going to be an unpopular opinion... but I really think it depends on the baby. My first was ((Well still is)) a crappy sleeper and nothing we did or didn’t do helped that. This LO is a much better sleeper. 

I will say that consistency is key, but we ended up going with whatever got us some sleep. Also, make sure you aren’t switching sides too early when breastfeeding. The hindmilk helps them sleep. Sometimes I’ll pump for 5-10 minutes and then put him on so he only gets hindmilk. 

slr1229

My first only liked the rock n play too but I blame it on giving up too soon so trying to be more patient this time around.  My sister is expecting in Aug so we’re going to split the dock a tot and give it a go in the bassinet.  I do agree being consistent is key, today we did all our naps in the bassinet too vs swing, etc.  Good call on not switching too early, I try everything to get her to stay awake to finish a feed.

bravoandprosecco

Do you guys check the diaper every time during night feeds? I feel like it wakes him up so I don't always but at the same time don't want him sitting in poop so maybe I should? As far as our routine i check diaper, swaddle then feed and wait 20 min before I transfer him to the bassinet. But honestly the 3 or 4am feeding i do laying down in bed,  kick my husband out of bed and co sleep

runsoncoffee

@bravoandprosecco I change diapers MOTN while they are this little. I think it was around five or six months with DS1 that I stopped doing that... and if there was poop at that age I still changed it. While there's poop in pretty much every diaper I wouldn't want to go without changing because they could get a nasty diaper rash!

mdfarmchick

@bravoandprosecco I change after he eats off one side. Then the diaper change wakes him up enough that I can put him on the other side and top him off. Like @scoogy19, I don’t want him to get a diaper rash from sitting in poop. 

DDRRT1982

I change too.  They get diaper rashes pretty easily at this age and are hard to get rid of.  I do preventatively put diaper rash cream on at night in case there is a midsleep poop and the off chance there is actually sleep happening.  

vflux33

I've been changing them after feedings and sometimes also during in MOTN, but still started noticing some redness down there --not a huge spot but some. I feel so bad and not sure what I did wrong. I mean I'm changing them constantly it feels like...

So wake them up for scheduled feeding? Or on demand feeding? On demand at night and scheduled during the day? What are you guys doing? At first the NICU insisted we do scheduled every 3 hours, but the pediatrician seems a bit more lax and also their EDD was today, which might change things for us personally. But assuming a full term regular size baby, do you guys trust the baby to wake him or herself when it's time to eat or do you wake them at set times? 

DDRRT1982

@vflux33 I wake to feed until they reach birth weight.  This was what my very pro-breastfeeding NP recommended.  After that I do a consistent every two to three hours during the day, mostly for my supply, and then let them go at night.  My kiddos usually put themselves on an every two to four hours at night schedule and I don't get sleep until they wean.  

Edit...I should also add that I co-sleep.  It's easier with breastfeeding for me, but it's also probably why my kids aren't great at sleeping all night until they wean.  They like the boob in the mouth all night long and I am a constant reminder.  I have tried to change this habit, but it doesn't work for me.  

vflux33

@DDRRT1982 Thanks for your input! We hit birthweight already but may not be a good indication for us due to the IUGR. Hmm. I am going to email the more lax pediatrician and see what he says. My supply isn’t a huge concern because I’m exclusively pumping and don’t cosleep. 

enigmaticjj

I echo what DDRRT1982 said about proactively feeding more during the day, then let them sleep until they wake on their own at night (assuming there's no weight gaining issues). But of course that doesn't mean they'll sleep in long stretches at night yet.

slr1229

I let her wake up on her own at night, however past few nights she’s been sleeping in so it’s allowed me to pump before I feed her because I’m so engorged if we go 30 mins past normal time.  During the day we try to stick to every 3 hour feed but sometimes she gets hungry before 3 hour hits and that’s cool, we’ll feed.  According to Baby Wise book, in week 3-5 they merge one feeding at night, we’ll see.

runsoncoffee

@vflux33 I still did scheduled feedings all through the day for the first two weeks after we came home from the NICU. Just in the past week I've been more so taking his lead. He is 5 weeks old today. I do on demand at night though since he's above birth weight (the first week after the NICU I set my alarm so it wasn't more than 4 hours, but he woke up before then anyway lol). As far as still getting a red bum, you may have to try different wipes or diapers... some babies are just more sensitive! 

mdfarmchick

@vflux33 I feed on demand at night and during the day. He never goes more than one 4 hour stretch in a 24 hour period and we have been cluster feeding quite a bit over the past Couple of weeks. But, to be fair, Sam gained 12 oz in a week last week so I’m not too concerned about him not getting enough. Mainly I’m trying to wean myself from the pump, and I’m trying to keep my supply up to what he needs. My supply abruptly started dropping off around 4 months with my first so I am doing everything to keep my supply up. I also change his diaper every 2-3 hours, especially during the day since we are using cloth diapers. I wouldn’t beat myself up over a red butt; it’s going to happen. You could just start using some diaper cream at night to be preventative about it. 

lgutu28

slr1229 said:

I let her wake up on her own at night, however past few nights she’s been sleeping in so it’s allowed me to pump before I feed her because I’m so engorged if we go 30 mins past normal time.  During the day we try to stick to every 3 hour feed but sometimes she gets hungry before 3 hour hits and that’s cool, we’ll feed.  According to Baby Wise book, in week 3-5 they merge one feeding at night, we’ll see.

Baby wise was a huge success with my first two!

vflux33

Thanks @scoogy19 and @mdfarmchick! Our doctor gave us the go ahead to try on demand around the clock so we tried for a couple days. They both already hit birthweight but because they are SGA for the smaller one the birthweight was only like 4 pounds so not as good of an indication for us. The smaller of the 2 babies went a whole 4.5 hours and needed to be woken to eat during the day, which made me nervous + the twin schedule got too screwed up and I was basically always feeding someone, which left not much left time for pumping or eating myself, or anything else, so we're going back to on demand at night and scheduled during the day. Oh well! Maybe I'll try again in another few weeks or month. 

Doing daily diaper free time, changing them constantly, plus lots of diaper rash cream to try to heal their butts. How long does it normally take for it to go away if you're on the right path to getting rid of it?? MH said he saw a little blood there on one yesterday and we feel so bad  

megpeg

@vflux33 my mom swears by caldescene powder and gives it for every baby shower. It is in a pink container with blue and white writing. It clears things up really fast- the NICU doctor told her to use it when my little sister was born.

vflux33

@megpeg Thanks, I will check that out!

fatstagnation

@vflux33 what diapers are you using? My doula said hospitals use pampers and will not use huggies because some babies have bad reactions to huggies specifically. Obviously I don't know the science behind this, but maybe try a different brand diaper? 

As others have said, don't beat yourself up. You're doing the best you can to resolve it, and some babes are just sensitive. 

fatstagnation

I think this is the right place for the Q - how do you dress your babies for sleep? DH and my mom are a bit freaked when I told them the SIDS guidelines say no blankets. How is baby supposed to stay warm enough? 

We keep the house pretty cool, which the guidelines also recommend, but then we sleep under two blankets! 

DDRRT1982

At this age I do sleeper and those sleep sack that swaddle them.

slr1229

@fatstagnation we do footy zip up and then Swaddle Me blanket (basically like a stray jacket).  We leave her arms out though because she gets pissed when they aren’t near her head. 

My MIL keeps sending me gowns but I just like having my babies legs more confined. 

vflux33

@fatstagnation We had been planning to use the chlorine free Earth's Best ones, but they don't have a preemie size so they are way too big. In the hospital they used the preemie huggies, but we couldn't find them easily so we are using preemie pampers. We also use water wipes, but using those less now and drying with wash cloths after. Using a ton of diaper rash cream, an organic one with good ratings but doesn't have zinc which we read helps, so we bought another with zinc and are waiting for it to get here in the next day or so. I can't tell if any of that or the diaper free time, which we upped to 2-3 hours yesterday, is improving anything --it looks so painful and raw down there. Kind of freaking out about it and feel really bad for them. I read that antibiotics can contribute to diaper rash and that would make a lot of sense because of all the antibiotics used for us during the failed induction, and also after the birth for one of the babies when the doctors weren't sure whether he had been exposed to the infections I had during labor (and that baby's diaper rash looks worse than the other's).

Our place is cold at night this time of year too--we have horrible insulation and even though we set the thermostat to 70 it feels so drafty everywhere plus our kids have temperature control issues due to their small size. So given all that for sleep put them in long sleeves, pants, hat, and socks, and then use a swaddle me or halo plus 2 blanket swaddles around it. We started off with fewer swaddles, but it wasn't enough in our house.

nancysimp

@fatstagnation

We use a zip up and one or two swaddle blankets, plus a hat.

fatstagnation

@vflux33 Gosh you're just having a heck of a time! Poor babies. I wish I had a magic solution. 

Ok, we will learn to swaddle. Plus that's technically a blanket, so maybe that will make DH feel better.

ashleyf911

@fatstagnation just so you aren't surprised if/when it happens - both my LO's have been little houdinis and won't stay swaddled in a swaddle blanket while they sleep, no matter how tight I do it. They'll only sleep well if I use one of the Halo Swaddlesacks. We keep our house at 68 at night and this baby loves to be warm so she wears fleece footed jammies and a fleece swaddlesack to bed. 

fatstagnation

@ashleyf911 thanks! We'll see what works.  

sarabeth5678

I also let her go all night without waking her for feedings. Recently, she has been up like clockwork at 3 AM and 6 AM, and then we sleep until 9 AM (or 10:30 yesterday! amazing). 

I agree with @mdfarmchick that it is really depends on the baby. When she's up at night, the most she's doing is grunting and little whining, so I'm able to let her self sooth and I can sleep through that for the most part.

If it's a bad night with more substantial crying, I have been doing the 5 S's from "The Happiest Baby on the Block" It's a book (also video version) on Amazon. The S's stand for swaddle, side position, shush, swing, and suck. You can literally just google is without having to buy anything to learn how to sooth your babe. I find that this has been super helpful so far!

chasingroygbiv

Sooo... I’ve been holding baby all night now for a month so both of us can get some sleep. Is it a habit now because she still isn’t sleeping any other way... what can I do to get her to sleep even a short stretch on her own? I LOVE the snuggles, of course, but DD1 was and still is a poor sleeper, I don’t want to do that again..

bravoandprosecco

@chasingroygbiv I've been co sleeping bc it's the only way he sleeps so I totally understand this,  I want my bed back! (I'm sure hubby wants in to,  he's on the couch)

DDRRT1982

@chasingroygbiv I have tried to not co-sleep for the last three babies and it never works.  My 18 month old is still in my bed, so this time I haven't even really tried and I am co-sleeping. She's actually pretty good with that and only wakes to nurse.  She sleeps beautifully in her rock in play throughout the day, but at night she won't go more than 30 minutes in there.  It's so weird.  I hope you get better advice on how to get them to sleep on their own.  

ashtuesday

When did you STM+'s stop swaddling?  Nora outgrew all of her newborn stuff in one actual day, including her sleep sack + swaddle. She's 6 weeks and I'm not sure if it's worth investing in the next size up!

BrittnieMariee

@ashtuesday Emma has already started rejecting her swaddles. She prefers to sprawl out on her back lol
ETA: my son was closer to 3 months before he started fighting his swaddles. 

baybeesunflower

I have yet to swaddle this little nugget. We have a bunch and i dont know why I'm not doing it aside from me being lazy. He will do 30 minutes in his bassinet but much longer stretches in his swing or on one of us. 

slr1229

We stopped swaddling around 5 months but she had arms free then.  

ashleyf911

We stopped swaddling around 4 or 5 months and months and moved to a regular sleep sack. Babies have their startle reflex until 3 or 4 months, so Lincoln would startle and wake himself up every time I tried to move him to his crib unless he was swaddled. 

mmom3

My daughter was swaddled until 6 months with arms in.  Then arms came out and she was swaddled until 9/10 months.  She loved the swaddle.

my son was swaddled until 4-5 months but needed a velcroed swaddle as he would wake himself with scratching.  The we switched to a sleep sack with arms out at the different sizes until at around 18 -20 months.  

slr1229

There’s just something about night time that I loathe!  

nancysimp

Gotta love middle of the night blowouts...and then more poop and pee as I change him or right after he's changed. Sooooo tired. Zzzz

slr1229

It takes me over an hour to get her back to sleep after a night feed which typically doesn’t seem as fulfilling to her as a day feed.  She does so so good during the day transferring to bassinet but she is AWFUL at night.  I need helppp