Please tell me this is colic

BCfan1 · November 2013

Hi Ladies, I'm a second time mom with a 10 week old and am desperately hoping he is colicky and there is a light at the end of the tunnel in a few weeks. When he gets overtired (which is nearly all the time) he will do the colic scream- straight legs, red faced, fist clenched. He has a terrible time blocking out stimuli and can only sleep in the ergo, with white noise inside the ergo, the hood closed and bouncing the exact right way. It sometimes takes upwards of an hour of high intensity squatting, shh-ing, twisting, etc. to get him to go to sleep during which time he will squirm and fight and eh-eh-eh but if I pause in my efforts for one second he will scream crazy. I have to keep bouncing to keep him asleep. Needless to say, my back is going to fall off. It is worse by the end of the day bc he is soo overtired. so, he doesn't cry that much bc I am killing myself keeping him quiet. When anyone else holds him they cannot get him to stop crying and he is inconsolable. He will only tolerate about an hour of awake time so I am not keeping him awake for very long. Can colic just be a really hard time falling and staying asleep and chronic overtired, which makes them mad? Please say this sounds like colic and will get better. Thanks for any support!

BCfan1 · November 2013

Also, despite doing about ten hours of baby soothing cardio a day and chasing a toddler around and nursing a giant baby I still have about ten pounds of baby weight hanging on....how is that fair??

BCfan1 · November 2013

Thanks for your response. Did he gain any sleep maturity after 3 months?

jschmidt6 · November 2013

This sounds exactly like my DS from around week 8 to week 10. We basically didn't leave the house because he screamed so much people would look at us like we were hurting him. My husband came home from work a couple times at 2pm because he called to check on us and both me and baby were in tears! It got A LOT better for us. I used to play a youtube video of vacuum white noise turned up as loud as it would go and set the phone ON him while I bounced and rocked. That worked well and I would recommend it because you can take your phone to restaurants, grandma's house, grocery, etc. I used to stick it in his car seat to calm him on the go. I think he will be over this stage before you know it!! Good luck!

AlexisLA · November 2013

Sounds like a type of colic to me. Do what works and as the others say, it is only a phase.

provwife · November 2013

Colic is basically just a name for not knowing the reason. Babies always have a reason for excessive crying. My guess would be gerd based on the fact your lo tightens up like he's in pain and also because he will only sleep in the upright position. I'd bring it up to your pedi and not leave with the "it's just colic" answer cause that's crap.

BCfan1 · November 2013

Thanks guys! I did talk to the doctor about reflux and he thought he was fine and he will sleep flat on his back in his crib (not great but not terrible...well sometimes terrible) at night and he is very happy being on his back when awake even right after he eats! It is frustrating bc I think I did everything great today with sleep times and naps and it took two hours for him to get to sleep. I tapped out after an hour and a half and my husband said he basically cried (in his arms) until he just collapsed from exhaustion....sigh. I'll just keep trudging along! The encouragement is very helpful! Thanks, ladies!

BCfan1 · November 2013

He also doesn't like the carseat. I have the inserts from two sleep sheep and a bassinet noisemaker stuffed in the Ergo at all times so I walk around with a delightful mix of babbling brook and heartbeat and baby screaming like a police car with its siren on!

MisN · November 2013

We went through this between 2-3 months. Going into naps, she was unconsolable. I wasn't letting her get over tired but she would cry so hard for up to an hour, wouldn't even nurse to calm down and car rides were out of the question. The good news is that this lasted only a few weeks. The bad news for us, is that dd is almost 6 months old and a terrible sleeper (not sure if this is related). Her night stretches are only a few hours at a time. At least now she can be soothed quite easily.