Describe your bedtime routine

HeartLikeMine3 · July 2016

My LO is melting down wanting to sleep between 7:30-8 she is almost 6 weeks and does one 4 hr stretch so that's where I get my most sleep but I don't really want to go to bed that early. So my questions are do you go to bed when LO does or do you wake them up to eat again before you go to bed?
How old is your LO?
how often do they wake at night?
Bottle or breastfed? Just because I'm curious if the FF babies are sleeping better.

DeePaddy24 · July 2016

My LO will be 4wks tomorrow. Timing varies for him at night, but he usually has his last feeding between 10-11pm. Occasionally he needs to be woken up for that one. My H gives him a bottle at that time (I breastfeed, but pump a few times during the day) while I go to bed. LO typically wakes me up once some time between 2-4am to eat, then sleeps again until 7-8am...sometimes even later.

purplefan1 · July 2016

My person still has a very irregular pattern. She might go to sleep around 1030 for 2-2.5 hours then up to eat (feedings vary between 20 minutes to an hour), eat again around 3ish and seems wide awake then until around 5. Then back asleep after a quick feed around 6-7.

I'm struggling a lot with sleep but hoping we get in a better pattern soon. She turned 1 month yesterday.

adiaz132003 · July 2016

DS is 4 weeks EBF and starting at 8:30 or so I give him a bath if he needs one and a coconut oil massage then I bring him to where he's gonna sleep, tonight is our bed, and give him his last big feed. After that he will stay down anywhere from 3-5 hours. I always try to go to sleep during that time cause I know it's the best I'll get. He will wake every 2.5-3 hours from then on.

KaylaR628 · July 2016

OP, this sounds exactly like my daughter. Around 6 she starts fussing constantly, which she doesn't normally do, and I believe it is to go to bed. Today I even had her dad give her a bottle of breast milk at 5 (we're trying this because he was sad she cried the whole time he was home from work) and she still fussed until I finally sat down with her at 7 to feed and put her to bed. It is also her longest stretch of sleep and I, too, don't want to go to bed that early but miss sleep if I don't!
Our routine is as follows to try and keep her up a tad later: bath with just water every other day and soap the other nights because she loves them, swaddle, feed where she is sleeping (currently our room) while I read a story to her with white noise from my phone. She is usually almost instantly asleep when I put her to the boob and will sleep 4-5 hours from there. She also naps heavily in the afternoon, so I'm hoping this eventually shifts later and later so we get her long periods of sleep at night.

arteduc8 · July 2016

My DD is 5 weeks today and EB (also battling reflux so her sleep hadn't been great). The 8-9 ish feed is her last before bed. We keep the lights low and the house quiet the last hour is so before her bedtime. We'll change her diaper and get her in her sleep sack for the night, then I'll nurse her. After burping, I'll put her to bed and attempt to get some sleep myself. Her first stretch is usually the longest, at best was 4 hours the other night, but usually 2.5-3. She usually wakes every 2.5 hours after that through about 6am then we are up for the rest of the day. Sometimes with her reflux she won't fall back asleep during a stretch in the MOTN and be inconsolable. The struggle is real and I miss sleep. Pumping and bottle feeding hasn't gone well, so I'm nursing every feeding.

ashkee05 · July 2016

My dude is 6 weeks. He is half formula half breast milk due to low supply. I usually save the formula for night. we get ready for bed about 10 so we feed him at 9, and he is usually done, burped, changed and falling asleep at 10. He has been KILLING us and our sleep by being up every two hours at night. Thankfully he eats and goes back to sleep but it is still hard. His 4/5am feeding he usually is up for awhile after but then back to bed and sometimes we can get 3/4 hours after that stretch. He definitely sleeps way more and way better during to day! Hopefully he'll make a good switch by the time I go back to work!

26pointrunningfor2 · July 2016

June2016BabyW said:

My person still has a very irregular pattern. She might go to sleep around 1030 for 2-2.5 hours then up to eat (feedings vary between 20 minutes to an hour), eat again around 3ish and seems wide awake then until around 5. Then back asleep after a quick feed around 6-7.

I'm struggling a lot with sleep but hoping we get in a better pattern soon. She turned 1 month yesterday.

Your little one sounds like mine, which is comforting. I keep hoping for longer sleep stretches.

rlbrooks84 · July 2016

I don't go to bed when my LO does but I'm lucky right now because my husband works from home and I have a difficult night with my LO I can nap when she does and he keeps an eye on our older boys. I usually can't go to bed when she does because I usually have bottles that need to be cleaned and some times my boys are still up and I have to put them to bed. I don't wake her up to feed her because she is a big cranky butt when I wake her to go some where and gives me a death glare.
She's 5 weeks will be 6 on Friday.
She typically wakes once in the night between 4/5 and then it takes about an hour for to go back down and then she wakes between 7/8. 8 if I'm lucky usually 7. She goes down around 9 but sometimes, like tonight by 8. My first son was a terrible sleeper and didn't sleep for 5 hr stretches till he was 3 months so every baby is different. All my LOs have been EFF I don't think they sleep longer if EFF because of my experience with my first.

HeartLikeMine3 · July 2016

Thanks for sharing tonight instead of going to bed early I let her go down at 730 I stayed up till 10 and woke her to nurse. Now I'm up at 1230 nursing again so I only get a two hour stretch guess that didn't work out too good. Sorry for all the moms getting no sleep my DS was a terrible sleeper didn't STTN till her was one but he's a great sleeper now. Hang in there mommas.

AmberLiz99 · July 2016

Dd is 3 weeks old today.
She is ready for bed at 8pm most nights, and there's no keeping her awake when she wants to sleep, haha. She gets a bottle right before she goes down, and will usually sleep for a good 6 hours before she wakes up to eat. Sometimes a little longer. She has a 3 hour stretch after that and sometimes goes back to sleep, but is sometimes up for the day at that point.

I stay up after she's in bed since that's the time my husband and I are both home and can spend time together. I like to be in bed by 10pm.

TheHauntedHauswife · July 2016

DD is just about 6 weeks.

We DO start our routine at 7 with the goal to have everyone asleep by 9 ish. However its worth noting that DHs alarm goes off at 5:15am and i cannot sleep through his alarm clock and he cant wake up with out it. [I am just used to getting up then as we have been together for 10 years and DH and my dad have the same job, therefore its been that way my whole life. Sleeping past 7-8am has always only happened a small hand full of times a year on average.]

We start downstairs by turning the lights off and spending our remaining time down stairs with just natural light, i often remind DH at this time to try and lower his powerful man voice a bit, keeping the lights off we head upstairs and me and DD get into bed, DH usually comes a little bit later one we are well into our bed time feeding.

She is exclusively breastfed. Sometimes her last feeding of the ''day'' is a little long and a little fussy, so assuming we are all asleep by 8:30-9, but its often (and ideally.) earlier. She usually wakes approximately 11:30-12, then again about 2:30, then one of 2 things happens...sometime she lasts til 4:30 at which point i often just feed her and then get out of bed and spend a little time alone knowing DH will up soon. Sometimes her feeds are more like 2 and then 3:30 and in that case i do go back to sleep again. Usually either which way, she eats again around 6-6:30, which the vast majority of the time I am already totally up and awake for.

As i mentioned the last feeding she seems a bit extra fussy (she will eat, fall asleep, wake right back up and then repeat, sometimes for 2+ hours.), i am going to actually start trying to baby wear her a bit and try to wear her to sleep and see how that works out. It works during the day but for some reason i never do it at bed time which i think is worth trying.

jmohio · July 2016

We are trying to get into a routine with LO now. She had reflux so after she eats she snuggles for 30 min which helps her digest. Right now she will go down between 10-11 then back up around 1 then again at like 3. It makes my nights really long because it about 15-20 min feed, 30 min digest time then she is down and back up about an hour later. It takes me forever to fall asleep so I don't get much sleep right now. Sometimes she will go 3 hours but usually only between 11-2. She is usually up for at least an hour after the 2 am feeding. We were waking her up every 3 hour even if she was sleeping. The doctor said we can bump this to 4 hours but we still need to wake her up because she is too young to go longer. I am trying to work on getting at least 3-4 hour between feedings at night.

My husband and I have a system down now where I take her the first part of the night and wake him up around 4 and he gives me 2 hours straight before he goes to work. I am exhausted most days though.

AshleyBKeen · July 2016

Jmohio: I feel you. The baby snuggles are great , but that extra half hour is a killer. It takes little guy 5 minutes for a diaper change, 15-20 to eat then 30-40 minutes of holding which means 2 hours of sleep between feedings if I fall asleep instantly. We ate trying to creep little guy's intake up so he will be comfortable for 4 hours, but his tummy can't seem to keep up. If he eats too much at once, baby volcano.

snowhite12 · July 2016

my LO is almost 6 weeks. I just started back to work part time so I sort of have him on a night time schedule.
I wake him at 8pm if he is asleep and feed him/keep him up til 9pm. He usually sleeps til 12-1am, I feed/change him, he falls back to sleep usually within 45min. He will wake again anywhere between 330-430am. I usually start getting ready for work at 430am. I formula feed him at night bc I wasn't producing enough and on breast milk he would wake every hour.
I breast feed during the day or give him what I pumped at work.

laurendiaz02 · July 2016

AmberLiz99 said:

Dd is 3 weeks old today.
She is ready for bed at 8pm most nights, and there's no keeping her awake when she wants to sleep, haha. She gets a bottle right before she goes down, and will usually sleep for a good 6 hours before she wakes up to eat. Sometimes a little longer. She has a 3 hour stretch after that and sometimes goes back to sleep, but is sometimes up for the day at that point.

I stay up after she's in bed since that's the time my husband and I are both home and can spend time together. I like to be in bed by 10pm.

Holy cow. 6 hours!? That's amazing. She doesn't leak out of her diaper? I don't let my son go more then 4 hours because I feel like it will leak! I'm curious: How many ounces of formula is she drinking each bottle?

amangels2 · July 2016

I usually start our bedtime routine around seven. I give him a bath, then he gets his bottle and I read him a story. He's usually out by 8. Then he sleeps until sometime between 1 and 3. After that he's up around 6. And then most days he will go back to sleep until 830 or so.

AmberLiz99 · July 2016

laurendiaz02 said:

AmberLiz99 said:

Dd is 3 weeks old today.
She is ready for bed at 8pm most nights, and there's no keeping her awake when she wants to sleep, haha. She gets a bottle right before she goes down, and will usually sleep for a good 6 hours before she wakes up to eat. Sometimes a little longer. She has a 3 hour stretch after that and sometimes goes back to sleep, but is sometimes up for the day at that point.

I stay up after she's in bed since that's the time my husband and I are both home and can spend time together. I like to be in bed by 10pm.

Holy cow. 6 hours!? That's amazing. She doesn't leak out of her diaper? I don't let my son go more then 4 hours because I feel like it will leak! I'm curious: How many ounces of formula is she drinking each bottle?

I know, it's pretty amazing. Out of my 3 kids this is the longest sleep for this early.

she drinks 3oz each bottle, but I offer 4oz in her bedtime bottle. She usually only eats 3.5oz. Her diaper has never leaked at night

HeartLikeMine3 · July 2016

I feed my LO before bed sometime between 8-9 then she wakes between 12-1 and I don't change her if she's just wet. When she wakes between 330-430 I change her then so she's going sometimes 7-8 hrs her diaper doesn't leak pampers are the bomb!

laurendiaz02 · July 2016

Sheesh! My son is a month old and drinks 4 ounces (sometimes 6ounces) and doesn't go more then 4 hours during the day and at night. Lol. I call him my squishy

ahernandez16 · July 2016

L is 3 weeks. He takes a nap from 3-6 ish usually and we try to keep him up after that until around 8/8:30. We bathe him every other night around that time, then I feed him one boob, we put him in his Woombie, and I top him off from the other one. By then it's usually 9/9:30 and he goes to bed. Sometimes it's as late as 10/10:30 but not usually much later.

He wakes up around 12:30/1:00 and H gives him a pumped bottle then he's up at 4 and I BF. Then he usually sleeps until he's up at 7. I go to bed when he does so I can snag that 5-6 hour stretch of sleep.

We didn't really do anything to get into this routine. He just kind of fell into it, but it seems doable for now. I'd like to get him in bed around 7:30/8 eventually so I can have some time to relax, be productive or hang out with H, before I'm 100% exhausted.

purplefan1 · July 2016

Based on some of your tips, we tried to start a new routine tonight. We will see how it goes. So far, we went for a long walk (partly because we got the new BOB stroller delivered and had to break it in....partly because we had to catch pokemon....). Then when we got back she got a bath in the sink (she loves bath time just like her mom). Jammies on then she ate for half an hour while I read her some stories. Put her in her swaddle and husband held her on his chest while I did work for an hour. She is now in the pnp in our room. She and I were sleeping in the nursery but since we would eventually like her to sleep in our room, we switched and husband is sleeping in the spare bed in the nursery now and I will try to feed/change her in our room in the hopes that she gets used to the pnp and the routine and we can all sleep together once again.

This is already an improvement because usually when I would try to transfer her in to her crib she would fuss. She is sleeping well in the pnp right now but will likely be up to eat again soon. So we will see how successful I am at getting her fed and back to sleep.

Edited for update: she slept really well when she slept, which is an improvement. No snorting or jerking around or anything like that. She fell asleep at 10, up at midnight, up at 130, up at 430, and up at 6. So not much improvement in the sleep span but hopefully she got restful sleep and won't be so cranky today. Trying it all again tonight!

rbflei · July 2016

Just for kicks. Last night. 7pm start feeding but let her play off and on and burping. Husband goes to change her and she pees everything. We laugh and go to bath time. Change baby and 9 pm rolls around. Feed again. She is overtired at this point. Screams until she is in the Moby wrap. Goes to sleep after 10min. Up at 1:30am husband wakes up and goes to change diaper she pees self again as he was slow on diaper change. Pee gets into hair and we are onto second bath. I run to restroom and her bathtime screams make me leak through my nipple pads and milk comes dripping down my front. Made make shift nipple pads from toilet paper. Try to feed her. She eats for like 10min falls to sleep breasts are throbbing so I go to try to pump while husband changes her before sleep. She pees herself again as he is again slow with diaper. He swears in the dark. I run to the boon bottle piece dryer no clean pump pieces. The pump and bottle parts are in the dishwasher case but didn't get loaded. Husband says to feed baby and I yell I have to clean a pump part. He yells that he can clean the pump but can't feed the baby. I feed her again but she only wants like 15 min of food as my nipples feel like they are going to explode. He is snoring, which is fine as I know he has work and I finish pumping by 2:30am. We are up again at 4:30am as he once again forgets she likes a fresh bowl but manages to lift her as she is peeing so that we don't have to give her another bath and just sponge her Lower extremities. At this point we are barely speaking to each other. I feed her and she sleeps again till 6:45am. Yay we made it through the night and are all alive and mostly speaking to each other . Thought the group might appreciate.

AmberLiz99 · July 2016

Knottie1449069263 said:

Just for kicks. Last night. 7pm start feeding but let her play off and on and burping. Husband goes to change her and she pees everything. We laugh and go to bath time. Change baby and 9 pm rolls around. Feed again. She is overtired at this point. Screams until she is in the Moby wrap. Goes to sleep after 10min. Up at 1:30am husband wakes up and goes to change diaper she pees self again as he was slow on diaper change. Pee gets into hair and we are onto second bath. I run to restroom and her bathtime screams make me leak through my nipple pads and milk comes dripping down my front. Made make shift nipple pads from toilet paper. Try to feed her. She eats for like 10min falls to sleep breasts are throbbing so I go to try to pump while husband changes her before sleep. She pees herself again as he is again slow with diaper. He swears in the dark. I run to the boon bottle piece dryer no clean pump pieces. The pump and bottle parts are in the dishwasher case but didn't get loaded. Husband says to feed baby and I yell I have to clean a pump part. He yells that he can clean the pump but can't feed the baby. I feed her again but she only wants like 15 min of food as my nipples feel like they are going to explode. He is snoring, which is fine as I know he has work and I finish pumping by 2:30am. We are up again at 4:30am as he once again forgets she likes a fresh bowl but manages to lift her as she is peeing so that we don't have to give her another bath and just sponge her Lower extremities. At this point we are barely speaking to each other. I feed her and she sleeps again till 6:45am. Yay we made it through the night and are all alive and mostly speaking to each other . Thought the group might appreciate.

I'm sorry you had a rough night, but this did make me laugh! I hope tonight is better for you

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