5 week old only sleeps 7 hours a day total!!!!

[baileybubs]

I'm sorry you are having such a hard time tawn. You must be so tired!

All I can suggest, and this is only what I found helped me with Emilia's colic, is that my MIL and df kept insisting trying a dummy/pacifier. I didn't really want to use one as I know later on it can cause issues with teeth and gums. At first she didn't seem to want one and was spitting it out but after a few times she was taking it and it seemed to soothe her and relaxes her into sleep.
Saying this when she's really screaming she won't even accept the dummy so I don't know how much help that would be.

Sometimes when Emilia is having her grumpy hours I will do the usual feed, burp, change, cuddle and then put her in her basket. If she continues crying I will leave her for about 10-15 mins to see if she will settle. Sometimes she does and sometimes she ends up screaming horrendously and so I go to her but I don't pick her up at first, I will put her dummy in or rock the Moses basket and put my hand on her tummy whilst doing a shushing noise. Then if she still continues screaming and it's been over half an hour she's been in her basket then I will pick her up a while, and repeat the whole process.

I'm not sure if any of that is any help to you. I know how upsetting it is to hear your little girl cry so hysterically like that, it's not pleasant and I really feel for you.
I would say its worth a try to see if she can self settle, I know it's hard but if there's a chance it may work it might be worth it.

I hope that you won't have to do any of this though and the Zantac works wonders and it is just a case of reflux.

Big hugs to you hun

 

[Smanderson]

I found this video a while back - Dr Karp of HBOTB answering a question about why some babies appear to hate being swaddled.

https://youtu.be/Nr_aku07Zvk

I have to agree with many of the responders to this thread. Try swaddling again! Swaddling is what gave me my nights back and helped my 1st baby learn how to relax into sleep. I swaddled my first (at night only) until she outgrew the medium swaddles (we started with a stack of small swaddlemes from my sister). I would swaddle, nurse her to sleep, and then use white noise to keep her there until she woke needing to nurse again.

During the day, using a fully reclined swing (Fisher Price Snugabunny Swing) would put her to sleep fairly quickly. Per HBOTB, put the swing on high (slow and gentle doesn't work) and turn on white noise or music (also on the swing's highest volume setting). Even if baby was crying when she went into the swing, she'd often fall asleep within minutes. If not, then something else was wrong, either a wet diaper, still hungry, or just wanted something else. If she fell asleep while nursing on me, I'd carefully transfer her to the swing and get it going with movement and music.

(This is not to say that DD didn't spend plenty of time sleeping on me. I would often sit for hours with her sleeping on the Boppy with my nipple still in her mouth. I had a laptop or smartphone to occupy me and didn't mind. I don't know how much of this luxury I'll have with a toddler to keep happy, but it's nice to know that I have these tools (swaddle and swing) to fall back on.)

Rocket thanks for the tip about putting the swing on high, i have been just putting ours on the second lowest setting as he would cry if i put it up to the next level but today i tried the highest setting after reading your post and he is soundo! he has reflux and wont settle unless im holding him usually so this is an amazing relief to have another way to settle him. thank you

 

[emilou83]

My daughter is almost 5 weeks old and has been an awful sleeper since day one. We have never been able to put her down to sleep or she would wake up immediately and she only cat naps about 10-20 minutes in very light fitful sleep on my chest about twice per day. This is no matter HOW MUCH effort we put in to put/keep her asleep at the first signs of her being tired. We bounce her on my fit ball, walk her, rock her, use our white noise teddy bear etc etc but she never ever deep sleeps and fights tooth and nail where it can take an hour to just eek out those 15 minutes rest from her! We've tried keeping her snuggled to keep her asleep, putting her down in her bouncer or swing to keep her asleep, and everything else we can think of but she forces herself awake as soon as we stop holding her and is very unhappy screaming her little head off.

She sleeping for three 2 hour stretches during the night waking up for an hour or so to breastfeed in between but it is so fidgety that I end up jiggling and shushing her to keep her asleep most of the night... Meaning I get 1-2 hour broken sleep max with a hot squirmy baby on my chest. She won't even sleep on the bed next to me, so I have to "sleep" propped up with pillows holding her but even more importantly it means my newborn who is supposed to get somewhere around 14-20 hours of sleep per day is only getting 7 fitful hours max.

I know they say you can't form habits this young but it sure feels like we are!!! We are so exhausted and fed up of having to work SO HARD to get her to sleep only for her to wake up fidgeting and then crying 20 mins later and we are worried we are making her too dependent on all that touch and jiggling etc to sleep but the catch 22 is if we don't do that she doesn't sleep AT ALL.

Please, has anyone experienced anything like this and if you did how did you transition your baby to sleeping A) longer B) deeper and more restfully and C) more independently (ie not on my chest where she just ends up rooting to feed even if she's full)

Suggestions would be so helpful! (Ps we've tried swaddling and it is a no go, she ends up purple in the face from screaming so loud she hates it so much and will wake up angry at the first twitch if she can't move her arms)

Hiya,

Know this is years after your post (!) but I found it and you are describing my baby perfectly. He’s 4.5 weeks and has medicine from dr for reflux but he is exactly the same - will only sleep on me, it’s fitful, he’s fractious and I’ve spent the best part of the last 13 hours trying to get him to sleep and he’s resisting and fighting it entirely. Like you I’ve tried everything - did you ever get to the bottom of it or does it just miraculously get better at some point? It’s SO, SO tough!!! xx

 

[Bevziibubble]

This is a very old post the OP is still an active member on here, so hopefully she will come back and update

 

[jessmke]

Honestly, I think it is WAY too early for her to learn some independence. My first was a dream when it came to falling asleep, from the day she was born we just put her down in her crib when she was showing signs of sleepiness and she would just drift off on her own (staying asleep was a different story however!). Then I had my second and he was a lot like your daughter. He would only stay asleep when I was holding him, he could be in the deepest sleep imaginable and would still jolt awake as soon as I tried to lay him down. When my husband was at work he had all of his naps in the ergo carrier with a boob in his mouth and me walking laps around the house/deck and my phone tucked into the back of the carrier blaring white noise so he would stay asleep. On days when my husband was home I would hold him for all his naps while my husband looked after our daughter. I would say this was the routine for the first 3 or 4 months of his life, and then he gradually got better about getting put down. I still had to nurse him to sleep but I would be able to put him down for a good sleep once he was out cold. Then around 8 months I could start putting him down slightly awake and he would drift off on his own. By about 10 months I would put him down wide awake in his crib and he went to sleep on his own. At 5 weeks old she needs comfort and security. I know how exhausting it is to be in this pattern, but it will get better and spending all your remaining energy trying to figure out how to "fix" the problem is just causing you more stress. If having her on your chest is what works, then keep doing that. Things will get better and she will get more independent, but in my opinion 5 weeks is just way too early to expect independence of her.

 

[jessmke]

Oops, just realized this is a super old thread!

 

[Angela Byrum]

Hi my LO is 7wks and does the same thing. He might get 10 hrs of sleep total a day. He only sleeps for 20 mins before he's wide awake again for 2 hrs. He has one 2hr stretch at night and will only sleep while being held. I've tried it all as well. He has reflux and I thought when he got the medicine his sleep would improve but it hasn't. Momma is running on E. Just know you're not alone!

 

[noon_child]

It's tough because a lot if what you describe is normal newborn behaviour (sleep only lasting 20minutes, waking as soon as not in someones arms, unable to fall asleep without movement and contact with caregivers, cluster feeding between 7 and 11) but there are other things that suggest this is a more extreme version that points to something else going on (feeds regularly taking an hour or more, sleep being fitful and unsettled, weight loss). I too think silent reflux describes a lot of your baby's behaviour.

While 14hrs might be the average a child that age gets, some have a lot more and some a lot less. My daughter definitely never had that much (and at 8 weeks went two weeks with zero daytime sleep, ZERO!!! It was hellish) but we also had feeding problems that may have added to this. My baby didn't put on enough weight, struggled to latch, when latched would either not stay on or would be on for close to an hour to get anywhere near full. Do you have good breastfeeding support?

I remember in those early weeks putting the moses basket mattress next to me on the bed, lying baby on it and feeding her on it side lying, them when she was finally asleep attempting to move the entire mattress with her on it back in to the basket through pure desperation to get her to stay asleep!!! Crazy huh!

Once cluster feeding settled down so she didn't need my boob so much in the evening, my husband would have her asleep on his chest from 9pm while I went to bed. He'd bring her to me if she needed a feed but otherwise he'd come to bed at 1am and I'd get up for my shift with the baby. That way I sometimes had a 4hr stretch and he got 5-6 hrs before work. She is now 8 and does not need to lie on daddy's chest to sleep!

 

[HLx]

I remember with my 1st, she wasnt an awful sleeper but definitely worse than my second, and I found by bouncing her nursing her rocking her cuddling her from day 1 made her an even worse sleeper, as soon as she got put down she would wake and start screaming, family and friends would rush and pick her up and that's how it all started.... with my son he would have a bottle, a quick cuddle and down he went from day 1, as much as I could have cuddled him all day every day I remember what it was like with my daughter, if he cried I didn't rush to pick him up, I'd try and settle him where he was sleeping, obviously if that failed I'd pick him up but 9 times out of 10 it worked, I also stopped family and friends picking him up while he was sleeping, or once he fell asleep in their arms, he got put straight down, no sleeping in arms! Lol something worked as he was sleeping through the night by 6 weeks, he would have a feed at 11pm and wake 6am, he did develop reflux shortly after, but it didn't affect his sleep as long as he was propped up!

So definitely doing the same with this baby, as harsh as it sounds, doing it this way helped me get some of the sleep I didn't have with my 1st