Baby can be so fussy and angry at times

[Lirpa11]

Sometimes we are unable to settle our 6 week old son no matter what we do. He will cry and cry and cry. Other times he is happy, he will smile, coo, make baby noises etc.

He is usually fine after waking first thing in the morning, then fussy around late morning to midday. He is then content mid afternoon and starts fussing again around dinner one until bed time. Fussiness can range from 30% of the day to 60-70% of the day (awake time). It is exhausting.

I will try to feed him, burp him, gas drops, gripe water, tummy time, toy time, swingy chair, lay him on me, rock him, bath time..: the list goes on. He eventually just falls asleep in my arms.

Is this normal? Will it pass? I am going today to get a script for reflux to see if that helps he was spitting up a few weeks ago (EBF), but hasn't spit up in awhile now.

Then, I get people telling me how their babies never cried and that makes me feel even more awful. What am I doing wrong? Is it me, my milk? He does smile and coo and make sweet noises too so it's not always a screaming and flailing arms marathon... But sometimes it is. How did they get through with a baby that never did that? Are we the only ones?

This makes it hard to make plans, go out and see people, go to town...

Right now he is just smiling and making cooing noises while on his play mat.

I wouldn't trade it for anything, I'll take the bad times with the good. But surely I am not alone?

Thanks

 

[pixxi]

You're not alone! Our little guy is exactly the same at the moment. The last few days, if he wasn't feeding or sleeping, he was crying and it was pretty exhausting. I spent all yesterday googling reflux/colic/cranial osteopathy He's not even smiling or cooing really yet so there's nothing to balance it out. Just keep in mind that babies change every week or so at this age, so whatever your current reality is, it won't last too long.

 

[_Meep_]

Oh, mama. He is a baby! I know you are fully aware of that, lol, but my point, and what I've come to realise, is that babies are mysterious, alien, BIZARRE little creatures. They have things happening in their bodies and minds that will never happen again for as long as they will live - things that happened to us too way back, but that were so monumental - perhaps frightening, or maybe even traumatic - that it's probably a good thing that for the first couple of years of our lives we have practically no long term memory.

I sometimes imagine being born to feel like being removed from your home, your town, your country, even your planet, and deserted in a completely different galaxy, with no option other than to slowly build a relationship with the strange beings therein, in order to survive.

That's pretty terrifying stuff.

Who knows what's going on for your little man right now. He is still very little and still adjusting to his life outside of you. Rest assured that absolutely nothing you have written sounds at all abnormal in the slightest. Your son is communicating with you - no, you may not always know what it is he wants. He probably doesn't either. But he trusts and loves you enough to talk to you about it anyway. And the fact that you are keeping on trying, even though you don't know what it is you are trying to do, far from making you a failure, makes you HIS perfect mum - the one that HE wants.

To be honest, I think people who claim their babies never cry or fuss are stretching the truth. A lot. Yes, some cry more than others, but it won't be this way forever.

In just a few months, things are going to be so different. Your son will become SO AMAZING. Even if you feel you couldn't possibly love him or be amazed by him more, believe me, it will all just grow with him. His current mode of communication will be replaced with far more enjoyable ones that you will both be able to take pleasure in, and all this shit will just be a distant memory.

Please don't worry too much! I know it's so hard living it right now, but it WILL pass.

 

[Lirpa11]

I hope so. We've just finished a crying marathon. He will cry so hard he goes red and gets hot. I can't do anything to calm him, or if he's calm and I move it starts all over again

 

[Lirpa11]

Thanks Meep, your post nearly brought me to tears. I've wondered whether people who say their babies wrre 'good' babies and never cried are stretching the truth or maybe they hve forgotten the crying that went on...

This is all such an up and down road! The first couple of weeks breastfeeding were so hard, and yet it's supposed to be natural. The first few weeks I was in a sleepless daze.

And the questions you get, they astound me. People asking if he is a good baby, and of course he is. He is a baby and only a few weeks old. And at a week old they were asking if he slept well... And I said well he's supposed to sleep 2-3 hours at a time so yes...

It's like all these questions are there to make you doubt if you are doing it right!

 

[bundle4me]

Wow meep that post was beautifully put!!!

Our lo fusses tea time till bed time, this only started a week or so ago and I hope it doesn't last cos I feel very useless when I can't settle her and hate to think she's in pain but I don't no what to do.
Hopefully our babies will grow out of it very soon

 

[_Meep_]

Sounds like you are having quite an emotional rollercoaster of a time.

Let me tell you a little about my baby, and what I've discovered on this mad journey. Mine was one of the 'good' ones ... for about the first 6-8 weeks of her life at least. But that was only because she slept all the time. Once she sort of 'woke up' out of her newborn daze, she cried. Lots. I thought something terrible must have happened to her. I even convinced myself I had given her shaken baby syndrome at one point by jiggling her too vigorously! I went crazy wondering what was up.

What I didn't realise was that she was just being herself - a totally normal baby. She was a late-stage epidural baby and born during a July heatwave, so she was a total zombie to start with. When she came out of her daze, it was a huge shock.

Breastfeeding took six long months to finally become anything more than a desperate fight with a screaming child who wouldn't feed unless she was asleep. It took a further four months before we could feed anywhere other than lying down together in bed.

She hasn't ever slept through the night and even now wakes 1-3 times without fail. She's fifteen months.

All around me, I saw parents of similar-aged children who made everything look easy and made me feel like I was the most crap parent ever, with my lack of routine, unwashed hair and general clueless demeanour about EVERYTHING. At first, I mainly wanted to kill them. Then I started to wonder what personal battles they were dealing with behind closed doors. What did THEIR babies do that worried and frustrated them? And I am 99% sure everyone has something, even if they do try to hide it.

In time, I slowly started to feel like I was getting somewhere. As my daughter was able to communicate more and give more feedback, it became apparent just how much she cared for me, despite my unwashed hair, lax routines and the fact that I didn't, and still don't, have a clue what I am doing. SHE DOESN'T CARE. I am enough for her, exactly as I am.

There is no 'right' way to do things. Whatever you do, you're always going to have days where you feel like you've done ok and days where you wish you could crawl into a hole and never resurface. But the balance will tip ... soon enough you'll suddenly realise that actually you're wanting to crawl into that hole less and less ...

Of course he is a good baby. How could he be a bad one? He has no concept of either behaviour. Crying does not make him a bad baby. Crying makes him a normal baby. And NOBODY'S baby sleeps 'well' at a week old, considering they want to eat all the time. Anyone who makes out otherwise is talking crap.

The people who ask these questions have clearly forgotten the mind-numbing conquest that is the transition to parenthood. It's damned hard.

 

[hlynne]

Meep,

Thanks so much for these posts!! I'm sure you have made a lot of FTM's feel a whole lot better about things....including me!!

It's definitely a roller coaster and I don't know what I'm doing most of the time!

Thanks again!

 

[_Meep_]

You're welcome. It sucks that people have to feel like this, because the 'joy' of motherhood you read and hear about constantly is largely an engineered reality. It's photoshopped, if you like. It's airbrushed.

The journey into motherhood is the most conflicted journey you will ever take. It's bliss. It's agony. It's terrifying. It's wondrous. All at the same time - much as the day of the birth was the most horrendous, but also the best day of most mothers' lives.

Nobody seems to TALK about the gritty bits though. People like to put on a front and present only the perfect parts of their lives ... whether they have babies or not. But when you DO have a baby, mama-wars become a serious thing, and when you're new to the job and struggling, that can really hurt.

The fact of the matter is though, those mothers struggled too, even though they won't ever admit to it. Or to farting. Or eating cake in their underwear. Whatever - so I'm not perfect. But my daughter thinks I am. And since I now live my life for her, that's a pretty good situation.

Once I stopped worrying so much about what everyone else was doing and wondering what they thought about what I was doing, I felt much better. It really doesn't matter. I'm not ashamed to admit to the parts where I have failed, or even laugh about how incompetent I can be, despite usually having the best intentions. I just wish more people could do the same, so we could share the load a little and maybe even have a snigger at the poop accidents, the nursing bra fails, the times we wet ourselves when we sneezed. We're all in the same boat: we should all be rowing.

 

[MindUtopia]

Yes, I think that's very normal. Things that we found helped: a wrap (helped me have my hands free and helped my daughter feel soothed and secure), this also meant I could do important things like eating regularly (it's so much harder to just deal with everything when you're hungry or thirsty or need to use the toilet and can't because you're trying to soothe your LO). Also, going outside. Often going outside in the wrap. You don't know how much time we spent outside in the garden, especially late afternoon and early evening, dancing around with our daughter. Being outside makes such a difference though. I think it's the change in the air, temp, light, new things to see, more relaxing for us, whatever. It really helped. Also, just know it really won't last forever. My daughter literally wasn't put down at all for the first 3 months. She was most content in our arms. We took lots of walks to get fresh air. She spent lots of nights sleeping on daddy's chest while he wanted box sets on tv because that was the only place she'd sleep. But then it does get much easier. The first 6-8 weeks are especially hard. It's all very normal.

 

[jodilee6]

Here's my insight as a second time mum...

Yes its hard, you're exhausted, you just want a hot drink, a wee or even just 5 minutes and this little person is crying at you. They've been crying for almost an hour and you just don't know what's wrong, you've tried everything and they are still crying.

While it feels like hell at the moment it will pass, soon that crying dependent baby will become a smiling 3 month old, then a sitting 6 month old, then before you know it you're celebrating their first birthday and the newborn days are a distant memory.

DS 2 is colicky and meditated for reflux, he is such a different baby from DS1 when he's not asleep he is so grumpy and just wants cuddling all.the.time. This is exhausting and draining but then I look at DS1 who is now a fiercly independent 3yo who really doesn't need me as much any more and it reminds me just how little DS2 is.

I do what I can at the moment to get through the day, slings and lots of cuddling to sleep.

the day's become weeks which become months, we've just started having smiles and it's made all the grumpy days worth it.

Your baby is still so little and is working out the world just like you are, hang tough mama, this phase will pass and then the next will start!

 

[sil]

And second time moms (me)! And even probably 3rd and 4th.

Thank you both to meep and hlynne for being so open and honest. It means a lot, probably more than either of you know.