Newborn waking every 1.5-2 hrs at night too

[2ndontheway]

Hi Ladies,

My 13 day old wakes every 1.5 to 2 hours, usually when she wants to eat. I understand that this is normal and I have no problem with it during the day, but at night time it is exhausting.

I'm basically getting her to sleep at night and then she wakes up 1.5 hours later to eat. Then she will go back to sleep (while nursing) and repeat. She has no long stretch of sleep, nothing over 2.5 hours day or night.

I've tried swaddling and I'm pretty sure she's getting enough milk. Any tips on getting them to sleep just a little longer at night? I would love a 3 or 4 hour sleep stretch; getting about 1 hour at a time is brutal!

If there are no tips, please reassure me that it will get better! I'm so tired and my 3 year old no longer naps so when my husband goes back to work in 2 days I will not be getting naps either.

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

That's what newborns do, they don't come to us with a concept of night and day. It definitely definitely gets better! I don't think Ruby was sleeping more than 1 hour stretches at 13 days, however a week later she was doing 7 hours. Not saying yours will, but it's possible.

 

[KayBea]

It will get better!!!!
My LO thankfully slept 8 hrs a night from 6 days and now 11 hrs.
My sisters LO was the same as yours though and by 4-5 weeks was going 6 hrs at night before needing a feed.
It might be that shes finding suckling a comfort thing..
Only thing i can suggest is a tight (obviously not too tight) swaddle.

Xx

 

[2ndontheway]

Thanks, I think I was really lucky with my son. He was a terrrrrible day sleeper, but slept a 4 hour stretch at night from day 1. I think it was because he was exhausted from being awake most of the day.

I just thought she would have at least one longish stretch of sleep, either during the day or night.

 

[xxClaire_24xx]

aw I feel for you there was a point where Ellie got up at 3am and that was her til 9am when I done the school run!! are you FF or BF and do you live with anyone

Peter and I used to take turns, he worked so I would go to bed about 8pm and he would do the feeds til 1am and then Ellie would sleep til 3am and I would do that feed and she would either be up or sleep til 5 so I would either be up at 3am or 5am but at least I had slept from 8am til 3am and then Peter got sleep from 1am to 7am xx

 

[CeriB]

It does get better .... may not stay that way for long, but it does get there!! Is she cluster feeding? (constantly feeding, normally between 4pm-10pm) If she is or is starting to, it will be her way of stocking up for the night and will start to sleep more because of it. Just make sure you are feeding to demand.

You could introduce a routine for bedtimes (bath, feed, bed for example) and this might help her get nights and days seperate?

 

[punk_pig]

At 13 days I was still setting alarms through the niight to stay on the strict 2hr feed regiment I'd been told to do!

 

[2ndontheway]

I bf and I do have my hubby so we've been talking about me expressing some and then doing something similar--going to bed early, having him do a feed, then me taking over. The only thing is that I pumped two bottles so far to try her on and she barfed both of them up, even using the smallest nipple size and burping her throughout feeding. Silly girl!

 

[puddlecat]

Sorry cant offer any advice but just wanted to sympathise with you as my newborn also does this (I also have a 3 year old daughter that doesn't nap!). He doesn't go longer than 2 hours at night without waking.

Hope your little one sleeps longer soon

xx

 

[tokyo_c]

I don't think my LO managed more than that at night till about 3 or 4 weeks. She's now almost 8 weeks and has never managed more than 4 hours at one time. Hopefully your LO will give you longer stretches soon but I think it's completely normal

 

[moomoo]

Sorry cant offer any advice but just wanted to sympathise with you as my newborn also does this (I also have a 3 year old daughter that doesn't nap!). He doesn't go longer than 2 hours at night without waking.

Hope your little one sleeps longer soon

xx

^wss^

I've been so tired I've been halicinating!

 

[xxClaire_24xx]

I bf and I do have my hubby so we've been talking about me expressing some and then doing something similar--going to bed early, having him do a feed, then me taking over. The only thing is that I pumped two bottles so far to try her on and she barfed both of them up, even using the smallest nipple size and burping her throughout feeding. Silly girl!

why dont you express little and often and freeze it for say 2 weeks and then start the routine with OH then that way you are ahead on the milk, harder said than done lol Ive been there I had to express every 2 bloody hours day and night and then at the NICU I hardly spent time at Ellies incubator cause I had to express have you thought of combi feeding and maybe having her late night feeds formula then you can rest xx

 

[2ndontheway]

^ that's a good idea, thank you. Hopefully she'll be a little less likely to throw up the bottle if I give it a couple of weeks and it'll give me a chance to have some milk on hand.

 

[tu123]

Hi Ladies,

My 13 day old wakes every 1.5 to 2 hours, usually when she wants to eat. I understand that this is normal and I have no problem with it during the day, but at night time it is exhausting.

I'm basically getting her to sleep at night and then she wakes up 1.5 hours later to eat. Then she will go back to sleep (while nursing) and repeat. She has no long stretch of sleep, nothing over 2.5 hours day or night.

I've tried swaddling and I'm pretty sure she's getting enough milk. Any tips on getting them to sleep just a little longer at night? I would love a 3 or 4 hour sleep stretch; getting about 1 hour at a time is brutal!

If there are no tips, please reassure me that it will get better! I'm so tired and my 3 year old no longer naps so when my husband goes back to work in 2 days I will not be getting naps either.

For us it got better! Our LO never slept in her crib and only slept for an hour at a time for about 4 weeks. It was hell on earth sleep deprivation. BIL came over one night and told MIL we looked destroyed! But, it got better!!!

 

[blondey]

Ava-Mae was the same, but she was sleeping longer during the day. She was definatley nocturnal when she was born.

It does get better, usually!!

One thing I would say though is about the expressing and feeding it at night time is that as your LO is still so young your milk supply is still regulating itself. When I was expressing (doing it exclusively) when my LO was 13 days old, I still had to express at night, partly to keep my supply up and partly because I would have become too engorged.

I'm sure it will get easier though when your LO starts taking more and it fills her up for longer she should be able to sleep longer.

xx

 

[peanut56]

It's totally normal. But I promise you, it gets easier. My baby used to sleep 3-4 hours TOTAL in a 24 hour period. Now she sleeps through, and has been since about 2.5 months. It's exhausting, but it does get easier.

 

[pinklightbulb]

Poor thing, mine used to be up every 3 hours on the dot and sometimes less too. It got better when he started doing 5 hours later on. My LO wouldn't take a bottle, some babies don't, but at 13 days yours should get the idea pretty quickly.
The only thing about expressing and BF at the same time is that you can encourage your body to make too much milk if you express too much while your supply is still regulating and you can end up really engorged and sore if you aren't careful Also at that small an age some babies can decide they prefer bottle if they will take it (nipple confusion) and start refusing to BF as bottles are easier for them.
Other than that I would defo express a feed or two for OH in advance for night times. It's no fun when you are seeing things during the day because you are so tired. I was the walking dead when LO was that small as he wouldn't take a bottle so it was all me. I remember exactly how you feel.

 

[Pixoletta]

My son used to wake and also feed every hour and i've been told it's perfectly normal and they are probably right. He is much much better and feeds ever 3-4 hours and only wakes up once or twice. So it will get less exhausting for you!