Born at 36 weeks exactly, at 11pm
I had suspected ruptured membrane at 35 +4 weeks
Induced at 35+6 weeks
Gave birth vaginally (had epidural) at 36 weeks at night. Did skin to skin.
Born at 2.2 kg
Spent one night in ICU for observations. I think he was struggling with breathing at one point and was spitting up a lot of fluid but was stable very quickly.
Was on antibiotics for 8 hours.
Breastfed him and was topping up with formula in hospital as he would fall asleep a lot then they checked his weight and said I didn’t need to top with formula once I left the hospital. Was in hospital for 3 nights and four days.
At home I was fully breastfeeding. Baby became very jaundiced day 2 at home. Went back to the hospital for intense light therapy treatment.
Started expressing and topping up my feeds to help with jaundice. After 3 nights we went home.
I was fully breastfeeding and topping up with breast milk for around 2 weeks. Baby was putting on weight very well. He had his Brit at 3 weeks old.
He failed his hearing test at the hospital. But we went to the hearing clinic a couple of months later and he was fine. Think it was fluid in his ears.
Seems to have met most milestones but as I haven’t been able to get him properly weighed and checked with at the health clinic I can’t know for sure.
He’s generally a very happy baby. Breastfeeds pretty well. Able to latch on now for longer periods of time as before it was quite short.
I was feeding on demand till about two and half months. Started to slowly stretch him and found it better because he would feed better once stretched.
He’s a sensitive baby. Once upset he will let you know, but generally has a happy and easy-going nature.
Extremely windy and burps a lot and also vomits/posits pretty much after most feeds. On average takes an hour to burp him but this has improved in the last couple of days and wondering if it’s the infacol we’ve been giving him or if he’s just getting older.
Wakes up between sleep cycles and difficult to make him go back to sleep. 45 minute naps. Sometimes longer if we’re lucky!
Most of the time he has his morning and late afternoon nap in the buggy where I rock him to sleep. Or sometimes I go for a walk. The afternoon nap he is happy to have in his cot.
Usually will finish feed at 12. And then need to feed him to sleep for five minutes before he goes down at 12.30pm.
FYI the timings aren’t very prompt. Sleep times and feed times especially at night are approx.
Feeds between 6/7am
Goes back to sleep and wakes up for the day 8am
Plays
Nap from 10-10.45 am
11 am feed
12.30 afternoon nap in his cot in his room
Might get an hour if I’m lucky. Today as I’m writing this it’s been nearly an hour and a half!
2.30 feed
Play
4.15- 5 late afternoon nap
Play
6.15 pm bathtime
6.30/45 pm feed
Wind and rock him for an hour or so before he finally settles to sleep between 8.15/8.30
11pm dream feed. Settles back in his cot in his room.
2am feed – I bring him to our room and put him back down in the chico next to me.
5.30am feed
6.30am feed
Sometimes he only feeds once if I can settle him. But he wakes up every night at those times. It just seems he’s really hungry or windy when he wakes up. He wakes up most of the time screaming. So I usually feed to settle. We have had one night where he slept the night when he was three months. And other nights where after 11pm, the next time he woke up was 4am and the 7am which was good.
We’ve tried to sleep-train with methods from books and online and not feed him when he cries but that hasn’t worked. He gets himself into a state and I end up feeding him anyway. Want to avoid crying out methods as much possible so we have been using generally quite gentle sleep methods and associations. But we are exhausted and need him to sleep the night.
Co-sleeping- I was doing this for at least three months as he wouldn’t settle in his own cot.
This has gradually decreased and now he sleeps most of the night in his own cot and naps either in the buggy or his cot.
Often it does happen that he ends up in my bed by the end of the night if I fall asleep feeding. But once I wake up I move him into the chico next to me.
Dummy- he has had one since birth. Didn’t properly latch into it until a month old but now attached to it and sleeps with it. Usually falls out of his mouth when asleep and I use it to make him go back to sleep if I can when he wakes up. I’ve also used it, especially when he was newborn, to help him burp as he would be in such pain I found it helped relax him and bring up the burp.
Sleepyhead – he sleeps in that in his cot and I have another similar thing in the chico next to me when I move him to my room in the middle of the night.
Comforter- he holds onto your hand and clothes sometimes when trying to self-soothe. I find stroking on the forehead and letting him play with my hand relaxes him and he closes his eyes whilst doing so. When I move or stop he wakes up suddenly and cries. I’ve given him a Comforter which he likes. Sometimes helps sometimes doesn’t.
White noise- we have a little sheep that makes womb noises that we put on at the beginning of the sleep. Not sure if it helps but we always use it.
Rocking- rocking in arms, crib or pram helps settle him to sleep. Very sensitive so once you stop a lot of time he will wake up crying. But it usually works. It’s getting better the last week.
Feeding to sleep – this definitely happens in the middle of the night. A lot of time when we can’t settle him in the evening or afternoon nap I feed to sleep.
Reflux- my eldest son would vomit all the time but never seemed to be in pain. Joshua seems to be in pain and crunches his legs, arches his back and screams. Usually easy to settle with a dummy and once the burp has come out but there have been many nights recently where he’s cried on and off for an hour when we are trying to settle him. He spits up so much sometimes that I need to change both him and myself. We are using infacol most feeds the last few days and seems to have helped. I spoke to the doctor as I just got his last set of vaccinations for the year, and they suggested I started weaning. What do you think?
Swaddling- that has helped a lot and been successful many times to just get him to sleep.
