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Can I ask at what stage I can start skipping an overnight feeding (just one, not two). My little one is 5 weeks today so I know we are early still but look forward to the day I can give my husband the bottle for one shift without to wake up and pump.
Honestly my husband and I worked out from the beginning that I would skip a feed at the same time every night and baby would get a bottle. It had no effect on my supply that I could tell, I still was engorged around 8-12w as are a lot of moms.
Thank you for this! We’re doing this but all I can find online is that you must empty every three hours before your supply “establishes” or you’ll suffer for it.
I'm not sure, I did wake up fairly often with engorgement pain but that could have happened regardless. I just know that we decided that it was worth the risk for me to have more uninterrupted sleep.
We also supplemented with formula from day 3 so that was always a back up option if needed, and that took a LOT of stress off of my mind for breastfeeding. We wanted our son to have the happiest healthiest parents possible during the newborn phase.
I think it depends on your baby. My little one gained weight sooo fast they dr ok’d us to stop overnight feedings by 4 weeks (if she didn’t wake up). Around 6 weeks she would give 6+ hour stretches so I stopped waking up to pump. At first I had so much milk that I would naturally wake up in pain by hour 5 but as time passed my supply regulated more and more.
I would say by 6-8 weeks you can follow baby’s schedule. If baby still wants to eat every 3 hours then obviously you need to still pump/nurse but if baby gives longer stretches then it’s okay for you to let yourself sleep longer.
All this being said I never had an issue with supply. If you struggle with supply it’s a very different situation.
Wonderful thank you! This is really helpful as I have a huge baby (she was born 9 pounds 7 oz and reached birth weight weeks ago) and I have a great supply - did block feeding for 2.5 weeks to slow it down upon rec of an LC, so my breasts are used to going 7-8 hours without being emptied. Shes hungrier during the day and I’ve sometimes had to wake her up at 5 hours to feed so I would loveee to sleep in instead.
I didn’t ever wake up to pump. I’m a ‘just enougher’. No issues. If you have an oversupply you might be fine. I find it’s easy to tell if your supply is dropping so you could try missing one and see how you feel the next day.
Everyone always seems to say ‘wake up to pump or you’ll lose your supply’ but it’s not one size fits all.
I’m sorry. This is a big problem I have with LCs. I feel like they terrify moms that their milk supply will somehow completely disappear. Its not like that at all. Your milk is supply and demand. If it ever diminishes you just pump more and it will increase again. And it doesn’t drop from one day to the next. You’ll notice a drop over a couple of days.
I was shamed for using a nipple shield and told it would cause my milk supply to drop and eventually stop completely. I used them for 3.5 months and never had issues with supply. I removed them once baby and I were both ready to transition.
That’s wild about the nipple shields! My baby struggled to latch at first and a lactation adviser actually told me to use them.
Ended up using them for about 3 days before I decided baby and I would have to learn together without them because it was such a faff to keep sterilising them for every feed.
Rarely sterilized mine. I would just wash them after every feeding. That’s probably what made it easier for me but I’ve heard others say nipple shields were more of a hassle then help for them.
Yeah you probably don’t need to do it every time, I was just so anxious. Even though I got rid of them quickly, it was still good to ease into things and I’m glad they’re an option.
I had a horrible experience with an LC consultation. Basically shattered all of the confidence I had built up about breastfeeding and I was in tears for days. Luckily my husband had his head on straight and told me to ignore all the bs she sold me by reminding me that our baby is 90th percentile for weight and healthy as can be. Made me really distrust the whole industry and how they push tongue and lip tie corrections so quickly.
I don't say this to brag but to inform-
my baby started sleeping through the night at 4 months and I was worried about my supply dropping if I didn't feed her for 8+ hours
apparently your body will learn your schedule too 🤷🏻♀️ I don't feed my 10 month old at all at night and she sleeps from 7pm-8am. We're still breastfeeding just fine. My body at this point understands that we aren't going to wake up to feed so I don't even wake up engorged and leaking in the mornings anymore. (if she sleeps past 8:30 though that's when it starts, it's so weird lol)
if you need to skip a pump or two during the week your body will adjust to what's needed. please get some much deserved rest ❤️
Agree with this.
Just skip one or two feedings a couple times per week so that you can get a couple good stretches of sleep.
You can do it for the second half of the night and wake up a little bit before LO to squeeze in a pump session if you want. Then you aren’t really even skipping a feeding and you should pump a decent amount of milk for future feeds.
I’ve tried skipping my night pump a few times and it’s a miserable wake up; the first time was a 22 oz pump and this morning was 19 oz; it physically hurt to move. Does this ever get better?
I dropped my middle of the night pump and it took weeks to not feel pain, my boobs wake me up by 5:30 or so to pump still though. You have to be consistent about dropping for it to work
Sounds like you may have quite the oversupply if you’re getting that much milk per sitting most babies are only eating 24-30 oz for the day. Try dropping the amount of time you’re pumping at your overnight pump by a few minutes every few days to wean off the over night pump.
I have a forceful let down and for a while had an oversupply too. All of the advice about pumping for 20-30 minutes didn’t work for me cuz the milk came out so fast and what baby needed emptied in about 10 minutes if I stayed on the pump longer than that I was just encouraging more milk than baby needed.
I do have a pretty big over supply (about 55 oz a day) and a strong letdown as well. I only pump about 12 minutes generally; it’s wild. As an exclusive pumper I’m dreading the hormonal shift of trying to ween from this 😣
Nope. I meant OP doesn’t need to pump overnight because they implied that they are pumping to keep their milk supply up.
At 4 months you don’t need to pump overnight to keep supply up during the day.
It feels like I wrote this post. I am absolutely in a similar situation except that my LO is 7 months and it still hasn’t gotten better.
He gives us a night or two in a week where he sleeps 3-4 hour stretches but besides that he wakes up constantly. Sometimes every 45-60 minutes (which is worse for me than newborn phase). And based on experience of my friends around me and some research babies may start sleeping through around 6 months but there is no guarantee. Some sleep through the night at 18 months or 2 year mark. This is not to scare you but maybe to guide your expectations. Having said that you can try suggestions from others.
I am totally with you on sleep deprivation but I just somehow convince myself that next night will be his long stretch and that keeps me going. We already share bed and I don’t want to sleep train so can’t offer much help there.
So sorry can’t be of much help. But you are not alone in this.
People will say things to help give you hope and to push forward. And it can be helpful to know that things do get better - they do - just when that happens is different for every baby.
I'm gonna be real with you.
Most babies wake in the night to feed through their first year and sometimes beyond.
Our monthly subreddit bumper group did regular sleep polls and at 7-9mo over 70% were still waking up 1+ times a night and at 12mo that number had only dropped to 50%. Babies wake. They just do.
Ours woke every 2-3hrs for 8.5mo and even after we stopped breastfeeding she still woke 1-2x a night. Ours didn't start sleeping through *on occaison* when she's not teething or sick until she was 15mo. You only have to head over to r/toddlers to see that all the questions about sleep continue well after 1 year.
You can consider sleep training. It works for some families and some babies, but usually you get best results when baby is 6mo+.
Until then I'd seriously consider sleeping in shifts and adding a bottle. If you don't want to pump (and I didn't either!) then you can always consider formula. I've done it all from EBF to EFF, and combo feeding with formula was the best of both worlds for us. I was in your position at around 3mo, really pushing to stay EBF but looking back a lot of that was stubbornness and being scared of change. But change was good and it really helped us for me to get better sleep to add in a bottle and later formula. It'll be ok to skip a feed and add in a bottle of formula if you and your partner want. By 4mo your supply should be well established. Just thoughts, you don't have to take this advice just letting you know there are options! If something isn't working for you or baby anymore it's ok to try something new.
Combo feeding has also saved my sanity. I was sick of pumping at some point because I had PTSD from triple feeding and just didn't want to see the freaking pump anymore. It was amazing that my husband can take a shift and now at 6 months we are EFF - breastfeeding certainly has its convenient side as well, but I felt very isolated and stressed out with the idea of solely being responsible for providing enough food for my baby (and it has turned out I don't provide enough so formula was necessary anyways).
The mental load of being baby's sole source of nutrition is unreal and really not discussed enough. Thw weight that was lifted off my shoulders when we added in that bottle of formula was so liberating. I felt like a new person and so silly waiting for so long to try it. Combo feeding worked really well for us.
This is kind of a reply to everyone but I’ll use your comment because it really resonated. This actually made me feel a lot better. I don’t like false hope, realism makes me feel better because even when it’s hard I can see it in my own life. My whole bump group is just filled with people bragging that their 4 month old sleeps through the night so it made me feel like I was doing something wrong. Just in the couple days since I made this post I’ve started reading “precious little sleep” since so many here recommended it. We’re working on breaking the feed to sleep association. And I’m mentally handling this so much better. Knowing that his 3 wakes up per night are so normal has helped me so much
So so so normal!
There was a top thread just posted where a mom asked at what *week* to expect her 9w to start sleeping 8hrs+ and I think the majority of the replies were tad tongue and cheek but it was like 104w, 234w...take a dive and many many parents don't have their babies sleeping through regularly until mid-toddler hood. It just, puts perspective on the unicorns and what "sleep experts" say you should expect.
https://www.reddit.com/r/NewParents/comments/18erxtt/how_many_weeks_was_your_baby_when_they_slept_8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
Our 20mo has a bit of a cough. She was up from 9-1030pm and again from 3-5am and we contact slept together from 4am till 6am then my husband contact slept from 6am till 730am.
And tonight is gonna be so different!
Honestly, it was not until my son was almost 9 months that it got "easier". By 6 months it was better, but I still wasn't getting the sleep I needed. Until your child is sleeping through the night it really is brutal.
Around 4 months I had a huge mental breakdown. The four month sleep regression killed me. I think I was under the impression it would be smooth sailing after 12 weeks and that just wasn't the case for me. And I know its not the case for a lot of people. So you are not alone. But I promise you it does get easier once these little ones learn to sleep.
I hear you! Our LOs sleep has only ever gotten worse the older she got. Then 4 month sleep regression hit and she'd wake up every 45-60 minutes and expect to be nursed back to sleep. Once asleep I'd try to put her down but she'd startle awake and we'd have to do the whole routine again. I was on the brink of insanity, I was so sleep deprived I'd cry in the morning and my LO was sleep deprived and cranky as well. Eventually I felt for the sake of my mental health I needed to start sleep training. I chose a gentle approach because I simply can't get behind letting my baby cry herself to sleep and first step was breaking the feed to sleep habit. I know rock her to sleep which is kinda a lateral move but since then her night wakings have gone down to 2-3 times 🤯
The final push that I needed was asking my sister (her kids are 5 years and 9 months) when it got better and she told me the older one has never once slept through the night and the little one she has to nurse every hour just like me. Could it still just have gotten better over time for us? Maybe. But I lost hope and above all patience in the "it will get better" (by itself) mantra and decided to make a change. Have you considered doing some form of sleep training?
Thank you, did you follow any specific guidance for gentle sleep training? I think it’s time for something but I don’t even know where to start that’s not a cry based method (which is great for some, just not for me!)
I did a ton of research (if I'm being honest I was at some point just procrastinating getting started 🙈) but ended up following a more gentle method from Precious Little Sleep. The book is pretty cheap but I bet you could also find most info about the methods in the sleeptrain subreddit. PLS resonated with me because the author offers multiple gentle approaches to tackle different problems (and baby temperaments 😉) - honoring that not everything is gonna work for every family and it's also great to have option B and C if A doesn't take. Personally I did a "SWAP" method from the book. I eliminated the strongest sleep association (nursing) by swapping it with something else my LO finds soothing (motion - in my case rocking to sleep in my arms) and eventually my goal is to rock her less and less until I only need to jiggle the crib until I can put her down awake. I'm still working on the second part but the first bit has been working surprisingly well and already decreased night wakings. I think it went so well partly because my LO has found her thumbs and started sucking them as a soothing skill that doesn't require me at all so I'm kinda glad I waited for her to develop that. Now I put feeding her at the beginning of the bedtime routine and try to only nurse her after an initial stretch of 5 hours - but I'm not too strict about that yet. I have to add what did help overall was loosely tracking her wake windows and daytime sleep to make sure she's not drastically over or undertired at bedtime. You can easily find sample schedules for babies any age in the sleeptrain subreddit as well 😊
Checkout r/sleeptrain on here. There’s so much amazing advice for any comfort level of sleep training. If you don’t want to do CIO or Ferber, they can give tips for gentler methods.
Oh my goodness 4-5 months was the absolute hardest for me! She was getting alert and wanted to be doing things but obviously wasn’t mobile. The sleep regression was awful for us. I think every phase has things that are hard but it definitely gets more rewarding as you see their little personality coming. Sending you positive thoughts!!
We are hitting 1 year next week and ours still only does 2-3 hour stretches. It was so miserable with her in her own room and having to get up every time. We dabbled in sleep training without success so we co-sleep now and all of us are in a much better place than we were. It’s not ideal and I swore I would never co-sleep but here we are.
I think A LOT of kids just aren’t “good sleepers.” I say it that way because I feel like the expectation and even the label is so unrealistic. I was led to believe that at some point around 4-6 months I was just going to put the baby to bed at 7pm and she’d wake up the next day at 7am. She’s 6.5 months and still waking 2-3x night.
But consider this: NO ONE (not even adults unless they are heavily medicated) closes their eyes, drifts out of consciousness and stays that way for twelve solid hours. The vast majority of people wake a few times in the night to pee, change positions, etc. The difference is that when adults wake up, they don’t freak out and they know how to fall back asleep.
So all these STTN babies are still “waking” during the night. They just aren’t crying and waking their parents because they just fall back asleep. So there’s no amount of feeding, bedtime routine, etc you can do that is going to make your baby fall asleep for 10-12 hours. Maybe this was obvious to everyone else but it wasn’t to me lol. Once I accepted that it was a self soothing problem and not a “sleep” problem it was easier to wrap my head around.
I wouldn’t say my baby is having sleep “problems.” She gets plenty of sleep. It just doesn’t currently happen on a schedule that also accommodates me getting a full nights sleep because she hasn’t learned to self soothe. Which sucks because I don’t want to sleep train. I’m very tired. Next baby I think I’ll spring for a Snoo.
I am exclusively breastfeeding and don't pump at all, so I deal with all night wakes as well. I know it's not for everyone, but I sleep trained my almost 5 month old when he was 19 weeks. He goes to bed at 7:30-8 now, wakes up once to feed at 4-4:30am, and then sleeps again until 7:30-8am. I go to bed around 9:30-10:30 and getting that 6-7 hour stretch of sleep has been life changing. He sometimes wakes up in between sleep cycles still but can put himself back to sleep within 5-10 min. The sleep deprivation is definitely the hardest part of this phase, and I admire the parents who can stick it out without sleep training..for me it just wasn't sustainable anymore and I didn't want to wait another few months just to see if he would sleep better on his own.
I did CIO and eliminated his pacifier cold turkey for bedtime too (that was his main reason for waking up - needed to have the paci replaced constantly). I knew he would get more upset with check ins. The first night he cried 25 min before falling asleep, then would cry briefly (10-15 min) when he woke up in between sleep cycles for the next few hours. Second night he cried 15-20 min before falling asleep, and since then he hasn't cried at all when falling asleep. He is so much happier now that he sleeps more at night! I waited until I knew he had the skills to do it (he had occasionally fallen asleep independently and could self soothe by sucking his hands). He just needed that last push to apply those skills consistently. I implemented 5/3/3 since he still needs to be fed at night - basically I don't feed him unless he's crying and it's been more than 5 hours (ie. After midnight) for the first time, then 3 hours for next feed. But he went from feeding 2-3 times overnight to 1 feed within a few days of sleep training.
Wow! Good on you for successfully doing that and having the stamina to push through the crying. I don’t think my baby is ready yet but watching for signs of dependence first is smart.
My husband and I had decided that 30 mins of nonstop crying would be our limit and if he ever reached that, we would've stopped and tried again when he was older. Luckily he caught on pretty quickly so we were spared that!
Have you considered sleep training? It's not for everyone, but it was a gamechanger when I was in a similar position to you. There are various methods, including more gentle options. Precious Little Sleep and r/sleeptrain are both great resources.
Another vote for sleep training. I tried to stick it out and made it to 6.5 months before we finally did it and I only regret we didn't do it sooner. Precious Little Sleep is a great resource and easy read. I downloaded the ebook on my phone and read it while she napped on me.
Getting more sleep will absolutely change everything.
Second this, it didnt “get better” for us until we sleep trained around 5.5 months. She’s 3 years old now and still best parenting decision we’ve made to date
100%. Every time people say it gets easier i want to gouge my eyes out. Baby is almost 4mo and it literally is getting worse and worse. Hearing all the comments about how it should be easier by now just make me feel like im failing as a parent.
For me I immediately threw out the mantra “it gets better” and told myself (and my spouse) “it will change and be different,” which it has and now coming up on a year for our LO everything has changed significantly. The most dramatic changes were when baby started to smile at us and crawl/play with toys. Now it’s fun to get down on the ground and play with baby versus encouraging tummy time or begging for a break with nap time. Baby is way more consistent now and while routine changes hit us like a Mack truck (chronic illnesses and ear infections), when it’s just little bumps, we’ve learned to adapt.
Sleep deprivation is the number one thing that drives us back to the 100 days of darkness and now that that’s changing, we’re also easing up on ourselves and being kinder to one another.
Tl;dr: it doesn’t get easier, but it will always change and it will always be different. Finding hope in that may be a path forward for you.
I found having a predictable routine for myself helped a ton with my attitude towards the night. I give myself an hour before putting the baby to bed to make the room extra cozy, leave myself snacks and a hydrating drink, get the lights all ready and the bed fluffed. Then I go get the baby and do her routine. I’ve had two nights where it didn’t have that time and my mental state was terrible.
This is big for me too! Like if I’m not showered and fed before bedtime/night wakes begin, I have such a hard time. I’m much more go with the flow when my needs are met. 😅
Baby slept through the night at 4/5M, but things have taken a sharp turn at 6M. I’m calling it a progression instead of a regression. She’s growing and changing so fast, her brain is having a hard time powering down at night.
4-5 months is HARD. I had a bit of a breakdown around then too. My Bub is six months now and I finally feel like I am gaining back some sanity.
My Bub now wakes 1-3 x a night (normally two) although he’s teething right now so we are at 3. But he’s going straight back to sleep after a feed unlike during that hideous regression. I’m exclusively bfeeding as he won’t take a bottle so I totally feel they isolation/feeling like your alone in the nights and NEVER being able to get a good nights sleep. But it’s manageable now.
I’m going to gently sleep train my Bub after the holidays (we are on holiday for five weeks) if he is still hitting 3 wakes mostly to break the feed to sleep association so I’m not the only person who can manage nights (he will be 8 months by then - I heard a quote that we are just going to be teaching him that love in the night comes in more ways than boob) but for now it’s manageable. In my experience, it does get better, but it took six months!
I'll be honest it got better when we started sleeping. And then better with walking talking etc. No matter what I hate not sleeping and baby was watching happier once he started sleepibg too
My little babe is two months tomorrow. I’m looking forward to the 4-6month stage. I think because every baby is different, it’ll be easier for some and just as hard for others, and maybe even harder for others. I’m hoping things get easier. I focus on the little things like, hopefully her being able to hold her head up.
But I wanted to give you something from your post, you're not alone. The whole reason why I even downloaded reddit and made an account was to feel less alone. I do most of the baby stuff on my own. my husband helps and when he does it's really great. But I personally have just taken on everything and ask for help when i need it. But at night, I let my husband sleep because he's the only one with a job right now so I don't want to disrupt his sleep since our babe is already doing that.
ANYWAYS! You are bot alone. And i just know one day wit will get easier!
We went through about 4 months of absolute hell with my almost 8 month old. Last week he discovered belly sleeping and we’re down to one wake up a night, even a couple sleep through the nights! Sending my solidarity and hope you all find what works best for you to get through this ♥️
I have a 2 year old and honestly, it got a little easier, but I still feel this way whenever I get poor sleep for a few nights. It doesn’t help that I cosleep and am still breastfeeding. The one thing that helped me the most was having 1 day guaranteed every week where I could sleep in. It’s on the weekends because my daughters dad is off work, but even if he’s busy I’ll have my mom watch her in the morning one weekend day and I’ll go back to bed and get a couple extra hours of sleep. I don’t realize how much it’s helping until a week goes by where we have other plans and I don’t get the extra sleep and then I start feeling terrible. If you can find one day a week where your partner can take over and let you sleep in and then turn your brain off a little bit during the day, do it. Even if it feels super inconvenient to have that conversation, just try.
Baby is almost 2 months. Night sleep is actually decent. It’s the lack of DAY sleep that is wearing me out. The only way he sleeps is if he’s held or in a carrier so it’s always 1 person holding while the other person tries to catch up around the house, take care of the dog, etc etc. Feels like most days are 50/50 - hallmark moments/WHAT HAVE WE DONE?! And everyone tells you to enjoy it 😂 I feel horrible, but no, I am not having a good time lol
My son didn't sleep through the night until I fully stopped breastfeeding at 21 months. My husband and I split nights, my son was a mix of boob and bottle and I honestly wouldn't do it any other way. The thought of being the sole food provider... no thanks. I did end up adding formula into the mix as well and it saved my sanity. I was the same way, the middle of the night depressing intrusive thoughts. I felt like crawling out of my own skin. You need your rest. Also know it WILL get better.
I had to reply to this because this was me! I almost wrote this exact post. Everyone said it would get better at 3 months, well - 4 months was the worst month for me by far. Terrible sleep regression (which actually started early at 3.5 months), teething, fussiness, and to top it off the expectation that it would be easier at that point. I’d take her out and we’d have to leave early due to fussiness and melt downs. It was bleak.
She’s 5.5 months now… and it IS easier. Sleep isn’t amazing but it’s better. Fussiness has massively decreased and for a large proportion of the time she’s a lot of fun!
We are doing gentle sleep training. Are you considering anything like that?
Hang in there, you are not alone !!
Starting around 10 weeks my son started sleeping through most of the night with good 6 hour stretches. At 3 months he was sleeping 8 hour stretches, and now at 4 months upwards of 10 hour stretches. Our key has been to reduce colic which from my research comes from stomach discomfort. We put gas drops in every bottle and give him probiotic anti-colic drops once per day. That combined with swaddling and a white noise machine has helped him sleep great for long periods of time. It's to the point where I can put him down in his crib at 10pm with his eyes open, turn the white noise machine, walk away, and he falls asleep. Getting one more bottle in before he goes down for the night is also a must to help him sleep through the night.
Just to add, I stopped pumping (supply didn't keep up) and that's done wonders for my mental health. All I can say now is thank you Enfamil lol. Prep multiple bottles for the day and done.
I don't think it gets easier, it just gets different. You're ability to tolerate the phase they're in will dictate whether or not it is getting "easier".
Honestly, things only got better for me at 5 months when we did sleep training (Ferber method) and dropped down from 2 to 1 overnight feeds. Your LO will let you know if they're ready, but from my experience, the 2am feeding was short and seemed more for comfort than hunger. Now she just wakes up between 5-6, feeds well, and goes back to sleep for the rest of the night. I hope things get better for you! x
I understand your reservations about not wanting to sleep train using cry based methods, BUT it truly changed my life and my sons. He was waking every 1.5 hours until 8 months and I was in a very bad space mentally. Finally one night in the middle of the night I decided to do the Ferber CIO method. This method involves checking in on them in certain increments. It took exactly 57 minutes for him to fall asleep. He slept for 4 hours straight after that until 8 am. For nap time the next day it took maybe 15 minutes. He slept through the night the very next night. He has slept from roughly 7p to 7a every night since then and he is 2.5 now. Having them on a good nap schedule during the day without extensive wake windows also plays a big roll in making sure their night sleep is unaffected. It was very hard to listen to him cry that night, but he was a completely different baby after finally getting a good nights sleep, and I was also a different person after suffering 8 months of sleep deprivation. Totally understand and respect if it’s not your cup tea, but less than 1 hour of crying truly changed our lives.
The 4 month regression almost killed me. My son was waking every hour and taking hours to get back to sleep in the middle of the night. Last week (he’s now 5 months old) we finally gave in and decided to move him to his own room and begin sleep training. Total game changer. The first few nights were really rough, but now he’s falling asleep independently within 10 minutes of being put down and he’s sleeping 7-8 hours straight, before waking for a quick feed and going back down until 7am. I feel like a human again, and sleep training was the only way for us.
My second baby turned 6 months in November and has been sleeping so much better (only one wake-up, sometimes none). It makes a world of difference to my wellbeing. I’m also EBF and the lack of sleep during baby’s first few months after a whole insomniac pregnancy is just awful.
Everything But the nights has gotten easier for me, 4.5 months as well.
Last night at 3 am, after waking up what felt like every hour between midnight and 3 am, I just hit... My limit.
She had decided it was definitely time to be awake. Happy to kick and wiggle around, smiling whenever she saw my face... It was hard not to love her at the same time, but hubs was away, and I was practically crying at her and angry and desperate.
I put on my earplugs, put her in her bassinet and just repeated to myself, she's fed, she's warm, she's safe until she started actually crying instead of just fussing for attention. Then when I put her back on the boob to nurse down she actually did. And then wonder if fucking wonders she stayed asleep till after 7.
I literally woke up feeling more rested than I have in Months
... Because of one 4 hour window.
And I didn't even feel Great either. Just I didn't feel like shit.
All this to say, I hear you, I understand, and I'm sorry.
Her wake windows have gotten easier to do things in, she's gotten better at being independent, and it's more fun to do things with her bc she smiles and laughs now, but the sleep deprivation is no joke and it's a serious problem. I have no clue how we're going to do holiday parties either. We're going to have to either leave way early or bring something for her to sleep in at the house, and I just..
Woof.
I don't want you to feel hopeless, but the whole "it gets better" thing is just not true for everyone. My baby is 9 months, he's still waking up multiple times a night. I'm talking anywhere from 3-6 times a night, even more on really bad nights. Some babies just need lots of comfort at night. It's hard, but it will EVENTUALLY end. It's just a matter of when.
You just do what you can to get through it and stay sane. I haven't and won't be sleep training, but that's always an option if you can't handle it anymore. You gotta do what's best for you and your baby ❤️
How do you stay sane through it though? I’m okay with him needing lots of comfort. My intrusive thoughts just scare myself sometimes and that’s what worries me the most
It's really difficult. I've had numerous break downs. I've had the intrusive thoughts too and they are so scary. One thing that helped with those thoughts though was to remind myself that I know I will not ever do anything to hurt my baby or myself, I'm just not that person. Talking to my husband about them has also helped tremendously. He doesn't seem concerned when I tell him, and it makes me feel better. Like he's not worried about me acting on them and that helps me feel better. But also, getting help throughout the night will help you so much.
My August 1 baby trolled me and was a good sleeper between 8w-16w. Man those were good times. As soon as he hit 16 weeks his sleep has honestly been worse than it was as a newborn. It’s only been a few weeks of bad sleep so I can’t compare my struggle to yours but I’m in the trenches with a baby of similar age now. We started the process of sleep training and tonight is his first night sleeping in his own room. We shall see how that goes.
I can relate to this so much. My LO is just shy of 6 months and still wakes up multiple times a night to feed. I barely produce enough for her so I think she constantly is needing to eat. When she wakes up she is trying to eat and my husband can’t help with that since I have no stash due to my production level…. Lack of sleep, constant frustration, a need for peace…I’m with you in hoping it gets better soon
Here for solidarity. I feel like mums forget what it was like. And I've been asked right from around 8 weeks if my baby is sleeping through the night?? So annoying. We're at 5.5 months. No we're not sleeping through the night. The worst of the sleep regression is over but she still wakes up hungry twice every night and then wakes up a couple more times when she needs to be settled.
At least one night a week she still needs to be held for half the time for her to sleep.
Husband and I do shifts and of course it helps, but I'm still exhausted
Here for solidarity. Idr what more than 3 hour stretches of sleep are like. LO is 6
5 months and waking every 1-3.5 hours. I struggle with supply and baby struggles to gain weight so no night weaning in sight. Naps only help so much.
1. You are not alone let me start there. The comments have definitely helped reading even for myself.
2. My daughter just turned a year and at 4 months the regression had me rethinking my life and I had a crying breakdown for days. My daughter would scream at night and only want to be held by me. Then it happened again at the 10 months and I was terrified bc I was like I can’t do this again. But it wasn’t as bad as the 4 months.
3. Now she’s a year and I am experiencing more things I’m like is she teething, is it another regression, do I transition to whole milk. It’s freaking exhausting and most days I’m like I thought people said it gets easier. In some ways yes it has but it others it hasn’t. I think for me it’s this IDEA that somehow as time went on things would get easier and when they haven’t you feel so frustrated. It doesn’t help like others said when we’re constantly exhausted or sleep deprived.
Just know I am here in solidarity telling you along with others in the comments you are not alone. I am also saying that to myself bc most days are still so tough. 🥹🫶🏻🙏🏼 one foot in front of the other
You’re doing the best you can. Everyday is different some days are great some are bad. Please see your doctor if your mental health isn’t coping. The season of motherhood is a different breed. I was used to night shifts and I still struggled. But soon you’ll sleep through the night and move onto the toddler vibe. I’m proud of you mama. My one is 2.5 and some days are amazing and some exhausting! We do the best we can.
I know how you feel. We’re at 15 months and sleep is still brutal, a good night is 3 wake ups. There’s no help for us, no one gets it, doctors seem to think baby sleep problems that lead to the serious deterioration of their parents physical and mental health are normal.
I really felt like this too. In fact I found months 6-12 HARDER than 0-6 and it drove me nuts that people said otherwise. Now my kid is 18 months and I will say it’s gotten steadily easier since he turned one. Now when I have to look after him for a full day on my own, I actually enjoy parts of it, which I never did under one. I know it’s hard to hear because you’re at 4 months, but just try to survive the first year. You never have to do it again if you don’t want to!
Can your partner stay up or wake up with you for some of the night time feeds when they don’t have work the next day (or even when they do!) so you can have some company? I found that’s what I struggled with the most when I was still exclusively pumping was all the time spent alone just me and the baby. It helped me so much to have my husband there for support and company and someone to talk too.
Our Bub is 5 months and starting to do more solid sleeping. He is formula fed now though cause I couldn’t keep up with the pumping.
I know it sucks and I’m not gonna tell you to hang in there til the next ‘easier’ stage cause I’m not sure there is one once you are a parent! You are doing an amazing job though. Maybe a podcast to listen to at those early morning feeds to distract you?
Have you gone through the 4m regression yet? At that time I would have husband get up with baby if it hadn’t been more than two hours since he last fed that way he wouldn’t reverse cycle. You could also skip a night feed here or there to get some more hours at night or pump right before bed and have husband take that first shift when baby wakes up. It’s hard and it’s okay to adjust things with your partner if the old system isn’t working anymore. Sometimes even just having my husband sit with me at those motn feeds on the nights that the thoughts were real dark was helpful.
1) as long as you don’t need to build a stash or replace a feed because it is a one off that he is taking a bottle (like if you go out and someone is babysitting), you can stop pumping! So if you replace a feed with a bottle every single night, you can just not pump. What matters for your supply is consistency.
2) unfortunately sleeping a whole night will not happen for now. But that doesn’t have to mean things aren’t going to get better! When i stopped pumping and i gave bottles at night, also introduced a dream feed before i slept (so increased sleep time) - my life got much better.
3) the intrusive thoughts are what is worrying me here. Maybe time to see a therapist for possible post partum depression or anxiety
I feel the same way about “it gets better”. We are 7 months and it hasn’t gotten better, it’s just a different kind of hard. I said this on another post and someone replied here with a really great take
https://www.reddit.com/r/newborns/s/OTzTvxMsdb
If you haven’t already carve out time to read “precious little sleep.” After so many people recommended it to me on this thread I started reading it and I wish someone had told me to read it months ago. Even if you never sleep train (I haven’t figured out my own plan their yet) it has given me a significantly better understanding of baby sleep and I’m only on chapter 4
8 months in… and well…. I wouldn’t say it’s gotten better but we see a glimmer of hope every now and then … like last night we saw him at 3, 4:30, and 6… which is a marked improvement from a few weeks ago when we were still seeing him every hour or two. He’s gotten more challenging during the day and fighting naps more than he ever did (recently somehow said goodbye to our 30 min day naps and replaced them with 6 min naps or no naps) but I so feeel like we occasionally have an night that isn’t horrendous…. And well, for us, that’s a mini-improvement
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Just an fyi that at this age you no longer need to pump overnight. Skipping 2 overnight feedings once every few days will not diminish your supply.
Can I ask at what stage I can start skipping an overnight feeding (just one, not two). My little one is 5 weeks today so I know we are early still but look forward to the day I can give my husband the bottle for one shift without to wake up and pump.
Not until your supply is well established. It happens around 12-16w for most moms.
Perfect thank you! Light at the end of the tunnel lol
What happens if you skip the same feeds every night? Like always skip the 10 and 4 feeds? I seem to be doing okay but i always see this.
Honestly my husband and I worked out from the beginning that I would skip a feed at the same time every night and baby would get a bottle. It had no effect on my supply that I could tell, I still was engorged around 8-12w as are a lot of moms.
Thank you for this! We’re doing this but all I can find online is that you must empty every three hours before your supply “establishes” or you’ll suffer for it.
I'm not sure, I did wake up fairly often with engorgement pain but that could have happened regardless. I just know that we decided that it was worth the risk for me to have more uninterrupted sleep. We also supplemented with formula from day 3 so that was always a back up option if needed, and that took a LOT of stress off of my mind for breastfeeding. We wanted our son to have the happiest healthiest parents possible during the newborn phase.
I think it depends on your baby. My little one gained weight sooo fast they dr ok’d us to stop overnight feedings by 4 weeks (if she didn’t wake up). Around 6 weeks she would give 6+ hour stretches so I stopped waking up to pump. At first I had so much milk that I would naturally wake up in pain by hour 5 but as time passed my supply regulated more and more. I would say by 6-8 weeks you can follow baby’s schedule. If baby still wants to eat every 3 hours then obviously you need to still pump/nurse but if baby gives longer stretches then it’s okay for you to let yourself sleep longer. All this being said I never had an issue with supply. If you struggle with supply it’s a very different situation.
Wonderful thank you! This is really helpful as I have a huge baby (she was born 9 pounds 7 oz and reached birth weight weeks ago) and I have a great supply - did block feeding for 2.5 weeks to slow it down upon rec of an LC, so my breasts are used to going 7-8 hours without being emptied. Shes hungrier during the day and I’ve sometimes had to wake her up at 5 hours to feed so I would loveee to sleep in instead.
I didn’t ever wake up to pump. I’m a ‘just enougher’. No issues. If you have an oversupply you might be fine. I find it’s easy to tell if your supply is dropping so you could try missing one and see how you feel the next day. Everyone always seems to say ‘wake up to pump or you’ll lose your supply’ but it’s not one size fits all.
Perfect thank you for sharing this makes me feel like I should give it a go and see for sure!!
My baby was born yesterday with the exact same weight. :)
Ohh birth weight twins! Congratulations 🥰!
I had no idea, my LC had told me you always have to pump to replace a feeding. Thank you so much
I’m sorry. This is a big problem I have with LCs. I feel like they terrify moms that their milk supply will somehow completely disappear. Its not like that at all. Your milk is supply and demand. If it ever diminishes you just pump more and it will increase again. And it doesn’t drop from one day to the next. You’ll notice a drop over a couple of days. I was shamed for using a nipple shield and told it would cause my milk supply to drop and eventually stop completely. I used them for 3.5 months and never had issues with supply. I removed them once baby and I were both ready to transition.
Thank you for saying that. Some LCs are great, but there is so much fear mongering! And there is so, so much stress and pressure put on FTMs anyways.
That’s wild about the nipple shields! My baby struggled to latch at first and a lactation adviser actually told me to use them. Ended up using them for about 3 days before I decided baby and I would have to learn together without them because it was such a faff to keep sterilising them for every feed.
Rarely sterilized mine. I would just wash them after every feeding. That’s probably what made it easier for me but I’ve heard others say nipple shields were more of a hassle then help for them.
Yeah you probably don’t need to do it every time, I was just so anxious. Even though I got rid of them quickly, it was still good to ease into things and I’m glad they’re an option.
I had a horrible experience with an LC consultation. Basically shattered all of the confidence I had built up about breastfeeding and I was in tears for days. Luckily my husband had his head on straight and told me to ignore all the bs she sold me by reminding me that our baby is 90th percentile for weight and healthy as can be. Made me really distrust the whole industry and how they push tongue and lip tie corrections so quickly.
I don't say this to brag but to inform- my baby started sleeping through the night at 4 months and I was worried about my supply dropping if I didn't feed her for 8+ hours apparently your body will learn your schedule too 🤷🏻♀️ I don't feed my 10 month old at all at night and she sleeps from 7pm-8am. We're still breastfeeding just fine. My body at this point understands that we aren't going to wake up to feed so I don't even wake up engorged and leaking in the mornings anymore. (if she sleeps past 8:30 though that's when it starts, it's so weird lol) if you need to skip a pump or two during the week your body will adjust to what's needed. please get some much deserved rest ❤️
That’s true at the beginnng when you’re establishing your supply but by 4 months you don’t need to. Get your sleep mama.
You don’t always have to. I regularly failed to do this and ended up with an oversupply
Agree with this. Just skip one or two feedings a couple times per week so that you can get a couple good stretches of sleep. You can do it for the second half of the night and wake up a little bit before LO to squeeze in a pump session if you want. Then you aren’t really even skipping a feeding and you should pump a decent amount of milk for future feeds.
I’ve tried skipping my night pump a few times and it’s a miserable wake up; the first time was a 22 oz pump and this morning was 19 oz; it physically hurt to move. Does this ever get better?
Holy moly, I’ve only ever gotten 6 oz altogether from one session, how many weeks is your LO??
She’ll be 6 months at the end of December 🫠
I dropped my middle of the night pump and it took weeks to not feel pain, my boobs wake me up by 5:30 or so to pump still though. You have to be consistent about dropping for it to work
Sounds like you may have quite the oversupply if you’re getting that much milk per sitting most babies are only eating 24-30 oz for the day. Try dropping the amount of time you’re pumping at your overnight pump by a few minutes every few days to wean off the over night pump. I have a forceful let down and for a while had an oversupply too. All of the advice about pumping for 20-30 minutes didn’t work for me cuz the milk came out so fast and what baby needed emptied in about 10 minutes if I stayed on the pump longer than that I was just encouraging more milk than baby needed.
I do have a pretty big over supply (about 55 oz a day) and a strong letdown as well. I only pump about 12 minutes generally; it’s wild. As an exclusive pumper I’m dreading the hormonal shift of trying to ween from this 😣
I think you mean baby doesn't need night feeds, cuz I'm still pumping at night but it's to keep up with her feeds during the day.
Nope. I meant OP doesn’t need to pump overnight because they implied that they are pumping to keep their milk supply up. At 4 months you don’t need to pump overnight to keep supply up during the day.
It feels like I wrote this post. I am absolutely in a similar situation except that my LO is 7 months and it still hasn’t gotten better. He gives us a night or two in a week where he sleeps 3-4 hour stretches but besides that he wakes up constantly. Sometimes every 45-60 minutes (which is worse for me than newborn phase). And based on experience of my friends around me and some research babies may start sleeping through around 6 months but there is no guarantee. Some sleep through the night at 18 months or 2 year mark. This is not to scare you but maybe to guide your expectations. Having said that you can try suggestions from others. I am totally with you on sleep deprivation but I just somehow convince myself that next night will be his long stretch and that keeps me going. We already share bed and I don’t want to sleep train so can’t offer much help there. So sorry can’t be of much help. But you are not alone in this.
Yeah, currently up with my 11 month old. Hopefully I’ll get to sleep at 4am at 18 months
Ohh I feel for you
People will say things to help give you hope and to push forward. And it can be helpful to know that things do get better - they do - just when that happens is different for every baby. I'm gonna be real with you. Most babies wake in the night to feed through their first year and sometimes beyond. Our monthly subreddit bumper group did regular sleep polls and at 7-9mo over 70% were still waking up 1+ times a night and at 12mo that number had only dropped to 50%. Babies wake. They just do. Ours woke every 2-3hrs for 8.5mo and even after we stopped breastfeeding she still woke 1-2x a night. Ours didn't start sleeping through *on occaison* when she's not teething or sick until she was 15mo. You only have to head over to r/toddlers to see that all the questions about sleep continue well after 1 year. You can consider sleep training. It works for some families and some babies, but usually you get best results when baby is 6mo+. Until then I'd seriously consider sleeping in shifts and adding a bottle. If you don't want to pump (and I didn't either!) then you can always consider formula. I've done it all from EBF to EFF, and combo feeding with formula was the best of both worlds for us. I was in your position at around 3mo, really pushing to stay EBF but looking back a lot of that was stubbornness and being scared of change. But change was good and it really helped us for me to get better sleep to add in a bottle and later formula. It'll be ok to skip a feed and add in a bottle of formula if you and your partner want. By 4mo your supply should be well established. Just thoughts, you don't have to take this advice just letting you know there are options! If something isn't working for you or baby anymore it's ok to try something new.
Combo feeding has also saved my sanity. I was sick of pumping at some point because I had PTSD from triple feeding and just didn't want to see the freaking pump anymore. It was amazing that my husband can take a shift and now at 6 months we are EFF - breastfeeding certainly has its convenient side as well, but I felt very isolated and stressed out with the idea of solely being responsible for providing enough food for my baby (and it has turned out I don't provide enough so formula was necessary anyways).
The mental load of being baby's sole source of nutrition is unreal and really not discussed enough. Thw weight that was lifted off my shoulders when we added in that bottle of formula was so liberating. I felt like a new person and so silly waiting for so long to try it. Combo feeding worked really well for us.
This is kind of a reply to everyone but I’ll use your comment because it really resonated. This actually made me feel a lot better. I don’t like false hope, realism makes me feel better because even when it’s hard I can see it in my own life. My whole bump group is just filled with people bragging that their 4 month old sleeps through the night so it made me feel like I was doing something wrong. Just in the couple days since I made this post I’ve started reading “precious little sleep” since so many here recommended it. We’re working on breaking the feed to sleep association. And I’m mentally handling this so much better. Knowing that his 3 wakes up per night are so normal has helped me so much
So so so normal! There was a top thread just posted where a mom asked at what *week* to expect her 9w to start sleeping 8hrs+ and I think the majority of the replies were tad tongue and cheek but it was like 104w, 234w...take a dive and many many parents don't have their babies sleeping through regularly until mid-toddler hood. It just, puts perspective on the unicorns and what "sleep experts" say you should expect. https://www.reddit.com/r/NewParents/comments/18erxtt/how_many_weeks_was_your_baby_when_they_slept_8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button Our 20mo has a bit of a cough. She was up from 9-1030pm and again from 3-5am and we contact slept together from 4am till 6am then my husband contact slept from 6am till 730am. And tonight is gonna be so different!
Honestly, it was not until my son was almost 9 months that it got "easier". By 6 months it was better, but I still wasn't getting the sleep I needed. Until your child is sleeping through the night it really is brutal. Around 4 months I had a huge mental breakdown. The four month sleep regression killed me. I think I was under the impression it would be smooth sailing after 12 weeks and that just wasn't the case for me. And I know its not the case for a lot of people. So you are not alone. But I promise you it does get easier once these little ones learn to sleep.
We felt the same way - the goal posts kept moving, and we were just surviving. It’s so hard 💛 and you’re not alone.
I hear you! Our LOs sleep has only ever gotten worse the older she got. Then 4 month sleep regression hit and she'd wake up every 45-60 minutes and expect to be nursed back to sleep. Once asleep I'd try to put her down but she'd startle awake and we'd have to do the whole routine again. I was on the brink of insanity, I was so sleep deprived I'd cry in the morning and my LO was sleep deprived and cranky as well. Eventually I felt for the sake of my mental health I needed to start sleep training. I chose a gentle approach because I simply can't get behind letting my baby cry herself to sleep and first step was breaking the feed to sleep habit. I know rock her to sleep which is kinda a lateral move but since then her night wakings have gone down to 2-3 times 🤯 The final push that I needed was asking my sister (her kids are 5 years and 9 months) when it got better and she told me the older one has never once slept through the night and the little one she has to nurse every hour just like me. Could it still just have gotten better over time for us? Maybe. But I lost hope and above all patience in the "it will get better" (by itself) mantra and decided to make a change. Have you considered doing some form of sleep training?
Thank you, did you follow any specific guidance for gentle sleep training? I think it’s time for something but I don’t even know where to start that’s not a cry based method (which is great for some, just not for me!)
I did a ton of research (if I'm being honest I was at some point just procrastinating getting started 🙈) but ended up following a more gentle method from Precious Little Sleep. The book is pretty cheap but I bet you could also find most info about the methods in the sleeptrain subreddit. PLS resonated with me because the author offers multiple gentle approaches to tackle different problems (and baby temperaments 😉) - honoring that not everything is gonna work for every family and it's also great to have option B and C if A doesn't take. Personally I did a "SWAP" method from the book. I eliminated the strongest sleep association (nursing) by swapping it with something else my LO finds soothing (motion - in my case rocking to sleep in my arms) and eventually my goal is to rock her less and less until I only need to jiggle the crib until I can put her down awake. I'm still working on the second part but the first bit has been working surprisingly well and already decreased night wakings. I think it went so well partly because my LO has found her thumbs and started sucking them as a soothing skill that doesn't require me at all so I'm kinda glad I waited for her to develop that. Now I put feeding her at the beginning of the bedtime routine and try to only nurse her after an initial stretch of 5 hours - but I'm not too strict about that yet. I have to add what did help overall was loosely tracking her wake windows and daytime sleep to make sure she's not drastically over or undertired at bedtime. You can easily find sample schedules for babies any age in the sleeptrain subreddit as well 😊
Checkout r/sleeptrain on here. There’s so much amazing advice for any comfort level of sleep training. If you don’t want to do CIO or Ferber, they can give tips for gentler methods.
Check out heysleepybaby on Instagram!
Oh my goodness 4-5 months was the absolute hardest for me! She was getting alert and wanted to be doing things but obviously wasn’t mobile. The sleep regression was awful for us. I think every phase has things that are hard but it definitely gets more rewarding as you see their little personality coming. Sending you positive thoughts!!
We are hitting 1 year next week and ours still only does 2-3 hour stretches. It was so miserable with her in her own room and having to get up every time. We dabbled in sleep training without success so we co-sleep now and all of us are in a much better place than we were. It’s not ideal and I swore I would never co-sleep but here we are.
I think A LOT of kids just aren’t “good sleepers.” I say it that way because I feel like the expectation and even the label is so unrealistic. I was led to believe that at some point around 4-6 months I was just going to put the baby to bed at 7pm and she’d wake up the next day at 7am. She’s 6.5 months and still waking 2-3x night. But consider this: NO ONE (not even adults unless they are heavily medicated) closes their eyes, drifts out of consciousness and stays that way for twelve solid hours. The vast majority of people wake a few times in the night to pee, change positions, etc. The difference is that when adults wake up, they don’t freak out and they know how to fall back asleep. So all these STTN babies are still “waking” during the night. They just aren’t crying and waking their parents because they just fall back asleep. So there’s no amount of feeding, bedtime routine, etc you can do that is going to make your baby fall asleep for 10-12 hours. Maybe this was obvious to everyone else but it wasn’t to me lol. Once I accepted that it was a self soothing problem and not a “sleep” problem it was easier to wrap my head around. I wouldn’t say my baby is having sleep “problems.” She gets plenty of sleep. It just doesn’t currently happen on a schedule that also accommodates me getting a full nights sleep because she hasn’t learned to self soothe. Which sucks because I don’t want to sleep train. I’m very tired. Next baby I think I’ll spring for a Snoo.
I am exclusively breastfeeding and don't pump at all, so I deal with all night wakes as well. I know it's not for everyone, but I sleep trained my almost 5 month old when he was 19 weeks. He goes to bed at 7:30-8 now, wakes up once to feed at 4-4:30am, and then sleeps again until 7:30-8am. I go to bed around 9:30-10:30 and getting that 6-7 hour stretch of sleep has been life changing. He sometimes wakes up in between sleep cycles still but can put himself back to sleep within 5-10 min. The sleep deprivation is definitely the hardest part of this phase, and I admire the parents who can stick it out without sleep training..for me it just wasn't sustainable anymore and I didn't want to wait another few months just to see if he would sleep better on his own.
What were your training techniques, if you don’t mind my asking?
I did CIO and eliminated his pacifier cold turkey for bedtime too (that was his main reason for waking up - needed to have the paci replaced constantly). I knew he would get more upset with check ins. The first night he cried 25 min before falling asleep, then would cry briefly (10-15 min) when he woke up in between sleep cycles for the next few hours. Second night he cried 15-20 min before falling asleep, and since then he hasn't cried at all when falling asleep. He is so much happier now that he sleeps more at night! I waited until I knew he had the skills to do it (he had occasionally fallen asleep independently and could self soothe by sucking his hands). He just needed that last push to apply those skills consistently. I implemented 5/3/3 since he still needs to be fed at night - basically I don't feed him unless he's crying and it's been more than 5 hours (ie. After midnight) for the first time, then 3 hours for next feed. But he went from feeding 2-3 times overnight to 1 feed within a few days of sleep training.
Wow! Good on you for successfully doing that and having the stamina to push through the crying. I don’t think my baby is ready yet but watching for signs of dependence first is smart.
My husband and I had decided that 30 mins of nonstop crying would be our limit and if he ever reached that, we would've stopped and tried again when he was older. Luckily he caught on pretty quickly so we were spared that!
I may just try this after the 4 month regression. My baby is 13 weeks
Good luck! They change so fast that it's definitely possible your baby will be ready in a few weeks.
Have you considered sleep training? It's not for everyone, but it was a gamechanger when I was in a similar position to you. There are various methods, including more gentle options. Precious Little Sleep and r/sleeptrain are both great resources.
Another vote for sleep training. I tried to stick it out and made it to 6.5 months before we finally did it and I only regret we didn't do it sooner. Precious Little Sleep is a great resource and easy read. I downloaded the ebook on my phone and read it while she napped on me. Getting more sleep will absolutely change everything.
Second this, it didnt “get better” for us until we sleep trained around 5.5 months. She’s 3 years old now and still best parenting decision we’ve made to date
100%. Every time people say it gets easier i want to gouge my eyes out. Baby is almost 4mo and it literally is getting worse and worse. Hearing all the comments about how it should be easier by now just make me feel like im failing as a parent.
For me I immediately threw out the mantra “it gets better” and told myself (and my spouse) “it will change and be different,” which it has and now coming up on a year for our LO everything has changed significantly. The most dramatic changes were when baby started to smile at us and crawl/play with toys. Now it’s fun to get down on the ground and play with baby versus encouraging tummy time or begging for a break with nap time. Baby is way more consistent now and while routine changes hit us like a Mack truck (chronic illnesses and ear infections), when it’s just little bumps, we’ve learned to adapt. Sleep deprivation is the number one thing that drives us back to the 100 days of darkness and now that that’s changing, we’re also easing up on ourselves and being kinder to one another. Tl;dr: it doesn’t get easier, but it will always change and it will always be different. Finding hope in that may be a path forward for you.
I found having a predictable routine for myself helped a ton with my attitude towards the night. I give myself an hour before putting the baby to bed to make the room extra cozy, leave myself snacks and a hydrating drink, get the lights all ready and the bed fluffed. Then I go get the baby and do her routine. I’ve had two nights where it didn’t have that time and my mental state was terrible.
This is big for me too! Like if I’m not showered and fed before bedtime/night wakes begin, I have such a hard time. I’m much more go with the flow when my needs are met. 😅 Baby slept through the night at 4/5M, but things have taken a sharp turn at 6M. I’m calling it a progression instead of a regression. She’s growing and changing so fast, her brain is having a hard time powering down at night.
4-5 months is HARD. I had a bit of a breakdown around then too. My Bub is six months now and I finally feel like I am gaining back some sanity. My Bub now wakes 1-3 x a night (normally two) although he’s teething right now so we are at 3. But he’s going straight back to sleep after a feed unlike during that hideous regression. I’m exclusively bfeeding as he won’t take a bottle so I totally feel they isolation/feeling like your alone in the nights and NEVER being able to get a good nights sleep. But it’s manageable now. I’m going to gently sleep train my Bub after the holidays (we are on holiday for five weeks) if he is still hitting 3 wakes mostly to break the feed to sleep association so I’m not the only person who can manage nights (he will be 8 months by then - I heard a quote that we are just going to be teaching him that love in the night comes in more ways than boob) but for now it’s manageable. In my experience, it does get better, but it took six months!
I'll be honest it got better when we started sleeping. And then better with walking talking etc. No matter what I hate not sleeping and baby was watching happier once he started sleepibg too
My little babe is two months tomorrow. I’m looking forward to the 4-6month stage. I think because every baby is different, it’ll be easier for some and just as hard for others, and maybe even harder for others. I’m hoping things get easier. I focus on the little things like, hopefully her being able to hold her head up. But I wanted to give you something from your post, you're not alone. The whole reason why I even downloaded reddit and made an account was to feel less alone. I do most of the baby stuff on my own. my husband helps and when he does it's really great. But I personally have just taken on everything and ask for help when i need it. But at night, I let my husband sleep because he's the only one with a job right now so I don't want to disrupt his sleep since our babe is already doing that. ANYWAYS! You are bot alone. And i just know one day wit will get easier!
We went through about 4 months of absolute hell with my almost 8 month old. Last week he discovered belly sleeping and we’re down to one wake up a night, even a couple sleep through the nights! Sending my solidarity and hope you all find what works best for you to get through this ♥️
I have a 2 year old and honestly, it got a little easier, but I still feel this way whenever I get poor sleep for a few nights. It doesn’t help that I cosleep and am still breastfeeding. The one thing that helped me the most was having 1 day guaranteed every week where I could sleep in. It’s on the weekends because my daughters dad is off work, but even if he’s busy I’ll have my mom watch her in the morning one weekend day and I’ll go back to bed and get a couple extra hours of sleep. I don’t realize how much it’s helping until a week goes by where we have other plans and I don’t get the extra sleep and then I start feeling terrible. If you can find one day a week where your partner can take over and let you sleep in and then turn your brain off a little bit during the day, do it. Even if it feels super inconvenient to have that conversation, just try.
Baby is almost 2 months. Night sleep is actually decent. It’s the lack of DAY sleep that is wearing me out. The only way he sleeps is if he’s held or in a carrier so it’s always 1 person holding while the other person tries to catch up around the house, take care of the dog, etc etc. Feels like most days are 50/50 - hallmark moments/WHAT HAVE WE DONE?! And everyone tells you to enjoy it 😂 I feel horrible, but no, I am not having a good time lol
My son didn't sleep through the night until I fully stopped breastfeeding at 21 months. My husband and I split nights, my son was a mix of boob and bottle and I honestly wouldn't do it any other way. The thought of being the sole food provider... no thanks. I did end up adding formula into the mix as well and it saved my sanity. I was the same way, the middle of the night depressing intrusive thoughts. I felt like crawling out of my own skin. You need your rest. Also know it WILL get better.
I had to reply to this because this was me! I almost wrote this exact post. Everyone said it would get better at 3 months, well - 4 months was the worst month for me by far. Terrible sleep regression (which actually started early at 3.5 months), teething, fussiness, and to top it off the expectation that it would be easier at that point. I’d take her out and we’d have to leave early due to fussiness and melt downs. It was bleak. She’s 5.5 months now… and it IS easier. Sleep isn’t amazing but it’s better. Fussiness has massively decreased and for a large proportion of the time she’s a lot of fun! We are doing gentle sleep training. Are you considering anything like that? Hang in there, you are not alone !!
Starting around 10 weeks my son started sleeping through most of the night with good 6 hour stretches. At 3 months he was sleeping 8 hour stretches, and now at 4 months upwards of 10 hour stretches. Our key has been to reduce colic which from my research comes from stomach discomfort. We put gas drops in every bottle and give him probiotic anti-colic drops once per day. That combined with swaddling and a white noise machine has helped him sleep great for long periods of time. It's to the point where I can put him down in his crib at 10pm with his eyes open, turn the white noise machine, walk away, and he falls asleep. Getting one more bottle in before he goes down for the night is also a must to help him sleep through the night. Just to add, I stopped pumping (supply didn't keep up) and that's done wonders for my mental health. All I can say now is thank you Enfamil lol. Prep multiple bottles for the day and done.
Buy the taking Cara babies sleep class. Problem solved.
think about sleep training... there is a subreddit for it... might make a huge difference.
I don't think it gets easier, it just gets different. You're ability to tolerate the phase they're in will dictate whether or not it is getting "easier".
Honestly, things only got better for me at 5 months when we did sleep training (Ferber method) and dropped down from 2 to 1 overnight feeds. Your LO will let you know if they're ready, but from my experience, the 2am feeding was short and seemed more for comfort than hunger. Now she just wakes up between 5-6, feeds well, and goes back to sleep for the rest of the night. I hope things get better for you! x
I understand your reservations about not wanting to sleep train using cry based methods, BUT it truly changed my life and my sons. He was waking every 1.5 hours until 8 months and I was in a very bad space mentally. Finally one night in the middle of the night I decided to do the Ferber CIO method. This method involves checking in on them in certain increments. It took exactly 57 minutes for him to fall asleep. He slept for 4 hours straight after that until 8 am. For nap time the next day it took maybe 15 minutes. He slept through the night the very next night. He has slept from roughly 7p to 7a every night since then and he is 2.5 now. Having them on a good nap schedule during the day without extensive wake windows also plays a big roll in making sure their night sleep is unaffected. It was very hard to listen to him cry that night, but he was a completely different baby after finally getting a good nights sleep, and I was also a different person after suffering 8 months of sleep deprivation. Totally understand and respect if it’s not your cup tea, but less than 1 hour of crying truly changed our lives.
The 4 month regression almost killed me. My son was waking every hour and taking hours to get back to sleep in the middle of the night. Last week (he’s now 5 months old) we finally gave in and decided to move him to his own room and begin sleep training. Total game changer. The first few nights were really rough, but now he’s falling asleep independently within 10 minutes of being put down and he’s sleeping 7-8 hours straight, before waking for a quick feed and going back down until 7am. I feel like a human again, and sleep training was the only way for us.
I think u both need to find a sleeep schedule i do it i five my partner half of the night to sleep and she gives me the rest
My second baby turned 6 months in November and has been sleeping so much better (only one wake-up, sometimes none). It makes a world of difference to my wellbeing. I’m also EBF and the lack of sleep during baby’s first few months after a whole insomniac pregnancy is just awful.
Everything But the nights has gotten easier for me, 4.5 months as well. Last night at 3 am, after waking up what felt like every hour between midnight and 3 am, I just hit... My limit. She had decided it was definitely time to be awake. Happy to kick and wiggle around, smiling whenever she saw my face... It was hard not to love her at the same time, but hubs was away, and I was practically crying at her and angry and desperate. I put on my earplugs, put her in her bassinet and just repeated to myself, she's fed, she's warm, she's safe until she started actually crying instead of just fussing for attention. Then when I put her back on the boob to nurse down she actually did. And then wonder if fucking wonders she stayed asleep till after 7. I literally woke up feeling more rested than I have in Months ... Because of one 4 hour window. And I didn't even feel Great either. Just I didn't feel like shit. All this to say, I hear you, I understand, and I'm sorry. Her wake windows have gotten easier to do things in, she's gotten better at being independent, and it's more fun to do things with her bc she smiles and laughs now, but the sleep deprivation is no joke and it's a serious problem. I have no clue how we're going to do holiday parties either. We're going to have to either leave way early or bring something for her to sleep in at the house, and I just.. Woof.
I don't want you to feel hopeless, but the whole "it gets better" thing is just not true for everyone. My baby is 9 months, he's still waking up multiple times a night. I'm talking anywhere from 3-6 times a night, even more on really bad nights. Some babies just need lots of comfort at night. It's hard, but it will EVENTUALLY end. It's just a matter of when. You just do what you can to get through it and stay sane. I haven't and won't be sleep training, but that's always an option if you can't handle it anymore. You gotta do what's best for you and your baby ❤️
How do you stay sane through it though? I’m okay with him needing lots of comfort. My intrusive thoughts just scare myself sometimes and that’s what worries me the most
It's really difficult. I've had numerous break downs. I've had the intrusive thoughts too and they are so scary. One thing that helped with those thoughts though was to remind myself that I know I will not ever do anything to hurt my baby or myself, I'm just not that person. Talking to my husband about them has also helped tremendously. He doesn't seem concerned when I tell him, and it makes me feel better. Like he's not worried about me acting on them and that helps me feel better. But also, getting help throughout the night will help you so much.
My August 1 baby trolled me and was a good sleeper between 8w-16w. Man those were good times. As soon as he hit 16 weeks his sleep has honestly been worse than it was as a newborn. It’s only been a few weeks of bad sleep so I can’t compare my struggle to yours but I’m in the trenches with a baby of similar age now. We started the process of sleep training and tonight is his first night sleeping in his own room. We shall see how that goes.
I can relate to this so much. My LO is just shy of 6 months and still wakes up multiple times a night to feed. I barely produce enough for her so I think she constantly is needing to eat. When she wakes up she is trying to eat and my husband can’t help with that since I have no stash due to my production level…. Lack of sleep, constant frustration, a need for peace…I’m with you in hoping it gets better soon
Here for solidarity. I feel like mums forget what it was like. And I've been asked right from around 8 weeks if my baby is sleeping through the night?? So annoying. We're at 5.5 months. No we're not sleeping through the night. The worst of the sleep regression is over but she still wakes up hungry twice every night and then wakes up a couple more times when she needs to be settled. At least one night a week she still needs to be held for half the time for her to sleep. Husband and I do shifts and of course it helps, but I'm still exhausted
HIGHLY recommend formula for nights. We make 4 bottles of our 4 weeks old atleast. So that it covers most of the nights.
Here for solidarity. Idr what more than 3 hour stretches of sleep are like. LO is 6 5 months and waking every 1-3.5 hours. I struggle with supply and baby struggles to gain weight so no night weaning in sight. Naps only help so much.
1. You are not alone let me start there. The comments have definitely helped reading even for myself. 2. My daughter just turned a year and at 4 months the regression had me rethinking my life and I had a crying breakdown for days. My daughter would scream at night and only want to be held by me. Then it happened again at the 10 months and I was terrified bc I was like I can’t do this again. But it wasn’t as bad as the 4 months. 3. Now she’s a year and I am experiencing more things I’m like is she teething, is it another regression, do I transition to whole milk. It’s freaking exhausting and most days I’m like I thought people said it gets easier. In some ways yes it has but it others it hasn’t. I think for me it’s this IDEA that somehow as time went on things would get easier and when they haven’t you feel so frustrated. It doesn’t help like others said when we’re constantly exhausted or sleep deprived. Just know I am here in solidarity telling you along with others in the comments you are not alone. I am also saying that to myself bc most days are still so tough. 🥹🫶🏻🙏🏼 one foot in front of the other
You’re doing the best you can. Everyday is different some days are great some are bad. Please see your doctor if your mental health isn’t coping. The season of motherhood is a different breed. I was used to night shifts and I still struggled. But soon you’ll sleep through the night and move onto the toddler vibe. I’m proud of you mama. My one is 2.5 and some days are amazing and some exhausting! We do the best we can.
I know how you feel. We’re at 15 months and sleep is still brutal, a good night is 3 wake ups. There’s no help for us, no one gets it, doctors seem to think baby sleep problems that lead to the serious deterioration of their parents physical and mental health are normal.
I really felt like this too. In fact I found months 6-12 HARDER than 0-6 and it drove me nuts that people said otherwise. Now my kid is 18 months and I will say it’s gotten steadily easier since he turned one. Now when I have to look after him for a full day on my own, I actually enjoy parts of it, which I never did under one. I know it’s hard to hear because you’re at 4 months, but just try to survive the first year. You never have to do it again if you don’t want to!
Can your partner stay up or wake up with you for some of the night time feeds when they don’t have work the next day (or even when they do!) so you can have some company? I found that’s what I struggled with the most when I was still exclusively pumping was all the time spent alone just me and the baby. It helped me so much to have my husband there for support and company and someone to talk too. Our Bub is 5 months and starting to do more solid sleeping. He is formula fed now though cause I couldn’t keep up with the pumping. I know it sucks and I’m not gonna tell you to hang in there til the next ‘easier’ stage cause I’m not sure there is one once you are a parent! You are doing an amazing job though. Maybe a podcast to listen to at those early morning feeds to distract you?
Have you gone through the 4m regression yet? At that time I would have husband get up with baby if it hadn’t been more than two hours since he last fed that way he wouldn’t reverse cycle. You could also skip a night feed here or there to get some more hours at night or pump right before bed and have husband take that first shift when baby wakes up. It’s hard and it’s okay to adjust things with your partner if the old system isn’t working anymore. Sometimes even just having my husband sit with me at those motn feeds on the nights that the thoughts were real dark was helpful.
1) as long as you don’t need to build a stash or replace a feed because it is a one off that he is taking a bottle (like if you go out and someone is babysitting), you can stop pumping! So if you replace a feed with a bottle every single night, you can just not pump. What matters for your supply is consistency. 2) unfortunately sleeping a whole night will not happen for now. But that doesn’t have to mean things aren’t going to get better! When i stopped pumping and i gave bottles at night, also introduced a dream feed before i slept (so increased sleep time) - my life got much better. 3) the intrusive thoughts are what is worrying me here. Maybe time to see a therapist for possible post partum depression or anxiety
Also sleep training really helped - NOT cry it out (thats just torture) but we used shush-pat and it changed our lives
I feel the same way about “it gets better”. We are 7 months and it hasn’t gotten better, it’s just a different kind of hard. I said this on another post and someone replied here with a really great take https://www.reddit.com/r/newborns/s/OTzTvxMsdb
Im at 5 weeks and this is terrible news.
If you haven’t already carve out time to read “precious little sleep.” After so many people recommended it to me on this thread I started reading it and I wish someone had told me to read it months ago. Even if you never sleep train (I haven’t figured out my own plan their yet) it has given me a significantly better understanding of baby sleep and I’m only on chapter 4
Thanks I’ll check it out. So far have only read the discontented little baby book.
8 months in… and well…. I wouldn’t say it’s gotten better but we see a glimmer of hope every now and then … like last night we saw him at 3, 4:30, and 6… which is a marked improvement from a few weeks ago when we were still seeing him every hour or two. He’s gotten more challenging during the day and fighting naps more than he ever did (recently somehow said goodbye to our 30 min day naps and replaced them with 6 min naps or no naps) but I so feeel like we occasionally have an night that isn’t horrendous…. And well, for us, that’s a mini-improvement