Newborns and sleeping arrangements at night

[Dreamer_D]

OK, at night, when you had a newborn (let's say the first 8 weeks or so), where did you sleep, where did baby sleep, where did your partner sleep? Where did you feed baby? Did it work well for you?

 

[Skippy123]

Well I have twins but this is what we do. Both babies sleep in their room or we would never sleep if, they were in the same room as us since they pass gas, grunt, etc and those noises would keep me awake. Their room is close by; we can hear them if they cry. Hubby and I do shifts. The baby that came home first is Extremely colicky (poor guy). I thought it was reflux but it isn't going away; the good news I hear is it goes away at around 5 months?? The other baby is mellow which helps. I sort of have them on a schedule; feeds every 3 hours. I feed one and then the other; if they fuss they fuss because I only have 2 arms. Unless they are really upset then hubby helps me feed them when he should be sleeping. We actually sleep in separate rooms right now (each shut the door when it isn't our shift) so that we Actually get to sleep and don't wake each other. What do you and your dh do? This works pretty good for us, or at least for someone who has two babies but we did it when the other one was still in the hospital We are sleep deprived but I did hear it gets easier.

eta: my boys are 3 months (preterm) but they are actually like newborns (adjusted age 4 weeks).

 

[Puppmom]

DS he slept in his crib from about 3 weeks old on. When he would wake, I would go nurse him in the nursery. I had a book on the nightstand which helped since I could read while I nursed. At that time, nursing took SO long! DH would usually get up and change and reswaddle DS and put him back to sleep. As time went on, we started bringing him into bed to nurse and DH's diapering and swaddling duties continued. DS usually only woke once in the MOTN though so it was manageable for us both to wake.

I have a friend who rotates duties with her DH and that seems to work well for them. She bottle feeds so she feeds the baby for the last time at around 8 and puts him to bed in his crib. She goes to bed at 10 and DH stays up until the midnight feeding then he feeds the baby and goes to bed. Then my friend feeds him at 4 or 5 and he usually goes back to sleep for a bit. They seem really happy with their arrangements.

If you have a newborn who wakes for reasons other than eating or is difficult to get back to sleep, I definitely think that complicates matters.

 

[Dreamer_D]

[NOTE I know all the safe sleeping guidlines, my choices below are informed decisions ]

With Hunter he slept on my chest the first two weeks, and then in a cosleeper beside my bed for the next two weeks, and the noise drove us to transition him to his own room at that point Newborns are the loudest sleepers EVER! I breastfeed, so I am on all the night shifts. With Hunter I nursed him sitting on my bed for the first week or so (BIG MISTAKE) then bought a great cushy rocker recliner and nursed him in his room. DH slept in bed with me. He is a heavy sleeper and took parental leave the first 7 weeks so it was not an issue. We just kept Hunter's door open and our door and I heard when he needed me.

With Ryder we are in a bigger house so we are doing things a bit differently. As with Hunter, the first week or so he was basically sleeping *on* me. I worked to get him used to sleeping on his own pretty hard, and so he was in his own cot sooner. He started in the cosleeper beside my bed, but now he sleeps in the cosleeper in our walk in closet, so he is about 8 feet away, and I wear earplugs . I nurse him in our comfy chair in our room. DH sleeps with us, he does not get too disrupted. The plan is for him to be in our room until about 12 weeks or more.

But Ryder does not sleep as well at night at Hunter -- or maybe my memory is faulty Between 1am and 5am, he often wakes every hour to nurse or just have some comfort and smell me. Sometimes he just sucks for 5 minutes and falls asleep, but wakes when I go to move him. He tends to be gassy and have more discomfort at night, and is soothed by being with me and nursing. I am not ready to do any real sleep training with him, so I am considering asking DH to sleep in the spare room and perhaps bedshare so I can nurse without getting up every hour. I know a few other mothers who did this and it worked for them. Anyways, just looking for some ideas of things that worked for other parents!

 

[Shoopy]

OK, at night, when you had a newborn (let's say the first 8 weeks or so), where did you sleep, where did baby sleep, where did your partner sleep? Where did you feed baby? Did it work well for you?

Sophia slept in our room for the most part. There was about 2 weeks that she and I slept in the living room after realizing that she slept better there for whatever reason. So I slept on the couch and she slept in her bassinet. In hindsight, I realized that it was FI's snoring that was bothering her. For the next one, the sous machine will go on from day one and FI will be kicked out to another room. The man sounds like a rusty chainsaw.

Dreamer, when I went back to work and Sophia did the wonderful reverse cycle we did bedshare. FI slept in the living room. It was just so much easier to nurse in bed. I didn't even get up and at that point I didn't have to worry about burping as much.

 

[Sha]

I co-slept on the couch with DD most of the time, and breastfed whenever she woke up, which at that time was every hour and a half. (With that waking schedule it didn't make sense to sleep with DH, since I was waking so often). Co-sleeping worked well - it wasn't as disruptive to my sleep as my boob would be out already and she would just latch onto it upon waking. It was the only way I managed to get a few (broken) hours of sleep per night.

DH slept in his bed still- snoring away the night

 

[packrat]

Both kids slept in the crib in the nursery from the get go. With London, she needed to be out seeing everything even at night so I always took her out to the living room to nurse. We ended up getting a rocker/recliner when she was about 5 months and that was such a blessing for nursing b/c when I sat it it to nurse it would tip back to the perfect position and I could doze. I also would read or watch tv when nursing. I did everything and JD slept. London put herself on a schedule at 8 weeks, starting the night before I went back to work which was nice.

Trapper....he was easily irritated so I couldn't read or watch tv or even really be anywhere but his room to nurse him at home so I actually used the glider in the nursery we got when I was pg w/London. He didn't sleep as well as London..part of it I think was my own fault b/c when we first brought him home I was so anxious that he wouldn't want to keep nursing so I'd wake him up if he was sleeping..and then someone said dude don't do that, if he's sleeping nicely thru the night let him sleep, but by then it was too late. He cried a lot more and was a lot fussier than London all around. We could get by w/her if we had to mess up her sleep/nap schedule a little..Trapper we learned right away that he had a schedule and it needed to be adhered to. With Trapper, JD was working overnights so there was no help.

I slept, as much as it could be called sleep, in my own bed w/the monitor on w/both kids. The kids sleep w/us more now than they ever did, and JD gets kicked to the couch more now b/c there's not enough room.

 

[somethingshiny]

JT slept wherever I could finally get him to! The plan was for him to sleep in the bassinet in our room, with both of us in our room too. However, sometimes JT was in a bouncer, a swing, or a carseat--still in our room. When he was about 3 weeks old, we moved him to his crib in his own room. I would wake up everytime he made a peep so I wasn't getting much sleep when he was in our room. We took turns with night feedings, in whatever room the baby was sleeping in. DH worked 2nd shift, so the nights were fairly easy. I'd do the 8-9pm, he'd be home around midnight to do that one, I'd do the 3-4, and then JT would get up around 8am.

Lily slept in a bassinet in our room for 6-8 weeks. We kept her in our room longer since she was taking heart meds. Because she wasn't a good sleeper at first, we would bring her into the living room for night feedings. That way, at least one of us was getting sleep. DH was on a late second shift when Lily was born. He didn't get home until about 3am, then he'd take over for 2-3 hrs so I could sleep and switch again. Those were the days that Lily would only sleep ON someone.

Both of my kids are great sleepers (10 and 12 hr nights!), so even though we may not have done the exact "right" thing, it still worked just fine.

 

[taovandel]

Both babies slept in our room in a bassinet for the first 8 weeks (Evan) and the first 6 weeks (Violet). They promptly were kicked out when the grunting got to be too much for us.

With Evan we had a chair in his room--so when he woke up his feedings took place there or in the living room. We were a single story apartment at the time with him. We would also occasionally sleep in the living room while one was in the bedroom asleep.

With Violet we feed her in our bedroom as we do not have a chair in her room and we are now in a two story townhouse and I don't want to blindly go down the stairs to feed her. She is also a completely different night feeder then Evan was. He would stay up for a bit at night...she eats in about 15 minutes and is back to sleep so it would be worthless to take her all the way to the living room to feed.

With both for the first 6 weeks or so when they would wake up at 1:00 and 4:00 for feedings, we would rotate the shifts. My husband would take the 1:00 and I would take the 4:00 feeding. Then once one was dropped we would rotate days--He would take Monday, I would take Tuesday, etc.

Works great for us for two babies now....

 

[Laila619]

My son slept in DH's and my room for the first 6 MONTHS! He slept in his car seat first, and then we switched to a bassinet type thing (Fisher Price Rock 'N Play sleeper). When he needed to nurse, I would just nurse him in the bed. He would usually go back to sleep fairly easily for the most part. At 6 months, we kicked him out and put him in his own room. DH and I love having our room back to ourselves because we don't have to tiptoe around and we aren't getting woken up by his noises.

 

[drk]

K slept on her tummy on my chest in our room for the first 2 months. Then she started to be able to push herself up over my shoulder while I was sleeping, so we moved her to sleeping in the bed (king-sized) between us. Around 3.5 months, she started to get too wiggly and was waking me up too much, so we tried to move her into a bassinet in our room. Then we moved her into her room.
I was breastfeeding and pumping and supplementing and DH was working, so I did all the night stuff. I'd take her down to the couch and surf the internet or watch TV while I nursed and pumped etc. I think if she hadn't been starving the whole time because of my low supply, she'd have slept better from the beginning and I'd have moved her to her room and her crib sooner. Not surprisingly, she started sleeping way better when I switched to exclusive pumping and solids at 4 months so she'd get bigger bottles and enough calories to satisfy her.
If I'd had better supply and a fairly quiet sleeper, I'd probably have coslept for longer so I could just nurse while sleeping. If the baby were restless, I'd shift them into their own room sooner.
DH didn't seem to be too disturbed by the interrupted sleep, and could always get back to sleep pretty quickly if we'd disturbed him. I actually needed him to wake me up for a while as I got so exhausted I'd sleep through my alarm to go pump and/or nurse.

 

[Jennifer W]

We had Amelia in a crib next to us, on DH's side of the bed so when she woke he could pick her up and give me a minute to get propped up with pillows etc before I fed her. It worked well for us, it meant that he wasn't entirely excluded from feeding and it was a safety thing too - I often fell asleep while I was feeding her, so he was able to put her back in the crib when she was done and I didn't have to worry about squashing her when she was tiny. She slept in our room until she was a year old, then moved to her own room across the hall.

If I had to wake up every 4 hours, as I saw it, the person responsible for the cause had to, too.

 

[noelwr]

the very first night, DH slept with baby in the living room as she was having a good cry.

the week after that, we would take turns sleeping in her room - she in her crib, we on the guest bed. I didn't breastfeed, so that was doable. however, I was exhausted and crying during the day, so it was recommended to not sleep in the same room as her as I would wake up at every little peep.

by 2 weeks old, she was sleeping alone in her room, in the dark. it wasn't until about 13 weeks that she started STTN, but I am so happy that we didn't get her used to sleeping with us in our room or in our bed. also I'm glad we didn't ever get a baby monitor. she can cry loudly enough when she needs us.

 

[geri]

Our daughter was in a bassinet in our room for 3 weeks before we moved her to her nursery next door because she was way too noisy. We also haven't needed a monitor. I always fed her in the nursery at night, even when she was sleeping in our room. We left a bed in the nursery so when she was really unsettled I would spend the night in there with her because it was easier than getting up all the time and I probably got a little more sleep than I would otherwise. In hindsight, I probably should have spent a few more nights with her when she was unsettled, for my benefit more than hers, but otherwise it worked well for us.

 

[AussieNic]

My now, 11yr old, slept beside our bed in a bassinet, then went to her own room in a cot, but i can't remember how old she was? Probably around the 6-8 week mark.

My 2nd child, he was the same, in our room in a bassinet. He was a horrible horrible sleeper. Would wake every 2 hours. Then when he was 3 months old he woke every half hour for 2 weeks!! He went in to his own room in a cot probably around the 8 week mark?

#3 is only 16 weeks old, and she is still in her basinet in our room. She sleeps rather well.... well, she did till about 4 weeks ago. Actually, for the first week we were at my parents house, then when we came home (live 2 hours from the hospital) i spent less then a week in our room before moving to the lounge to sleep. C/Section recovery was a bit rough due to previous history, so the only place i could sleep was the lounge cause I had support for my back while laying on my side a little. So, we spent probably 3 - 4 weeks sleeping in the lounge room, before moving back to our room. We are moving the cot in to our room in the next couple of weeks, mainly cause she will have to share with her older brother and he is still adapting to the new little person in our lives. All 3 of them were feed in the lounge room of a night time. Some nights I would sit at the computer desk and feed, cause the lounge is so comfy I would fall asleep while feeding. Early morning feeds were sometimes in bed, but not often.

Your little one sounds like my son. waking way too often, and he too would suck for a few minutes then wake when i either moved him or when his little head hit the mattress. I would go and feed him again, only to have him only latch on for a few minutes again. Does your little man have a blanket that you can wraparound yourself and then wrap/cover him up with it when he goes to bed? So they still have mummy's scent around them. I never tried it with my kids, but have friends who do/did it with their kids to help them sleep.
Goodluck, hope sleeping improves for you soon

 

[Loves Vintage]

Dreamer, Why not just move the co-sleeper back to your bed? Then you won't have to get up, and your DH can stay in the room if he can (mostly) sleep through the noise. If S would still fit in our co-sleeper, I would surely still have her in there! I loved that thing!

Re: bed-sharing, a lot of people bed share with both parents in bed. Are you concerned that your DH's sleep would be compromised in that case?

Re: noisy sleeping baby, are you running any white noise in the room? We run a fan (which reduces SIDS risk, too) and that helps a bit with the noises, and I think helps baby sleep too.

 

[janinegirly]

With # 1 she was in the bassinet by the bed for the first few weeks/month. Then co-slept with me and DH took the spare room when he couldn't sleep. At 3-4 months she moved to her crib.

I see the same thing this time around - we might put a bed in the nursery so there is the option for DH to sleep in a separate room from us those first few months. DH needs his sleep when going to work or else he can't function while I can exist on v. little (hmm, funny how that is, isn't it). Anyway, I honestly would rather he be another room so I don't have to be dealing with the extra pressure of worrying about if he's sleeing (even if DH says it's not a problem I end up worrying!). This is only when DH is working, when he's home on paternity he better be taking turns!

With a toddler this time around I also plan on noise machines in each kid's room. We'll see! Oh and I like the walk in close idea!

 

[Pandora II]

For the first week in hospital she slept on my chest - I got no sleep though as the bed was too small and uncomfortable to lie next to each other.

The first few weeks at home she slept in the mini co-sleeper in our room. Then due to sheer exhaustion I moved her into our bed (I'd feed her to sleep in our bed, then try to put her into the co-sleeper, the beady eyes would open instantly and she'd scream the place down - they I was up with a not hungry baby for the next 3 hours) and we finally all got some sleep.

She'd still wake-up but only to latch on and so neither of us had to wake-up fully.

Daisy has always been a totally silent sleeper and she doesn't move much either. She was so silent that I used to constantly panic that she'd stopped breathing - even now I check sometimes!

DH has almost always had a full night's sleep - he has to go to work during the day, I don't and could always sleep then if I needed to, plus I was breastfeeding so I was going to have to wake-up whatever so no point in two exhausted people.

Two years on, we are still co-sleeping and the cot is a great ironing basket...

If I ever have another then we will just co-sleep from the start.

 

[nfowife]

For the first 2 months I slept in the guest room/nursery with her. In the beginning she slept in the bed with me so I could just feed her and lay her back next to me. Once she was going a bit longer between feeds, I put her in her crib (in the same room). Around 3 months old I went back down to my room with DH. He is a pilot and needs to get a good night's sleep to be able to perform his job. Also I don't see a need for both of us to get up all night long when I'm the only one with the proper feeding equipment Also I felt better cosleeping without him in the bed and I didn't have to worry about being super quiet as much.

With my first, she was in the cosleeper from the start, we never coslept. She went from the cosleeper next to the bed to her own room around 3-4 months. With my second he was in the cosleeper at first, then my bed (DH was deployed when he was 6 weeks old until 4 months old), then cosleeper in my closet, then up to his own room around 4 months.

 

[DivaDiamond007]

James slept in the carseat in our room until he was about 8 weeks old and then we moved him to his own room in his crib. He's 3 now and sleeps in a toddler bed. Grace is 6 months and sleeps in our room in a PNP. We have a 2 bedroom house so are trying to wait for a good time to transfer her to the kids' room. She usually STTN (YES!) and James is a solid sleeper but it's still hard moving her out. Even at her age she makes so much noise at night and keeps me up.

 

[Dreamer_D]

Dreamer, Why not just move the co-sleeper back to your bed? Then you won't have to get up, and your DH can stay in the room if he can (mostly) sleep through the noise. If S would still fit in our co-sleeper, I would surely still have her in there! I loved that thing!

Re: bed-sharing, a lot of people bed share with both parents in bed. Are you concerned that your DH's sleep would be compromised in that case?

Re: noisy sleeping baby, are you running any white noise in the room? We run a fan (which reduces SIDS risk, too) and that helps a bit with the noises, and I think helps baby sleep too.

I think if I was going to bedshare full time I would try the cosleeper again. But now he does sleep on his own in the cosleeper most of the night, and in that situation, I sleep about a billion times better with him away from me. If I give up and cosleep, the thing is, moving him away from my body at all wakes him up. Also, when he is nursing in bed with me I take the swaddle off, but sleeping on his own he likes a swaddle. So I am not really sure the cosleeper will help me out right now, as the issue seems to be he wants to be attached to mama!

My husabnd is a very deep sleeper, my concern is that he would roll onto Ryder or something. The other night he wacked him in the head with an arm To give Ryder enough room and myself have enough room, means no room for DH. But I think that having DH leave is no different than using the cosleeper -- if I have the whole bed then I will be away from baby and he won't sleep. So I think using the cosleeper is the best solution IF I can get him to settle in it without me touching him, and without a swaddle. Tall order.

We have a fan in our room. I am a big FAN of white noise

ETA: I guess I am looking for a solution where I don't have to cosleep. I just dont' sleep well like that at all!

 

[nfowife]

dreamer, why does he need to sleep without the swaddle? I swaddled mine before nursing as I knew they'd fall asleep and it's so much easier to transfer a sleeping baby swaddled. Why do you unswaddle to feed him? Once I swaddled at night I didn't unswaddle unless I smelled poop.... thank goodness for huggies overnights diapers!

 

[Pandora II]

It's extremely dangerous to have a swaddled baby in bed with you.

Dreamer, although DH doesn't move much at night we have a line of pillows down the centre of the bed (we only have a queen sized bed) to stop him whacking Daisy and vice versa. On my side I have a bed-rail so that I can fully use the whole side - no worries about falling out.

We also have a memory foam mattress which I do think helps - certainly it's much more uncomfortable co-sleeping in other beds.

 

[tammy77]

I had C/S with my girls and nursed them exclusively. The only way I got any sleep was getting a little cosleeper that goes in the bed between the parents. After they'd outgrow that they slept in a bassinet (sometimes...) but most of the time they were in bed with me.

If the stars align and I can have another baby, I'll do things MUCH differently though, so ignore my example!

 

[Dreamer_D]

It's extremely dangerous to have a swaddled baby in bed with you.

Yes, this was my intuition, that he needs to move around on his own freely if in bed with me. Otherwise I don't unswaddle unless he needs a diaper change. But like our other son, he is a pee machine and needs a change pretty much every time right now! Size 1-2 diapers don't hold much, unfortunatley, and the next size is ridiculously huge.

 

[Shoopy]

Interesting. I had Sophia swaddled in bed with me in a sleep positioner.

 

[Deelight]

for the first 2.5 months she slept in the basinet in the lounge room through the day and hubby and I would move it to the bedroom at night when we went to sleep now at 4months old she sleep in a cot next to our bed and I just feed her in bed I have a special pillow to rest against the bedhead - hubby sleeps through it all he does not wake up unless i wake him up

 

[Pandora II]

Even a newborn baby will fight hard to be able to breathe - if they become trapped against something/someone that inhibits their breathing they will do what they can to push away. If they are swaddled then they are unable to help themselves in this way.

I'm a huge proponent of co-sleeping and my view is that it is extremely safe as long as certain criteria are adhered to. Some of these are outright dangerous and some merely increase the chance of something going wrong:

- mother must be in a bed not on a sofa or chair (the vast majority of infant suffocations occur when a parent falls asleep on the sofa)

- mother must not be incapacitated due to alcohol, meds or drugs.

- parents should not be smokers (this is also a big risk factor for SIDS wherever the baby sleeps)

- bed should not be pushed up against a wall - bed rails are safer as the baby can't fall between it and the bed, plus the rails are mesh so even if the baby is pressed up against it they can still breathe easily.

- the baby should be dressed in lightweight clothes and have ease of movement. They will pick up heat from your body and so it's much easier for them to overheat.

- no swaddles

- the mother should be breastfeeding - a breastfeeding mother will automatically lie in a certain position: on side, knees bent up, one arm above head and one arm over the baby. This stops the baby moving down (knees), moving upwards (raised arm), sideways (arm over) and means they have easy access to the breast. The mother will also not enter the deepest stage of sleep as the hormones involved in milk production prevent this.

A mother who is not breastfeeding is much more likely to turn their back to the baby in the night, move around more and will sleep more deeply.


In the 19th century in the UK, co-sleeping was banned due to the number of infants who were 'overlain'. It turned out that most of the babies were dying on saturday and Sunday mornings, and what was happening was the mothers were getting drunk at the weekend and then smothering their swaddled babies!

 

[Lanie]

I don't mean to threadjack, but how do the cosleepers have "special nights" with your DH's??? Do you pick up your baby and put them somewhere else?

 

[Dreamer_D]

I don't mean to threadjack, but how do the cosleepers have "special nights" with your DH's??? Do you pick up your baby and put them somewhere else?

I have wondered this too. It is not an issue in the early months, as there are no special nights for us then, but later?