I can’t get baby to sleep. At all.
Hi, really really really hoping someone can help. I’m a FTM DD is 5 weeks old and I am having terrible trouble putting her down to sleep and I’m really struggling from lack of sleep, I think I get max 3 hours a day and in truth it’s pushing me to a very dark place. She seems to go down for my husband but not me. I have no one around me in terms of family or friends that would be willing to help so that’s not an option and my husband has gone back to work so I’m dealing with it all on my own and I really really am at breaking point. She was born at 37+4 and I was induced due to her being ‘constitutionally small’ she was born 5lbs but had no blood sugar problems, good muscle tone and an Apgar score of 9. She’s 5 weeks now and last time I weighed her a few days ago she was 7lb 6oz so she’s putting on weight well she’s breastfed and seems to have a voracious appetite. We’ve been through quite a bit which I also think is contributing to my low mood. We had feeding difficulties at the beginning too, largely due to lack of support whilst in the hospital so I was using nipple Shields but we also found at in week 3 that she had a posterior tongue tie. So we had that cut and long story short for the most part she latches without the shields. Sleep however seems to be getting worse, especially for me. It’s really pot luck if she will stay down when I put her down. My husband and I take shifts in the evening, he takes her from 8-1am and me from 1am onward so at least I have some sleep. I do have to wake up in the middle of the that time to express so that leaves me with about 3 hours all in all. When i take her for my ‘shift’ she almost immediately wakes up. The real trouble is settling her after a feed. So what I currently do is, she wakes up I take her out of her swaddle, and to the chair and feed her on one side, burp her, change her nappy, feed her on the other side, burp her and hold her on my shoulder until she drifts off. I’ve tried putting her down in the light sleep and gently massaging between her eyebrows (advice from baby massage) and also getting her to a deep sleep. But she seems to stir a LOT and wake up within 40 mins and the process starts all over again. It takes all I have not to just weep or frankly run away. This is the same for nap times during the day too. We also take her to a cranio osteopath to try and relax her and bath her before bed and keep the room dimly lit with no stimulation and white noise. I’m at a loss and frankly can’t carry on like this- does anyone have any tips?
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