Newborn and baby advice

I am sooooo happy:) James slept through for the first time last night. 9- 5. I actually woke up at 3 (he normally wakes at 2) with my boobs so sore. I thought he had dies in his sleep so I jumped out of bed and ran to his nursery to check he was still breathing:) The went back to bad and couldnt sleep because I was so engorged. By the time he woke up at 5 I couldnt wait to feed him:) Hopefully it lasts, but I'm not getting my hopes up. Who says breastfeeding on demand babies dont sleep through the night?

That said I think he now thinks he had too much sleep at night, because he woke at 5 to feed and then fell back to sleep untill 7h30 when he wanted more food and didnt want to sleep again. I finally got him down at 1pm:) He wasnt irritable, but I was worried that he was just overstimulated, so I eventually put him in his car seat and drove him around a bit (that usually is a sure fire way to get him to sleep) and he sat singing inthe back till we got home and when I took him out the car gave me the biggest grin!

@ Desiree - connors mommy, thats awesome that he didnt cry. I cant wait till the 14 weeks injections are over because then its a nice long break until the measles one at 9 months!

@ Mrs SH, sorry cant help you with the routine thing, but I find that James is dropping night time feeds on his own. At about 6 weeks he stopped waking at 12 and then last night he didnt wake at 2. I know that when he goes through his growth spurts though that I will wake every 2 hours!

1st timer - how did ou get the routine thing right anyway? James marches to his own drum, and if he is hungry after 2 hours (eg when he is growing) or if he is thristy (Durban gets hot) He screams blue murder and no amount of dummying can stop him until he gets a boob. As a result his feeding times are so erratic. I'm just glad I work from home and only have to occasionally rely on an expressed bottle. I just knew that he could only handle 1 and a half hours awake before becoming irritable, but even that has gone out the window today!

please dont forget to add your birthdays here

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Thanks for all the advice ladies - really much appreciated.

I have a couple more questions if you don't mind.

Do you find sticking to the 3hour or 4hour feed schedule works better?

And how does one 'drop' a feed? Does the LO just not want it anymore or do you give water in place or milk at that time? When is it good to drop the 10/11pm feed?

The sister at the clinic said that I must do 3-hourly feeds in the day time and then LO will drop the 2am feed. Alex feed like that for 2 days now, but now he wakes up 3-hourly in the night too...which sucks (no pun intended . He used to sleep 4-5hours.

@Firstimer - sounds like a fantastic routine. I might start expressing a bottle for week nights too. We're already doing that over the weekends so the DH gets the graveyard shift on Fri & Sat. But DH and I equally love our sleep...so I reckon I'll get away with him giving him the after-bath feed. Don't really want to ask him to help with the graveyard one as he has to go to work in the mornings!

Ladies!!! just got back from taking Connor for his 4 month injections, and he was such a little soldier - didn't cry, AT ALL!! I really think the Emla patches did their job I was soooo proud of my little boy! he now weighs 7.3kgs, so he's more than doubled his birthweight, the clinic sisters were very pleased with his progress, his neck control, everything is just great!

@Dells - welcome to our thread!! Great to have you here

@Claudia - I've given up on trying to follow the babysense books and all the other books too, lol, Connor doesnt fit into any of their moulds and Im done with trying to make him - we just follow our own thing now and it works just fine!

@Jacadebra - soooooooooooooooo glad your water came back, I dont know what the hell I would do if we had no water for that amount of time, I dont have a pool - eeeeeek, I'd have to spend a fortune on bottled water!!

@Bronz - how old is Graeme again? Connor dropped his 10pm feed between 8-10 weeks, and his 2pm feed at between 10-12 weeks, so he sleeps through both now, sleeps from 8:30ish to 5:30ish most mornings, what you can try is if Graeme wakes again for an earlier feed, try giving him his dummy, if he settles, chances are his not that hungry...if he doesn't settle then offfer him a feed and see if he takes a full feed.

Sorry if I havent mentioned everyone by name, Im off to do some work now, he he

hey ladies, it is good to be back in the world of moms. my little angel Senamile was born on her EDD 03 April 2010. what a lovely little girl. she is super easy to handle than my two other kids. her birth weight was 3.4 kg and now she weighs 5.7kg
it is great to see all the familiar names from our chats of PF. I am looking forward to sharing all our kiddies milestones and advises with u all mommies.

Glad your water got sorted out Jacadabra:)

I had to laugh, I went for coffee with a friend today at a local bookstore, and afterwards was browsing and had a look in the no cry sleep training method book (I dont believe in letting James cry it out, I believe its more important that he knos he is loved:)) and in it it says that a baby is considered to be sleeping through if it goes a full 5 hours (ie only from 12 till 5), if thats the case then James has been "sleeping through" at the wrong time since birth (he does 9 - 2). All I know is that I have had panda eyes for 3 months now and makeup doesnt even hide them:( I also worked out that James only sleeps 11 hours total in a day - 9 of them at night and then 4 30min sessions during the day. So much for me sleeping when he sleeps. I've given up trying to get him to sleep longer. He now goes down quite easily. I stopped rocking him about 1 week ago and the 1st day was hard, but now he falls alseep with minimal fuss. He just wakes after a catnap wide awake and nothing I do can get him back down (seriously if I rock him with a dumm swaddled tight etc he just stares at me with wide eyes an coos through his dummy with a big smile on his face) he obviously is just a baby that doesnt need much sleep, and hes not miserable and can be entertained quite easily, its just hard work for me trying to get anything done:)

Hello Ladies
Our water came back on after 30 hours or something. Late last night. Luckily my son slept right through and was feeling better today - and nobody else got the bug (touch wood).

I am not sure why the water was off - there was a big excavator working at one of the dams in the estate so maybe it hit the pipe - either that or there were water pipe issues and they were just working on it anyway.. who knows.

Yay to those of you whose babies are sleeping through - that's great! Lia still hasn't got a set sleep routine - some nights she sleeps 8 hours followed by 4 more.. some nights she wakes every 2, 3, 4 hours .. lol.

Lia has BITTEN me on the nipple about 5 times today... what the heck lol. She'll be sucking merrily and then CHOMP. Ouch. I checked to see if she is teething but I can't see anything... best she doesn't keep doing that... jeepers lol.

Joburg is darn freezing... my word... not much to do to keep both a toddler and a baby happy in this weather. Oh well.

Hope you are all cosy and have a great night's rest.