supergolden88

For those who have seen my many posts on this forum you will know that I have a baby boy who is 4 months and waking up a LOT at night. Sometimes it is up to 6 times and others only 2/3 but when he is up less he tends to stay awake for hours at a time. Last night it was 3.30-5am partly because the nappy leaked and after changing him and his entire outfit/growbag he was WIDE awake and giggling. I am determined to try and improve his sleep - this is my second baby and I have been through a year of broken sleep with my daughter 4 years ago. I really want to avoid that this time around. Or try to anyway. Baby boy is breastfed although we do try to give him a bottle once a day (usually the second night feed) with either formula or EBM. Even when he takes the bottle (usually he fusses and refuses it) he only takes a maximum of 60ml or more frequently 20-40ml. My question is how many feeds where/are you doing at 4 months? My son can go 4 hour stretches or longer but he sometimes will brestfeed for 5 minutes or less even when the gap is a big one. He also tends to not be interested in first morning feed which leads me to believe he is taking too much during the night. The past few days he feeds on first wake up (between 10-12pm not always consistent) and he tends to refuse a bottle and breastfeed - sometimes very little others a lot - before falling asleep again. Second feed tends to be around 2-4am (again depending on when first one was - roughly three hours since last feed). This one he usually takes bit of a bottle and then breastfeeds on top of that. Morning feed is 7-8am depending on when he was fed last. As I mentioned he is usually not that interested. I am desperate to turn his daytime feeds around so I would ideally like to drop the feed in the middle of the night. I should also mention that his nose tends to get blocked at night which wakes him up and on top of that he is teething something fierce! That is to say perhaps he is not waking up due to hunger but is used to feeding before going back to sleep.

I think I saw something at Sainsburys - not sure it was boxes though. They had some nice frilly cupcake cases. Their bakery section seems to be constantly growing. Perhaps someone who went recently can confirm

My baby has the same and it was diagnosed as dry skin or infatile eczema. We are plastering him in oilatum jr if the rash forms a sort of circle it could be ringworm in which case you need anti fungal cream

Same reason they decide to do an enormous poo that soaks through three layers of clothing the one time you decide to go out without an outfit change in nappy bag. They just know!

I have been using cooled chamomile tea and it seems to be helping. Not sure he needs drops - hopefully we can avoid them.

Baby boy has sticky, slightly red, itchy eyes. Yup eye infection time - surprised it took so long. No appointment at GP and am trying to remember whether they prescribe basically same eye drops they would give an adult - variant of Optrex infected eyes? Can I get something over the counter? My eyes are having similar symptoms minus stickiness

CRAP ...and he is awake. Did not even last two and a half hours. He did better as a newborn :(

Seriously don't do it. I managed to avoid an induction (following a sweep) with a brisk walk around the block and nipple stimulation. TMI I am sorry!!

I am joining in the sigh of relief. Hope and pray that Japanese takeaway (currently being picked up by hubby all the way from Brixton) can be consumed before baby boy decides to wake up... I mean there's wine in the fridge and everything!

The baby clinic that was on every Wednesday at my medical centre (DMC Chadwick Road) has been suspended since January as they are doing building work. This means I haven't been able to see a HV and get baby weighed since then. Is it possible to turn up at another baby clinic and be seed even if you are not registered with the practice? I would really appreciate it if one of you can ask and let me know...

If you are after a nursery place the sooner the better in some cases as they are few ones that take babies and the spaces get filled quickly. I have seen pregnant mums put down the name of their future offspring on waiting lists at Asquith. If you are after a childminder or nanny you can wait until near the time you need them - maybe make enquiries a couple of months in advance.

Well baby had the shot and did not even cry. However his sleep (or complete lack of) is still beyond terrible. Trying to figure out what to do and I am at a loss

Thanks I may take him. If I survive today which right now is 50-50

Baby boy is seriously testing my sanity (more on that in separate thread later)by not sleeping at night. Worse than he has ever been due to teething/ blocked nose. He has a BCG jab on thursday and am wondering whether to take him or not considering how extremely unsettled he is - and witf final round of other jabs in two weeks. Do babies react a lot to the BCG? I remember it gets pussy etc eventually...

Thanks for all your suggestions. I had some responses through Netmums and Childcare.co.uk

I spend my days either carrying baby on right arm facing out or with him on a sling and breastfeeding a lot. My back is killing me - especially between the shoulderblades. Can anyone suggest some stretches or suitable exercises? I could do my yoga DVD but am too knackered to do more than few minutes of anything. I also suspect my nursing bras all need to be replaced - none fit properly which may be making matters worse.

Can anyone recommend a reliable website for finding registered childminder / nanny / nannyshare? I am looking for one of the three for baby boy nearly 4 months in Nunhead area. I seem to recall there was a free website that listed available childminders at least but can't find it. Any suggestions much appreciated

I honestly don't think there's anything the matter with him - he is bright eyed and bushy tailed it's me who is about to be reduced to a weeping heap. Just spend an hour trying to settle him for a nap. Again he would fall asleep on my shoulder or breastfeeding but wake up in cot. And after an hour of crying/hand chewing/not sleeping have brought him back downstairs. You would think that with the night he had and no nap since he would be napping, but no. If this continues I will take to GP just in case.

OK please let me figure this out. Gave him a bit of Calpol and he managed to sleep 8pm - 12.50am. Woke up chewing his hands like a mad thing and had 60ml of expressed milk from a bottle then breastfed till asleep again. Put him down at 1.30am. Was up at 2.40am and then that was it. Nursing for couple of minutes got him back to sleep momentarily but second he was back in the cot he would wake up again. No amount of rocking, shushing etc would let him sleep longer than 5 minutes. I have been up all night long - even though I went to bed at 10pm I was kept awake by insomnia or too much caffeine till baby kept me up. I tried to let him sleep next to me but I don't feel comfortable doing it and don't really like the idea of the baby nursing all night long - his daytime feeds are disrupted enough as it is. Mercy.

My point - if I indeed had one having not had much sleep past few days - is that while I love being a mum I love work as well and feel very frustrated by the lack of choices we get as working mums. I gave up a fulfilling but ultimately frustrating job to be mum and would not have had enough support from employers to go back to same role after maternity. I know lots of women who went back to work only to diascover they were made redundant /refused flexible hours etc. I think the reason it is nearly always women amending work hours to accommodate childcare is that once we take maternity leave we find our choices limited unless money is no object. Having said that I know more than a few couples who are sharing the childcare role by both working part time and taking care of the children on alternate days. When I say I want it both - being a mum and having a job I love - I realise it is practically impossible. Baby was up 95% of last night for example and if I get my new project today I certainly won't be able to do much about it! And I feel I should clarify that the reason I did not take a break from freelancing this time around was that having spent four years building a steady freelance contact base I felt very insecure about stopping work because once you refuse a few projects you get very quickly forgotten about. Edited for content/spelling etc. Can't believe I tried to post at 1.30am with baby nursing at same time. Damn auto correct!

Before I got pregnant the first time I was Art Director of a small magazine publishing company. I was working 8am to 8pm and I was not working I was constantly thinking about work. When I got pregnant a year into the job thing got worse as we were launching new magazines etc. My stress levels were through the roof. After I had my daughter I decided not to go back to my job partly because I had concerns about the company but mostly because I knew that I would not be able to fit work around childcare (ironic that both bosses were women). I went freelance when baby was 8 months and at nursery. Working freelance is brilliant as you can work from home but what happens of course is that you work twice as hard turning no work down and doing all house related chores as well as nursery pick ups (hubby did drop offs). If I was given more options at work I would not necessarily choose to stay home because of illness/childcare issues. Edited to add here that my husband does all he can to share childcare but he hates leaving early or going in late because of school/nursery closures or illness etc. Hates it because he will get no understanding and will have to work insane hours at home to make up for it - something he does frequently staying up till 3-4am. Now I have a new baby boy I was so concerned about telling my clients I was pregnant and therefore unable to take on work for a time that I never told them about it and continued to work through it all. I was laying out a book three days after the birth. Now I realise this is extreme and quite possibly insane but I do want it all. I love my baby to bits but I love working as well and balancing the two has been very hard at times.

No temperature.

Just when I think I have figured something out about baby boy he goes and changes completely to keep me on my toes. He has always been rather sensitive - reacting to everything from too much foremilk to dry house in rather extreme ways (frothy poos and horrendous nappy rash / horrendous nasal congestion and skin rash). His sleeping has not been very consistent but he did manage a few long stretches together with frequent wake ups. Past two days he seems to be teething: chewing hands/toys constantly,drooling red cheeks and most importantly not managing to sleep longer than an hour in the night and minutes in day. Last night was terrible: bedtime 7.30, up at 9.20, 11, 1, 2.45 and then in bed with us writhing. Up at 7am and only now managed to get him down.typing this over cot ready to shhh again etc. Ready to calpol him tonight but please tell me if anyone else has experienced such extreme reaction to teething. At 3 1/2 months seems early to me. My daughter had teeth out at 6m but don't recall such bad reaction to it possibly because her sleeping was worse than baby boy's.

Just out of interest Helen did you manage to easy your lo's wind? My son seems to be really suffering from trapped wind especially during the day - will refuse to feed. Trying Infacol but without great success. He is three months old

I can sympathise I am in same boat. My three month old son CAN take a bottle he just refuses it. Most success I have had is middle of the night when he is quite sleepy. Then he will take some (maximum 2oz) usually a mix of EBM and formula. I have some Nuk bottles if you want to try those they have a latex teat