hellosailor

thanks everyone, will take at look at these! And thanks for offer jollybaby, if we decide to go for that one may pop round and check it works in parent facing mode!

Hi Ruth, Spare batteries for tens machine - you don't want it running out!! Eye mask / ear plugs for ward - they claimed there was no way of turning of the lights on my headboard, but after pressing hundreds of buttons I managed to get them off! the infamous bendy straws for labour!

...thought I's start a new thread so as not to hijack snowboarder's one. (I also tried to get the bee raincover on yesterday, gave up, put mini sailor in sling and held an umbrella) Like JennyH I'm looking into what to get for a sunshade - I was thinking of getting the shade a babe style one rather than a sun hood style one, but as I currently use a muslin to block out stimulation and get her to go to sleep as much as for a sun shade, is that still going to be poss if I have a proper shade a babe? i.e, they may be sun protected but surely they can still see out of the shade a babe so very much wakey wakey rather than sleep inducing muslin?! Would you peg a muslin over the shade a babe? Or better to go for a hood style sunshade and peg a muslin off that as you would the normal hood of your buggy? Sorry to be so tedious, so early in the day!

Kalamiphile I have to do the dream feed at 10:30 as my baby won't take a bottle from her dad, but have recently stopped staying up for it, and now go to bed at 9, sleep for an hour and a half and set alarm for 10:30, do 20 mins feed then back to sleep by 11ish. I find this easier than if I didn't do it and had to wake in the early hours to do a feed instead. (mind you sometimes have to wake in the early hours to re-settle her anyway, even though she doesn't need feeding!!)

Thanks Buggie, we're going to keep going with the shush patting and I was already looking into a white noise machine - we have a slumber bear already which has setting for heartbeat, waves, rainfall etc, but the thing is the loop is only 5 minutes and then it cuts out, and then you have to punch slumber bear in the head to get him going again with the movement sensor. And given that the sudden cutting out of the white noise startles your baby awake every 5 minutes, I can vouch for the fact that you really do want to punch slumber bear at that point. ;-)

Langley boys and girls both excellent state secondary schools.

thank you so much everyone, and buggie for expert advice! haven't had time to post as it turns out getting through a baby's first cold is hard graft!! she is feeding a lot better now which is a huge relief, though still snotty. What we're now trying to get to grips with is that having had a cold has changed everything!! She has gone from sleeping through which she'd been doing for last few weeks, to waking up and crying at the same time in the middle of every night, at least once, even when we pick her up etc, doesn't want to go down for day time naps (I had just, just got this to happen fairly reliably after endless hours spent shush blinkin patting) aghhhh!) and on the occasions she does give up and go down will certainly only do so for 40 mins until she comes out of first sleep cycle, there's no gently soothing her through it to extend nap to a long refreshing one like before. Oh and the buggy and sling are no longer guaranteed nap solutions, she cries in them too. I'm dreading that this is now how it will be long term and she seems pretty much recovered from the cold so the night wakings in particular feel like a new habit....do they ever get previous body-clock / habits back after a cold and go back to what was established before or is it all back to square one?...gulp!

Will order that cd too I think fuschia! Snowboarder, we have only had success with swaddling for naps recently, 3 months plus, I couldn't get the hang of it in the early weeks, found it hard to make it snug and inescapable enough with a blanket etc and rather wished people would stop going on about how useful it was because it didn't seem to work for us. She also resisted it with some top volume crying the few times I tried! But now using one of those stretchy ones called 'miracle blankets' from mothercare or online, which are not just a flat blanket, but have a pouch for the legs, clever bits to keep the arms snug etc, and they don't come undone. It's helping a lot with naps as helps her through the jolting, though too nervous to swaddle at night because our room is so baking hot I worry it would feel like too many layers, even with just a vest on.

thank you, so far today she is feeding better than she has been..fingers crossed it will last!

I hope it's easier when they're old enough to tell you what ails them!!

thank you so much everyone - very kind of you to reply, I really appreciate it. Just went to seldoc and the doctor was reassuring, examined her throat, her ears, listened to chest etc and said there was no chest or ear infection and that the feeding issues would be as we guessed, the result of congestion in sinuses making it uncomfortable to feed. She obligingly threw up the mucus sick (sorry, not nice at supper time) I described while we were in the consultation room so he was able to see it and said that it was normal with a cough and cold for her to be doing this. He said we could try calpol and to keep using the saline drops and snot sucker as we have been doing. He did also say to keep offering the breast even more frequently so that even if she's taking very small amounts it will add up. The last 2 feeds since posting have been a bit better since trying some baby vapour rub on her chest, she latched on for several minutes at a time which has been impossible, so I'm hoping it will stay that way now. We'll keep a close eye on it and if feeding is as much of a struggle tomorrow would take her to paeds a & e I think. The doc said she wasn't dehydrated and we want it to stay that way of course.

Thanks Fuschia, I hoped you'd reply.. She had a slight temp first day but not for the last 3 days. I have some calpol in the house but haven't tried it as she didn't have a temp - perhaps I should. She is tired and clearly really needs to sleep as her night sleep is so broken but she is also having alert times between naps as usual. her nappies are perhaps less wet than usual as I would expect because she is drinking less, and that does make me worry about potential dehydration, yes. I have been wondering whether to call seldoc but figure, perhaps pessimistically, that they will just there's nothing that can be done for a cough/cold, and nothing that can be done to make her eat, and to try calpol etc, but maybe I should ring them to see if there is more help they can offer than that. I am about to try to feed her again and hoping she will take some but if not perhaps I should ring seldoc. Surely childrens a & e would say I shouldn't bring in a baby with cough/cold if I brought her in? Or am I underestimating how serious it could get with such reduced feeding? thanks fuschia

Could anyone advise on what to do about this? My 14 week old baby has had a cough/cold for a few days, and it's stopping her being able to feed, (she is breastfed). It's as if it hurts her to feed, particularly on one side, so I presume it's because her nose is blocked or her eustachian tube is blocked etc. Her nose doesn't seem that blocked anymore though, it looks quite clear and saline drops/snot hoover don't seem to get anything out, so am a bit puzzled. She writhes, cries and claws at the breast when I try to feed her, so even if I struggle to get her to feed for an hour I feel she has taken in a very tiny amount. I think it is more that she is finding it hard to feed than that she has lost her appetite, as every so often, during one of these sessions she latches on and sucks furiously for a few seconds before her face crumples and she howls. Even after having a tiny feed she pukes up mucus and she is waking up and crying in the night and is not easy to comfort, which I presume is also because she doesn't feel well? But I'm worried it's also because she hasn't taken enough calories in the day and is hungry. Also worried about my milk supply. A friend just lent me a syringe to finger feed expressed milk, but perhaps because of the time of day/my tiredness/stress pumping is yielding nothing, so don't think I can even feed her this way. Is it dangerous for them to eat very little while ill? Any advice really appreciated.

Health matters sell a powder for this called Bifidobacterium Infantis made by BioCare which is specially formulated for infants. You put a quarter of a tea spoon of the powder into their mouths with every feed if breastfeeding. I used it after having to take various antibiotics for 3 weeks while breastfeeding and worrying about baby sailor getting thrush or digestive probs. It's not cheap - looking at my bottle here it's ?26:15 but worth it if it helps!

bugger! I must have been told that twice already but I can't retain it! having a baby has made my brain atrophy! Is my theory that this would be a way to get hold of tickets generally a sound one though - to keep in mind for next season?

My bloke is a huge spurs fan, we've just had a baby so he can't get out much at the moment and I was wondering how I might go about arranging for him to go to a spurs match with a friend. Last time I looked into getting him tickets for a game that wasn't even a particularly 'big one' I couldn't even get a ticket for that so am thinking using the tickets of someone who has a season ticket but is going on hols or needs to miss a match may be my best option to get hold of some?

meathgirl I had the same problem - both ends are identical - I was going to ring them and ask if it was a mistake - though I suspect not if yours is the same. I did find that by pressing hard I could ram it in and get it working so I could use the pump. though it does seem weird if medela expect you to have to ram it in so hard it hurts your hand every time you want to use it! If you speak to medela people please let me know what they say!

Thanks for the advice everyone, lots of helpful stuff that makes sense and a relief to know that rocking to sleep sometimes etc isn't necessarily a cardinal sin..Kate W what you say resonates a lot! Also glad to hear that having probs with napping independently now doesn't necessarily mean that naps won't get better as she gets a bit older..and even a few days of trying to get her to go down in the cot makes me realise how much I'd miss the cuddles if she did! But would still be good to have her settling as an option so will persevere with one nap a day being in the crib for the time being, and then cut us both some slack and have the longer afternoon nap in the buggy or sling so we don't spend the whole day shush patting in the dark which is knackering for us both!

Thanks so much for sharing that millpond stuff in such detail Moos, very very useful, though I imagine that may be for slightly older babies than my 12 week baby if you're using it with a 6 month old? I know their experts tailor the method very precisely according to age? Sounds like 33 nights well spent tho!

littleEDfamily you are praised for your loan of the bednest about a thousand times a day round our house! Moos, have only been doing it a few days and I imagine it would take weeks rather than days as you say :'( - are you doing a similar thing, trying to soothe in cot and picking up, putting down, repeat to fade? Snowboarder - 'Mine is never 'drowsy' - he's either asleep or awake and angry' = just made me laugh aloud, which is quite something seeing as I'm sitting in a room with blackout blinds drawn trying to work out why she suddenly won't go to sleep tonight! plus I agree, everyone says you mustn't mustn't mustn't feed or rock to sleep but am struggling to find an alternative!! Surely most babies won't happily go down in a cot while awake and slip peacefully into a relaxed sleep...

thanks fuschia, I've recently read the no-cry nap solution, lots of interesting stuff from E Pantley BB100, sadly she also won't take a dummy or be swaddled but thanks for suggestions! Moos, yes, think i will do nap training for one nap a day as can only imagine how exhausted she'll get if I do it every nap...ooh-er....

Fellow forumites, What the dickens do I do about this? I posted a while ago about the fact that my baby would only take naps on me or my partner and I was somewhat at the end of my tether as with feeding added in as well, it meant I literally never even got off the sofa to go to the bathroom! Well, things have moved on a bit at least - she is 12 weeks old and she now does night time sleep in a crib next to our bed rather than co-sleeping which is great as has removed my anxieties about rolling but daytime naps are tricky... I've been putting her down in the crib while drowsy but awake (ambitious!) for naps and doing a version of shush patting to get her off to sleep, which can take 15 mins of grizzling, and then repeating this every time she wakes and grizzles/cries, sitting by the crib for the duration of the nap and trying to soothe her in the crib each time she wakes and only picking her up if the crying escalates from grizzling to a proper cry and then when she stops popping her back down, and repeating process till she drops off etc. Yesterday and this morning we were up there for 2 hour stretches, during which time she did about a 40 min nap and a second 5 or 10 minute stint after the first soothing, but couldn't be soothed on the 3rd or 4th wake up so I called that the end of the nap. The thing is, if I did as I have been doing and let her sleep on me for every nap, she sleeps deeply and for long periods, and she is a baby who can only really be awake for 75 mins at a time and ideally seems to want up to 6 hours worth of naps a day, so I'm finding in the last few days that by following the advice I've been giving on getting her to sleep in a crib means that she is not sleeping anywhere near enough as she tends to only do one sleep cycle if I'm lucky and we spend most of her nap time shush patting and doing this 'nap exercise' rather than her actually having a proper snooze, so she is so tired that feeding her is difficult as she always falls asleep within a minute or two of a feed as she is so tired all the time! I've been trying to ensure that she gets a better nap later in the day by having a nap in the buggy or sling as I know she will sleep properly, but this doesn't seem to compensate for the sleep she's still losing while I do this crib stuff to try to get her to go down for naps, plus I wonder if the inconsistency of doing this crib nap 'exercise' for some naps and not for others is undermining what I'm doing with the crib naps anyway?? I really want to continue taking steps to get her to go down for naps but not at the expense of her being exhausted by lack of the long naps she used to have on me..any ideas gratefully received!

I was scanned on the day I went into labour and told my baby was 9lbs 12oz, and later that day she weighed in at 8lb 9oz, a friend was given extra growth scans because they kept telling her that her baby was small and she weighed in at 9lb 4oz.

Thanks for the advice, all really useful and I will definitely get some mother's milk tea from the health food shop tomorrow! I feel more relaxed about it as I think you're right - if my milk supply was low then she would not be satisfied after a feed which she seems to be, so is perhaps that I'm not relaxed enough to get a good flow going with the pump - will persevere! thanks again! x

Morning forumites, I'm in real confusion about expressing and also my milk supply and would really appreciate any advice or tips.. my baby is about to turn 7 weeks old and over the last 3 weeks I have expressed a few times with very mixed results. On the occasions I've expressed, there has been an occasion where it took 45 mins to produce 1oz, another where it took 15 mins to produce over 4oz and other times 20 plus mins to produce about 3oz. I know there is nothing predictable about the human body but I don't understand why it is so varied? even the occasion where I produced over 4oz I would not say was that productive as that isn't really a full feed, or only just. The first couple of times I tried the let down was quick, even though the yield was drastically different each time. The last couple of attempts, the let down has been very slow or hasn't happened so I have given up. The one time I produced a full(ish) bottle was first thing in the morning, as I know is suggested, so I thought that was the key but I tried first thing yesterday and today and again managed to produce 1oz only. It can't be the pump (medela swing) or I wouln't have produced a semi decent amount on that occasion? I'm wondering if my milk supply is dwindling? I'm really keen to be able to express so that there is the option of her dad giving her a bottle but it doesn't seem to be working out that I can, certainly not with any reliability. Does anyone have any tips?