Looking for patterns in newborn ? should I just give up?

[supergolden88]

My little bug is going to be three weeks on Friday. He is exclusively breastfed and gaining weight nicely.

In the first 2/3 days he was at the breast almost round the clock but since there was only a tiny bit of colostrum it was mostly to soothe himself and jump start the milk supply. Milk came in day 3 and almost immediately he seemed more content and spent large parts of the day (but, crucially, not the night!)sleeping. At night he woke up a lot and fed and was hard to settle.

At some point - I guess some time in week two he slept well in the day, long naps and ok in the night ? dream feed around 10.30 and up at 2/3am and around 6am. This pattern continued for 2/3 days and I felt so much better for it. Then suddenly overnight he had terrible time sleeping seemed very grizzly and uncomfortable day and night. Bad wind, hard tummy, some throw up, seemed colicky (for lack of better word). This was a very pronounced change made me think it was something I may have eaten or drunk (only culprits I can think of: orange juice and some alcohol).

Again he flipped round and slept better at night and seemed better in the day although nowhere near as settled and then again last night made me want to scream - was up most of the night, snacked a lot but not fed properly and seems very windy again this morning. Tried giving him Infacol in first week but gave up early on not sure if I should try it again as he is awfully hard to burp!

I am keen to try some kind of routine on him as he seems much happier when his feeds are spaced out at around 3hours - I have noticed if he feeds sooner than he should he usually brings it all back up. His bedtime is a little late at around 7.30/8pm so that my husband has a little time with him and it coincides with my daughter's bedtime but I have noticed that by 7pm he is very tired and would rather be asleep (usually we wake him for a bath).

Anyway not sure what the point of this post is other than sharing (am very tired!) but would love to hear how other mums with newborns are coping!

[womanofdulwich]

i think i would let him sleep at 7pm- your husband can see him for a nappy change when he wakes uo next. I am sure it will change next week.

[KateW]

Our little girl is the same age as your little man and I started her in a four hour feed routine from day 4 (mainly because husband is in the army and heading back overseas so I wanted to get her in a routine for both our sakes). I'm using Rachel Waddilove's routine which is nice and flexible. Feeds are roughly 6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm, 10pm, 2am. She sleeps well during the day and pretty good at night, on the whole sleep chunks of 2 and a half hours. When she hit week 2 (as the book said) she started being more restless in the evening (her natural wakeful time) and has been much more windy like your wee man. I'm noticing now what is a windy cry and what is a tired cry. I know she's due a growth spurt any day now so we'll ride that one and see if she settles down again. On the whole, the routine is working so well and it sounds like your boy would slip into it quite nicely if he's already had some longer stretches of sleep. She's having a more windy/restless time following her 10pm feed which is when I'm most tired, so that's a bit tought at the moment, but I can ctahc up with some sleep during the day so I can't grumble. Not sure if any of that helps, but it might be worth having a look at Rachel's book? Best of luck!

[supergolden88]

SOunds worth a look. And I think I have figured out why poor lamb is so restless - bad nappy rash and pooing constantly. I think he wakes when he is uncomfortable which is pretty much all the time