Flimsy routine

Hi OneMumsJourney!
My name's Sarah. I'm from Glasgow and have just stumbled across your blog! Just wondering how your day is structured with your little one? I am just demand feeding but want to try get into a routine! Help? I've had a bit of a nosey through google but just can't seem to find a lot. Many thanks and happy blogin'!


Sarah, UK - 09:43:46 PM, Monday 06, June 2011 BST

Thanks so much for your email! You don't know how exciting it was to see I had mail for the first time!! I'm not sure I'll be any help though, so here we go.

I chose to adapt the feed, play, sleep kinda thing. They say to feed your baby once he/she wakes up and you get her out of bed - change his/her nappy and then play time or short awake time (depends how old your bub is?) - then swaddle and into bed when you see a tired sign (anything from rubbing eyes, yawning, making fists, grizzling, looking away from you).

It's all about what works for you and your baby. he/she might not like the way you do things. .  One way is you could note down how your day goes (feeds, sleeps etc) and see if there's already a loose structure. I try to have fixed times (which I keep feeds as close to the chosen time as much as possible) but if my wee boy wakes up early or stays up a bit longer then I just roll with it hahaha :D

A great easy breezy day goes a little bit like this:

7:30am - wakes up
Nappy change and then breast-feed
(I tend to change first as he has a bit of reflux so this helps!)
Has a play in his bouncinette
I sterilise his bottles for his formula top up (my low milk supply)
Swaddle
Bottle feed him and he tends to fall asleep straight after 25ml*
9am - asleep!

11:30am - wakes up
Nappy change
Hops under his play gym for tummy time while I sterilse and make his feed of 50ml
Swap over to his back (he gets impatient on his lil belly)
I try to make lunch and/or play with him!
Swaddle
Breast-feed then bottle top up
Let him sit for 5-10 minutes to let his tummy settle
1pm - asleep!

4pm - wakes up
Nappy change
Hops under his play gym while I once again sterilse and make his feed of 75ml
Swap him to tummy and play with him etc :D

Swaddle

Breast-feed then bottle top up*

5:30 - asleep!

7:30pm - wakes up
Has a play in his bouncinette and play gym after
Meanwhile I get everything ready if I haven't in between feeds (bottles 100ml, bath etc)
Bathtime!
Blowdry (with hairdryer he loves this and gets him dry fast and kept warm!)
Massage
Swaddle
Breast-feed then bottle top up
9pm - asleep

~**~

Then it starts all over again! Sometimes I dream-feed depending on the day and how much he drunk. Sometimes he can be silly and wont have a lot and sleeps more and some days he has extra big feeds. If it's been a busy stressful day he is so tired he wont drink much for his last feed so then I'll give him the top up so he doesn't wake.

* - They suggest to not feed to sleep as they associate the two together so often I just wake him up again as I'm putting him into bed. Turn his mobile on, give him a firm kiss and say Goodnight baby quite loudly. Someone suggested this so they then see they're in bed (and don't worry that they're now in a different place an mums no longer there) and then put themselves back to sleep. Seems to be working for him so hey :D

See my next post for nappy changes with a reusable nappy - cause he's a serial wetter so I need to do them a bit more often while he's awake. Good luck Sarah and whatever works works, sorry I'm no big help but it really is a trial and error cause what works for one mum and bub might not work for the other! :D

Boobs and Bottles!

The debate over breast-feeding and formula is crazy!

I still can't believe how it wasn't even mentioned during my pregnancy. I think there is a great amount of information (and pressure) out there to breast feed how to's and such but just what happens if you can't or like me, have a low milk supply. Then what. .  Starve them? No. You have to use an alternative - formula.

I don't see the harm in it. Yeah, comparing it to breastmilk there is a bit of an outweigh but still formula does have it's pros. I wish I could fully breast fed as opposed to mix feeding him but I did have to stuff it up. People say to eat but don't give you reasons why you should. I'm the kind of person that if told "If you do this then you wont have to deal with that. And if you have to do that there are all these problems . . ." How time consuming is buying (or lately, finding) the formula you have chosen, preparing the feed and sterilising the bottles beforehand, having pre-boiled cold water!! So exhausting. Sure makes for a well thought out dreamfeed. I took for granted just popping a boob in that's for sure.

If only I had been told. Hey, Melissa just so you know there's a thing you can have called a low milk supply. Now some people just get it and it's their body. But you, you're going to struggle with feeding and eating. .  looking after yourself. You're not going to find time and boy, it sure is hard to, but you need to. If you don't you wont have enough milk to feed him. If you're lucky you'll spot it before he looses weight. He wont sleep properly because he's hungry. He'll cry lot's. Oh and you know that little time you had. .  where you could maybe eat but will decide to sit there in thought or just blob watching tv until his next feed (you'll probably fall asleep) well, instead you'll be using that very little time to now prepare bottles and the bottle feed for him. So now you really have less time to yourself and very VERY little time to eat.

. . . . . Now that you have very VERY little time to eat your milk supply will decrease even more.. it'll slow riiiight down as you'll have less and less calories and energy to burn . . . . .

Great. A never ending circle.

- ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ -

On positive news I have discovered an AMAZING wrap. It's called the miracle blanket. Here's one place you can get it from - the sleep store! (click!!) They also have great sleeping information for newborn to pre schoolers. My lil button no longer can get out of it! It's great because there's still so much room for him to move in it (pediatrician approved!) and it's not tight at all. So easy to use, no velcro, no nothing! So easy peasy. This will make a few things easier.

Oddly he hasn't been feeding or sleeping a lot in the last 48 hours. I've put him down to bed today a whole hour early (great as he was starting to take an hour longer at the night feed) and he drunk almost as much as he normally does (boobs and bottle) before he fell asleep. So cute.

I love breast feeding him and just wish I had of known EVERYTHING about it all beforehand. But that would have been too easy hey?

Blunt as.

Things I have learnt.

Babies, well you work around them not the other way around. Especially those early days. Try fight it but they resist harder and smirk in their sleep!

Starting this whole journey. .  with 3 days of no sleep. Not good for your health. I can't imagine if I'd lost any more!

Broken sleep does NOT count as sleep.
This has been my latest sleeping er. .  gains?

No more than 4 hours of sleep for 2/3 of the time
           - Only 1.5 - 2 hour sleeps: first month
           - 4-6hour sleeps for 2 weeks tops
           - back to 3 - 5 hours broken sleep: 6 weeks


I know that a lot of mums I've talked to feel the same feeling as I do when I glance over to my partner and see him in sleepy land having the time of his life! Soon he shall know the wrath of the night feed :P

The start you really are on your own (not aaaactually) even with your mum and whoever else you have helping. .  There will be numerous times where you are just at home. You and bubby. What's worse maybe is if you have SO much help, one moment there may not be any when you need it. .  then it hits you.

My day is all over the show. And rather repetitive.
While having to cook dinner for the mum and dad (that's us!) and do the washing, look after a dog amongst it, clean up, wash, settle the baby, hang out, try shower, settle again, make dinner, prepare feeds, doctors visits, put away washing, post up trademe auctions to make money, package and address them, oh settle the baby, grab the barking dog because he's seen a cat for the millionth time oh and resettle the baby AGAIN since hes now woken up from the barking, clean bottles, give baby gaviscon, do groceries. . . . . . . . ! AUGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is give me a freaking break. .  someone, please?! :(

Sorry -- cracked nipples, engorgement, no sleep, sex attempts of sorts (hard to explain), do almost everything around the house not to mention the whole process of pregnancy. . and let's not get started on having to get the poor thing out of me -- just a bit intense aye? :S

People who say they 'slept like a baby' has obviously never had one.

Boy. Sleep is scarce around here! Any quiet moment (which is rare in itself I must say) I find myself drifting off to sleep. Sometimes while breast-feeding, going toilet. .  even bathing him makes me even sleepier!

Help would be invaluable right now. .  you'd think it would actually live up to it's name though - help. .  it would help in some ways, give me a break is what my partner says. But really, if I'm not feeding, burping, changing, bathing, coxing him to sleep I'm trying to catch up with everything else. If I didn't the washing piles would be up to the windows by now and my sister would have made us all clothes out of flax. That wouldn't be a bad idea actually since there is an abundance at this house!


Who would have thought having a baby would be so hard. Yes it's rewarding but the true test is the whole trial and error debacle!! I have trouble getting him to fall asleep most times when he is due to sleep and now has started refusing stubbornly during times to go for hours and will just cry. Sometimes i'll look at the clock and it'll have been 3 hours and still not a droopy eye in sight. What works for one baby won't work for another. THEN to mix it all up again what works one day might not work the next.

You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance.

~ Franklin P. Jones

I have tried everything. Wrapping, not wrapping, rocking, a bath before night time, singing, using a pacifier, playing classical/soothing/white noise from youtube, dimming the lights, the feed-change-wrap-'play'/'interact'. .  then swapped it around to change-wrap-feed for night time.. massage, controlled crying - although most people would say he's far too young. I've run out of ideas!

Using a dummy was brilliant for the first week and he didn't spit it out too often and stopped crying to concentrate on his new found comfort. Now he spits it out all the time and has learnt how to cry. .  with the dummy still in!! Every time I need to settle him to sleep it truely is different from the last.

I was warned that a babies sleep cycle can be pretty erratic but this just feels ridiculous. In saying that give me a few weeks and I'll look back to now and think "well. .  that wasn't so bad really. ."

Fingers crossed huh?

Who am I kidding?!!

So today I brought a magazine. .
Who was I kidding thinking I'd get a chance to read it!!

The life of a mum seems to be going a bit like this for me.

It's a big change going from the busy body that I was now 'stuck' at home. It is a lot of effort to go anywhere at this stage as you need to bring half the nursery with you. My wee one is having a bit of trouble with sleeping and settling.. So with that after the feeding, burping, changing, wrapping and sometimes bathing the time in-between is spent coxing him to sleep.

Frustration is inevitable when doing so as the universe is against me. Sometimes he'll wake up just as he drifts off because he startles himself (not hitting himself as he's wrapped up almost to the point where he can barely move but as if he's having one of those dreams where you suddenly feel like you fall and it wakes you up. Also movement in the room, accidently knocking the bassinette are other factors but it just never seems to end. .

What do I do??