first-time mom with little-no help

my daughter is just about a month old now and I'm starting to burn out. my baby doesn't sleep much during the day, unless I'm holding her. once I put her down she sometimes will stay asleep, but not very often. i don't have much help and when I do, it's very little. my boyfriend is in rehab and may not be out for a minimum of six months and my mom just flat out refuses when I ask. sometimes she'll come over to say hello and look at the baby, but she rarely stays for longer than five minutes. i live with my grandparents who cant really do much. i have a friend, but she works a lot and lives all the way across town with no transportation. most of my days are spent here alone except when I babysit my little brother for my mom and he helps some. I'm just exhausted and need to vent I guess...

 

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you need sleep...during the day, lay her on your chest and sleep too.

 

I think you need to set a routine for you and your baby.

Set a time you want to get up, eat, drink, sleep and stick to it

When she is getting to sleep try swaddling her - babies like to be squashed, a comfy squash lol

Is she a hungry baby? If she is make sure she has a full tummy when she is going to sleep and even dream feed her (feed the baby when she is asleep)

As for you being in all the time etc - look for mummy and baby groups in your area. Go to the park and talk to people, do a college course with a free nursery.

Let me think of some more lol

 

Is your friends mother still around? If she is....ask her for help....or for some advice. Maybe a local womens center? Do you have those? They may be willing to help you out with what you need.

 

I don't have one of those.

yeah sometimes I do that. we sleep together during the day. when I'm not sleepy I just feel tired and I just need some time to do other things. I barely have time to just take a shower and make food. my main concern is just trying to eat enough. I'm losing my pregnancy weight fast and I wake up hungry sometimes.

yeah I'll try more of a routine. when she's sleeping I try swaddling her, but most of the time it just wakes her back up. I can't keep her swaddled all the time because she gets really hot and starts sweating. My grandparents are really sensitive and have to keep the heat up higher than normal. I do nurse her while she's sleeping. that's all we ever really do lol.

I think my town is too small for a women's center.

 

Are you breast-feeding?

 

If you don't have a sling for her, get one! I've known so many mommies who've told me these things saved their lives. It will allow you to do more of your everyday activities (including cooking and eating) and have both hands at your disposal while still "holding" her. I don't know how young they make these for, but I've known mommas who wore pretty little-ones around with them.

No matter how little your town is, there must be some sort of public resource, or maybe a LLL group. If you don't have the time to do some research and find something good, feel free to PM me with the town you live in and I'll try to help.

Feel better, I wish I was there to help you out!! Just love your little girl, and know that this too will pass...

 

yes

yeah I just try keeping that in mind constantly. It's not really all that hard, but sometimes I start to get really frustrated and I can definitely see where someone without as much patience as me could just go nutty! I have a rebozo sling thing that you tie, but it's not very good and it slips. my mom's friend gave me a carrier thing with straps everywhere and buckles and it would work, but whenever I have her in it for like five minutes, her little feet and toes turn red! I haven't found any spots where the circulation to her feet were being cut off, so I can't figure out why. yeah, I think there is an LLL here I could probably call.

 

there's been some great advice already given...but i'll try to add something....
Leane could never sleep unless she was swaddled so tight she couldn't move. When I would see her getting tired I would wrap her up, pick her up a rock her back and fourth, sometimes while patting her back, others while running my fingers across her face. I would also give her a soother, but i wouldn't recomend that since you're bfing. I would sit in the spot where I would eventually put her down and warm it up so that once she is asleep, and i set her down, she's not on a cold surface. It can take about 20 minutes to get babies into a deep sleep, so keep rocking.
I hope this might work for you. take it easy, the first few days/weeks are always hard.

 

hey thanks a lot. just now I took a nap with her on the couch and when I woke up (I always do before her) I got up slowly and put a pillow in my place and behind her and she didn't wake up!! but damnit there goes my grandma dropping shit on the kitchen floor lol now I'm sure she's awake. ...guess not.
my mom's friend suggested I try putting a pacifier in her mouth right before she fell asleep so she could still have that sucking comfort, but that didn't work. she made a tastes-bad face and spit it out. that was actually pretty cute.

 

she slept for two hours this evening and then fell right back to sleep after being awake for an hour and a half!!!! that doesn't seem like much but it really helped me get back to feelin like myself again.

 

She spit out the pacifier....Smart baby!!!! Your breast should be the ONLY thing which goes in her mouth right now.

I have to STRONGLY disagree. Babies should NEVER be scheduled. Infants are very irratic creatures and setting artificial times for them to eat and sleep will not cause them to "regulate" it will only make them sad and effect your ability to bond and attach to the baby. Your baby KNOWS when she is hungry, or when she NEEDS to suck. Let her do it when SHE says so. Your baby KNOWS when she is sleepy. Let HER sleep when SHE wants to. Your baby know when she NEEDS to be held, Let HER decide when that happens (which will be about ALL the time and that is the way it is supposed to be.)

If you can get to a Le Leche League meeting, you will meet other moms who are parenting the way you are. www.lalecheleague.org or call 1 847 510 7730 or 1800 LALECHE to find a group near you.

Look into "The Baby Book" by William and Martha Sears for good infant care info. It is the BEST book on child care I have ever read, and I have read several thousand.

Let her decide when to eat sleep, be held and suckle. It will all pay off in the end. The people I know who tried to "Schedule" their babies ended up with miserable kids who never sleep, my "spoiled rotten" Attachment Parented babies were all sleeping happily and eating normally while their kids were up at all hours of the night at 7 years old, and eating nothing but hot dogs and potato chips. LISTEN to your baby. She knows what she needs. Mainly YOU!


I have four kids, NONE were ever scheduled, and yeah, I was tired. But, studies have shown that babies on Demand Feeding have mamas who actually get MORE sleep in the long run. I know you are exhausted. We all are when we have a baby this age, but listening to the baby is best. Sleep when she sleeps. Even a 45 minute nap is good. If she sleeps with you, you will spend less time walking around in the middle of the night picking her up and having to put her back. You will get more sleep if she is with you most of the time.

In a few months she will regulate HERSELF a little more (still not a "schedule" but more regular than a newborn) and things will feel better. Until then, be with her, nurse her when SHE wants it, and don't even look at the clock. Especially in the night.

Blessings.

 

everything everyone has said here sounds like really good advice to me. I think the sleeping with bubba thing during the day was a real help to me when I finally acceptd that even thoiugh I had never been a daytime napper it was going to help me get through without going slightly barmy(in factif I go to sleep in the day it is a bunfight to make me get up before the next one!) . It is hard when there is not someone else there that is 100 percent committed as you are but you sound like you are in a safe place and even though the people round you cannot necessarily help out as much as would like and have their own issues to deal with it will make a major differnece in the long run to your darlings overall wellbeing the fact that they are there for you and your little one. I think that the stuff about finding other mums in your area that are like you is a great idea, small country places make it more difficult but I would be very surprised if you were on your own in this situation so maybe getting hummblebee to check it out for you is a great way for someone here to help out.
Take care and know that you are not alone and that loads of loving people are around for you if you need.
stephanie

 

hey thanks for that. we do co-sleep. I just would never make her sleep somewhere else. I wanna be close to her, too.
It's not actually that I'm sleepy all the time, just tired of never being able to do anything, like make a good meal and things. I guess I just needed a break from her, which she gave me last night and it really made a big difference.
I agree with you that she knows what she needs when she needs it. I guess I'll just stick with that. it also just gets very tiring when I don't have anyone else around to do simple little things, like turn the light off if I forget, or hold Abryn while I'm setting up my chair to nurse her, or change her diaper once in a while, other things.

thanks so much. and thanks everybody else, too.

 

I agree with Maggie. Schedules create more problems than they solve, especially if you are nursing your baby. A feeding schedule meant my first child lost weight, a sleep schedule meant she wasn't getting enough sleep. It was disastrous, but I didn't know any better at the time! Learning to nurse laying down in bed saved my sanity. I can latch baby on and snooze while she nurses. There were days when that's the only sleep I got! It also helped a lot when I decided that nothing was more important than taking care of myself and my baby. Everything else can wait. The laundry can pile up, the dishes can stink until DH washes them. Baby's needs come first, Mama's needs come second, and nothing else really matters after that (at least for the first year or so).

 

If you sling your baby, she will be comfortable and close to you and you will have your hands free to be able to cook, read, whatever really.

 

yeah but I have to find a good sling, first. I bought a rebozo that slips and was given a snuggly that somehow makes her feet and toes turn purple! and I don't have much time to look for one.

 

tamee, you sound like an awesome mom, kudos to you

i want to teach you how to use your sling, or help you aquire one that you can use more comfortably. you have a rabozo? so basically a wrap. check out this link: http://mamatoto.org/Default.aspx?tabid=121 check out the videos, explore the site then check back and ask some questions. if ytour wrapping it right, it shouldn'y slip unless it's a fancy fabric which is odd for a wrap. if you can learn to use a wrap, which is seriously no biggie, you'll be able to learn to use any sling with ease. my favorite is the pouch: http://www.wearyourbaby.com/default.aspx?tabID=123

i've got two other small children besides my slinger and at 9weeks pp, i'm keeping up like them like supermom. i just strap my babe to myself and go about my business, she just sleeps or observes. it is my sanity savor. i've even gone shopping and tried on pants with her strapped to my body. i love it and so does she.

do you have a digicam? if so, take pics and we can work together to help you figure out how to wear you baby

 

oh, and you should be resting as much as you can, sleep when she does and eat when she does. i hunker down when my babes nurse, i expect to be sitting there for awhile, i bring water, food, magazines and my computer. if you're sitting at a desktop puter, grab some pillows and get comfy and nurse your babe there. you can multi-task and keep in touch with the real virtual world as to not isolate yourself. and check out lll, definately