for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

did you work out some sort of schedule for the middle of the night feedings?

right now. Luce wakes up about 3 times between midnight and 8:30 (give or take)

I have been doing all of the feedings since dh has been at work, but I don't think I can do that once I start working.

right now, he wakes up, I feed him, burp him, get him to sleep, then go pump. so, while he's sleeping 2.5 to 3 hours between feedings, I am sleeping about 1.5 hours between them.

I pretty much have to be up when he is up anyway bc I am still trying to build up my supply so I will always pump...but I am thinking of asking dh to do at least one of the feeding burping sessions to cut down my "awake" time.

not sure which one though...

he is a very LONG nurser, so nursing him at night is not the answer. I'd end up being more tired and frustrated and he won't be full so I'd have to supplement him with a bottle anyway.

if anyone has any suggestions, I am open to them. TIA

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

In the beginning, I would have DH take the first night feeding during the night. So that we could both get longer stretches of sleep.

So if DH took the 11 pm feeding, I would sleep from 10 to about 3, then get up at 3 and 6 for feedings. Sometimes he would take the 6 am feeding as well, so that I could sleep till 6:30 and get up for work.

This worked out the best for us so we both got a longer stretch of sleep each night-even if at different times.

I did do the feedings majority of the time though. I think DH faked sleeping more than once .

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

We had a system that worked pretty well until DD started STTN.

In the beginning, I put her to bed at 9:00, and then I put myself to bed right after.

I got up for the middle of the night wakings, but it was fine because I usually already had about 5 hours of sleep by then so I didn't feel like a complete zombie.

Eventually, DD started going to bed earlier and earlier so we started a "dream feed" at about 11 or so, which DH would give her right before he went to bed which would keep DD asleep longer - until about 4am or so and again, I was going to bed early enough so that I could handle waking up at 4 without it throwing off my whole day.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I did exactly what Rebecca said.....and was equally as terrified as you Jess....

I would give Gavin his bath and bottle and put him to bed around 7 or so...then I would hit the sack shortly thereafter...no problem falling asleep at that time!

Then DH (who leaves the house at 5:30AM) would dream feed Gavin almost a whole bottle around 10:30 and Gav would prolly sleep a good 4 hours after that, which gave me a nice stretch of time to snooze...and DH would get up at 5 when I was on feeding #2 of the night and say goodbye.....

It really worked for us!

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I woke up. I work from home and my DH has to be in his office in the morning. So I always woke up but I will be honest I resented him for it and I was a huge b!tch...

One thing you can do, is BF him from one side and pump from the other. He WILL get more efficient at nursing and it will get quicker. What I used to do is feed one, feed the other then pump so I was up for about an hour. When they were 12 weeks i got a babysitter so I would sleep in the morning but that won't work for you...Good luck

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

We both work, but I did all the night feedings. I was breastfeeding while home, so I wanted to do the feedings anyway. Plus, I missed her and actually wanted to do them to get the extra time with her. A few times if she got up shortly after a feeding and I knew it wasn't hunger and had to be a diaper change, I'd wake him up for that. Still though, I find if he does one of those, I am awake the whole time. I can't sleep if she's crying/unhappy/or simply just awake.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

DH takes 2 days a week, but honestly, he either acts like he can't hear him or else takes so long to stretch and get to him (while he's screaming) that I wind up doing it myself. We're at almost 5 months and he's up 4-5 times a night , but just one of those for a bottle.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

i will say that you get used to not sleeping. i probably average 4 hours of sleep a night now, and while i felt like a zombie the first month of DS's life, now I am kind of used to it, and able to function at work. My whole body hurts and I have pretty constant headaches, but I manage.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

How many weeks is Luce? When do you have to go back to work?

If you got time, he and you may be able to slowly wean out the middle of the night feedings. I know I dreaded going back to work when I was up all hours of the night, but by the time my leave was up (12 weeks), DD was STTN.

One trick I did when I was exhausted (when DD was about 4 weeks old) was to put a little formula in a breastmilk bottle at the night feeding (and pump while she was feeding). It was by my ped's recommendation b/c I wasn't producing a ton because I was so exhausted. She said when mommy's happy, baby's happy and doing that and buying a couple more hours at night definitely made mommy happy.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

When I was home, I woke up every time since I didn't have to work. When I went back to work, I pretty much woke up in the middle of the night whenever DS woke. It was usually just to eat and since I was EBF, there was no way DH could do it. When DS did wake up and wasn't hungry, DH would get up, since I needed some rest, too. Perhaps you can ask the bomb to take care of Luce the first feeding so you can get to bed earlier and get more sleep. Is this doable?

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

DD was FF...but what we did was what other girls suggested. I would put Kaydyn down for the night around 9/10pm and I would immediately go to sleep. My DH would take care of her any time she woke up before 2am (in the beginning she was waking up around 1am)...then I would wake up for the rest of the feedings. I was getting about 5-6 hours and I felt soooo much better. Luckily Kaydyn started doing 5-6 hour stretches pretty early and when she went to only waking up once maybe twice a night then I would get up with her each time. The only time DH got up was either Friday or Sat night so I could sleep a little.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

My DS was waking up twice a night almost a year old! both of us would get up, he screamed so loud my DH would hold him to calm him down while I made the bottle. we would switch off who fed and though

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

Luce is one month old today and will be 6 weeks ( ) when I go back.

the thing that REALLY sucks is that tax season is looming down on us now. I feel terribly even considering asking dh to interrupt his much needed sleep during the busiest time of his profession.

I can't feed him from one boob and pump from the other b/c BOTH boobs never fill him up at a feeding..one boob he'll be throwing tomatoes at me

btw, does EBF mean exclusively breast FROM THE BREAST fed, or does it mean exclusively fed breast milk (from breast or bottle?)

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

Jess, my DH works through the night & DS was NOT STTN until 9-10 weeks or so. I had to go back to work at 5 weeks (for 10 days) & it was not fun. I was up half the night & then working during the day. I was 1/2 nursing, 1/2 pumping at that point too.

To me EBF means getting BM exclusively whether from bottle or breast

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I think that by the time the 6th week rolls around, he won't be waking up 3 times a night...actually, Michael was waking up only once a night by that time at would STTN at around 8-9 weeks...but I breast and formula fed him.

Are you formula feeding as well? If so, I would give him the formula bottle before bed time so that it fills him up, pump your supply, go to bed and when he wakes up in the middle of the night, give him either the boob or the pumped milk. I remember around this time, I was already weaning him off the boob in the middle of the night bc I needed sleep...so I just pumped before bed time, gave him a bottle in the middle of the night, and then nursed in the morning and right when I got home from work.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

We work in shifts. I would go to bed ridiculously early, like 8pm or 9pm, and DH would be in charge of all wakings/feedings until 1am, and then I'd take over. Works out for us because he's a night owl, and I'm an early riser

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I just wanted to say that it sounds like Luce is on a pretty good schedule and even if you have to be awake for all the feedings, he WILL eventually drop some of them.

I did all the night feedings with DS because I nursed. I would complain to DH and he would say, well your the one with the boobs! DH would then tell people how at 5 weeks our DS was STTN. Um no hun, you are STTN not DS! =) BUT those days didn't last forever even though it seemed like a year it was really only 3-4 months.

Definitely by 12 weeks I was getting 6 hours of straight sleep which actually caused some anxiety because I thought something was wrong.

Going back to work at 6 Weeks will be a little tough at night but if you could get your DH to do just one feeding and convince yourself this won't be forever, everything will work itself out.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

DD started sleeping through the night around the time we went back to work.

We would take shifts-one of us would cover until 2 AM, the other would cover from 2-6 (everybody was up at 6).

This way, we each got about 4 hours of sleep.

I would definitely recommend working out some kind of shift/trade with DH. You just can't operate on the hours you are pulling now

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

AJ would eat at 8pm and sleep a little, then I'd go to bed around 9pm.

Jim would 'cover' her until he went to sleep at 12-1am (idiot)

Then I'd be up for on more feeding (3am)

At 6am we all woke up anyway.

Jim always went to bed late before AJ was born so this worked for us.

As time went on the time between feedings grew longer and Jim just took over all nightime feedings. Id wake up for maybe one?

Message edited 11/20/2009 5:03:36 PM.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I did them all b/c I was EBFing. DS is a very long nurser, but around 3 months, he started nursing for only 10 minutes in the middle of the night before passing out. During the day, he'd nurse for 45 minutes. It was exhausting, but I got used to functioning on very interrupted sleep.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I did ALL the feedings for DD #1 and am doing the same for DS. I had to as I was EBF and didn't use a bottle.

Re: for those households with both parents working during the day, and a baby that does NOT STTN

I did all feedings with Ryan even when I went back from work and he had a 4 month regression and woke up every 2 hours from months 4-6

But if I didn't nurse him, I'd be engorged and have to pump anyway, so it made the most sense for me to just do it.