5w old - looks overstimulated all day long

[wisna]

Hallo,
I'm new to the EASY routine and new to the forum as well. I hope I can find some help here.
I just bought the Baby Whisperer book and am trying to set my son on routine but somehow it doesn't work. He sleeps quite well at night, goes to bed about 8pm, then feeds at 11pm and 2-3am (bottlefeeding). Then he feeds at 6-7am and I was trying to keep him awake afterwards but he just seemed too tired and wasn't interested in anything, crying all the time until he fell asleep. (I still need to carry him to sleep as I'm only starting to teach him how to fall asleep on his own).
So he usually has short naps interrupted with crying until the 10am feed, then was active for about 10 minutes and started to look overtired again. I have to put him to sleep again. But his naps never last too long except when sleeping outside in the pushchair. There is always something interrupting him, wind or I don't know what...
He never seems to have slept enough, never wakes up in a good mood. :-(
Yesterday afternoon he slept in his pushchair for 2,5 hours, then woke up, fed and started crying as if he was tired in about 15 minutes. When I held him, he closed his eyes immediately.
In his bright moments, he already started to smile at us and shows interest in toys, but these moments are very rare and difficult to catch. :-(
Thanks for any advice
(sorry for my English, I'm not a native speaker)

[anna*]

At this age, it's really normal and fine for them to just feed, nappy change, then go back to sleep. I wouldn't try to keep him awake.

[wisna]

Thanks for the reply.
I was afraid that if he sleeps all day, he might not sleep so well at night.
And also the interrupted napping is a problem. He wakes up every few minutes even if he falls asleep alone, not in my arms.

Can anyone post an example of a routine for a bottlefed baby 5-6w old?
Thanks!

[anna*]

Is he swaddled? A swaddle and dummy/paci may help him to stay asleep. A routine might look like:
Awake/feed:7am
Nap:8am
Awake/feed:10am
Nap:11am
Awake/feed:1pm
Nap:2pm
Awake/feed:4pm
Nap:5pm
Cluster feed:6pm
Nap:6.45pm
Cluster feed:8pm
Nap:8.45pm
Cluster feed:9.45pm
Asleep for the night:10.15pm

[wisna]

I tried to swaddle him, I have the magic blanket by red castle, but at night he seems to sleep better unswaddled.
During days, it didn't make a difference if he was swaddled or not, he woke up every few minutes anyway. He has a dummy as well but spits it out after few minutes.
Thanks for the sample.
May I ask, what does "cluster feed" mean? Thanks.

[anna*]

Cluster feeding is 'tanking up' so you do extra feeds in the afternoon and evening. Many babies want to do it naturally. Do you think gas is waking him? Does he burp well after his feeds?

[wisna]

I'm not sure about extra feeds as I'm afraid of overfeeding. When I started bottlefeeding two weeks ago, he started to gain too much (500g/week) so I had to reduce the amount of milk.
He's burping well but often when he sleeps, he starts crying and then I can hear cannonade in the nappy. Sometimes it wakes him up, sometimes not.
I was desperate today so I let him sleep in the babysling on me for 3 hours. He was in a slightly better mood but only for a few minutes. Then we went to pick up his sister from school and he fell asleep in the pushchair in an instant. So he probably needs more sleep and that is the reason for crying.
Now my task is to teach him to fall asleep alone!

[creations]

Hi there Wisna and welcome to BW

I see you've already had some good advice from anna.  You might find the following links useful:

You'll see in this first link that at 5weeks your LO will need up to 18 or even 20 hours of sleep per day, like anna said there is only really time for a feed, nappy change and a little cuddle, nursery rhyme or a look around their environment before they need to go back to sleep.  The second link shows you how much A (activity or awake time) you can expect, around an hour.  As it takes quite a long time for a LO of this age to feed that takes up much of their awake time at this point.
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=85134.0
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=64158.0
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=85500.0
http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=186622.0
This last link about starting EASY has several other links, one of them will take you to sample routines for age.
I know it seems like lots of reading, there is so much useful information here, just look at a bit at a time when you can.

Can I just ask about the milk quantity - it is very unusual for a baby to take more than they require, where you advised by a health professional to reduce the amount of milk you give LO?

You LO is still very very young.  At this age I'd suggest it is more about starting some good habits and getting into a structured routine (not a timed schedule) where both you and your baby know what to expect next.  Don't worry about having your baby sleep in a sling or a pram, the closeness is good for bond building and there is plenty of time yet for sleep training.  At that age I never worried about where LO slept if we were going out.  When at home I always aimed to have him sleep some of his nap in the cot (or say one nap per day), but if it didn't happen and he needed to be held for a full nap I didn't worry about it.

[wisna]

Thank you so much for all the links, can't wait to read it all, I hope my LO will give me some time :-)
I'm so happy I found this board, it's been very helpful already.
This is my third child but sometimes I feel lost as if it was the first one. It's definitely the most difficult one.

The milk quantity - You know, I was fully breastfeeding for the first two weeks, but he was fighting with the nipple all the time, drinking too little and we found out he was loosing weight. (Birth weight 3450g, weight after 4 days 3250g, weight after 14 days 3150g). So I decided to express milk and bottlefeed, as I was so tired of fighting with him to suck and didn't want him to lose any more weight. We started with 7 bottles of 70-90ml, then in a few days increased to 120ml. (3 doses of my milk and 4 doses of formula). He started to gain 500g per week. Then he drained the 120ml constantly so I increased to 150ml, which was probably the mistake because he was still gaining so much and had bigger problems with gas. So a few days ago I decreased to 120ml again and he seems fine with it, the gas problem has improved a bit. He feeds every 3 hours a day and every 3-4 hours at night, which makes 7 bottles a day.

I started the shush/pat training yesterday and it was quite successful, I could leave in one hour and he slept for 4 hours until his night feed. Then we repeated it again. Now for the morning nap, I could leave after 45 minutes but he woke up after 15 minutes and so we repeated the shush/pat again, for 30 minutes and now he's asleep...

I tried to start the day at 6-7am for a few days but it doesn't seem to work, after his morning milk, he wants to continue sleeping. So today I made the milk at 6am as if it was still night, no stimulation and he slept until 8,30. Then had milk at 9am and was quite in a good mood active until 10! Now it's 12,15 and he's still napping, which is wonderful!

I also read a baby book by another author so I thought it was important to start the day about 7 and also most of the routines according to BW looks like that, but my LO probably needs much more sleep than I thought. Maybe if he gets it, he won't be so difficult anymore :-)

[creations]

Hey, it sounds like you are doing great!

At this age I used to let DS sleep as long as he liked in the morning, and I took full advantage of it myself and got some extra sleep too.  If a later start works for you then go with that.  The EASY routine is a guidance to help mummy and baby know what is coming next, it isn't a strict timetable of when to get up in the morning.  You might want to start a regular wake up time later on but for now if you're all happy I would do what you are doing and treat that first feed as a night feed and let him sleep.

With regards to milk intake. I was quite surprised at how quickly my LOs bottle increased in quantity as the weeks went by.  As young babies don't over eat, I always offered as much milk as he wanted.  There are growth spurts when they dramatically increased their intake for several days, and then naturally drop down a little again.  During DS's growth spurts he sometimes took double a normal feed, quite impressive, and never had any problem with weight.

xx

[Lolly]

With bottle feeding it's really important to make sure there is enough in the bottle for them to stop when they are full and not just because the bottle is empty. If they are draining bottles you need to put another oz or 2 into the bottle so there is a bit left when they are finished. If he was still breastfeeding he would be stopping when he was full and you wouldn't know how much he was getting so he needs the same chance on a bottle.

What many formula fed babies do is to increase their milk intake quite rapidly in the early weeks, but then it seems to even out and they seem to settle on bottles that are 7-9oz until they start solids. Mine were both taking 7oz bottles by about 10 weeks but didn't really increase their bottles after that. There is massive growth in the first 4 months so they do need the calories, I found with both of mine too that they gained a good 500g+ a week for a while but then it slowed down. DS was 50th centile born and jumped up to the 75th and then stck there until nearly 1, DD was 75th born, jumped to the 91st and has stuck like glue to it until recently.

Babaies are really good at self regulating and won't over eat providing they aren't overly encouraged to feed.

HTH!

Laura

[wisna]

Thanks to both of you!
The high weight gain frightened me a bit because my first two kids were not gaining so much in the first months. And there is an advice everywhere that a baby should have about 150ml per 1kg of weight. He is now 4,6kg and even the 120ml x 7 is a bit too much according to that.
But he is now always draining the 120ml, so I'll try to add another 30 again.

He seems to be a very irritable baby, he slept quite well at night, then woke up without crying at 7,30, smiled at us for about 10 minutes when changing the nappy and then started to cry again and wanted to sleep. Still, the trouble is that when he fell asleep, he woke up in a few minutes, fell asleep, woke up, and it went like that until it was time to feed. This way, he always seems to be sleep deprived during the day. :-(

This way, there is no EASY pattern attainable, because sometimes it is like EASAES.
He sleeps for a while, then is active until feeding time and of course gets tired, so falls asleep after his feed.

[wisna]

And I have a question about falling asleep. My LO seems to respond better and calms down quicker when I do the shush plus put my palm on his cheek or forehead than when I do the tapping.
Can I do that instead or is it considered a prop which might be difficult to eliminate in the future?

[creations]

Wisna, the waking up every few minutes sounds like hunger to me.  Later on (much older) this is one way of working out if a night waking is due to habit or hunger or pain etc.  When they are hungry AND tired they will fall to sleep but the hunger then wakes them again where as if they aren't hungry usually they would go to sleep and stay asleep.
Equally a baby will prioritise if they are very tired and will sleep past a feed sometimes, in these cases you'd usually let them sleep and then feed as soon as they wake rather than disturb the sleep.

The soothing to sleep.  If a palm on his cheek or forehead is more calming for your LO then I see no problem with this.  Many people adapt the shush/pat (I used to rub DS's tummy, now I rub his back).  All of these things (even shush/pat) can become a prop to sleep but at this age it doesn't matter as you are still teaching him what it feels like to fall to sleep in a cot (on a mattress where he can feel his own weight rather than in arms where he feels weightless) and that's the priority at the moment.  Later on you can gradually reduce the amount of patting (or in your case gradual withdraw the hand on the cheek), you 'might' even be able to do this a little sometimes now.  The thing is not to be scared of that sort of prop as it is relatively easy to gradually reduce and wean.  Also you want something (that hand on the cheek or patting etc) to be a good source of soothing for you LO so that in the months to come you can return to it when needed...and you WILL need to return to it.  When they are ill, teething or having developmental disruptions to sleep you will always return to your method of soothing in the cot to help LO through these difficult times.  So it's perfectly ok (an important in my opinion) for them to associate something with soothing help.

It is quite ok for your routine to be EASAES, LOs sleep for different lengths of time so sometimes there is some activity before the feed time.  If you find the E coming very close to S just try not to 'feed to sleep' so, keep LO awake during the feed and for a minute or two afterwards, a nappy change is a good way to keep him awake just prior to sleep.  As the weeks go on you will settle into a more regular routine.  You might also find if you increase the milk offered he is not hungry just prior to sleep.

hope this helps x

[wisna]

Thank you!
Since I know that he needs to sleep after a few active minutes, everything is much better.

Today I was watching him almost the whole nap and I'm pretty sure the waking up is due to gas problems. He starts to move his head left and right and do the painful face, first without any sounds, then starts to cry. SOmetimes it helps when I massage his belly.
I don't think he wakes up due to hunger, I increased the milk dose to 150ml again and he fell asleep about 30 minutes after his feed.

So, today he woke up about 4 times during the nap but I managed to get him back to sleep, so he slept for 2,5 hours altogether, then had his milk and stayed awake in a good mood for 30 minutes! Then I put him to his pram for another nap, before he started to cry and he fell asleep immediately.
Today was probably the day with the shortest crying time ever!