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But he was in charge of any toddler wake up and getting up with him in the morning.

Mine got up to get the baby and brought her to me. I'd put her back after we were done.

With both of them as newborns, we took turns sleeping in a recliner for their first six weeks, so my husband would sleep in the chair for three hours or so until they woke up, and then come wake me to swap. After that he pretty much did nothing at night for #1, and then he handled all the big kid wake-ups while I had the baby stuff once #2 arrived (which was actually an awesome deal because #2 was a fabulous sleeper and #1 not so much, so he probably dealt with more wake-ups than I did for a good stretch of time).

And I confess that I also sometimes made more noise than I had to to “accidentally” wake him up.

Nothing. I did this with both my babies and it’s so so hard. Hugs mama.

@ineebee: I did all of it. But I made my peace with it so that it didn’t drive me completely up the wall!

My DH is wonderful. He is also a heavy sleeper and someone who does not do well on minimal sleep. He also had a demanding schedule that he had no control over. I am able to function in less sleep than he does so I did all the wake ups pretty much for kid1 and definitely for kid2. The big one was 3.5 by the time the baby was born so she wasn’t super needy but there were occasional double whammy’s.

For me I had to step away from what is fair in terms of sleep DH vs me and zoom out to what works for our family to function through the phase of baby (lack of) sleep. And me being the go to person worked for us. I owned it and moved on. But that doesn’t mean that will work for you.

For kid 1 he did not a damn thing and I resented it big time. For kid 2 I pumped before bed and he was in charge of the first wake up and also in charge of kid 1 if he woke up. Now DS2 is on formula and is going through a terrible sleep regression and we just take turns with all wake ups no matter which kid.

@ineebee: my husband has a demanding job and he got up and changed the diapers in the middle of the night until both kids stopped pooping overnight. Even after they stopped pooping, he would usually wake to change their wet diaper until their were feeding less overnight. And then when I got really tired, we would have nights where I pumped before bed and he would do the first wake up by himself so I could get one good stretch of sleep. When I had insomnia spells, I would use my stash and he would keep the babies in another Pom for the whole night so I could be sane. =). Even so, our nighttime split was probably 65% me, 35% him.

@ineebee: I feel your pain! I stay home with my LOs and while the older one is at preschool through the week, the whole thing is totally harder with the second when they aren’t sleeping through. My husband helped with every overnight feed (practically) in the first two or so weeks after delivery. Then once he went back to work it reduced a lot, until it became apparent he didn’t do well on broken sleep! He has a demanding job with long hours so I needed him to be on form when he was home...so I took all the weekdays and then weekends I had no shame in prodding him awake at night. He then brought LO2 to me, and I would feed then most times he would take him back to the cot. Once I felt less bruised and fragile after delivery I was more capable of rolling out of bed so I was able to put baby back easily enough then fall asleep again.

In the early weeks I remember a Friday night pumping once and letting DH do that first evening feed while I crashed out and had an uninterrupted 7pm - 5am sleep for the first time in ever...it helped me from losing my mind after weeks of awful sleep. I would love to do that more often but I don’t really expresss that much so I guess it’s tricky!

DH helps out big time with LO1 and when I’m doing the bedtime feed etc.

@MamaCate: I couldn’t agree more with everything you said here. I had to change perspective very early on, to what’s best for the whole family!

Our situation was the same as with @mamacate. I had to come to terms with the fact that DH requires a lot of sleep. I was very resentful about this for a long time. Also, we tried different ways of having him involved and it never really worked,, in large part because DD1 only wanted me and would freak out if it was him going in.

Dh did nothing. Every time I woke up for motn feeds he was sound asleep and in the beginning I was jealous he could sleep so peacefully where I wake up at every sound the baby made but it was best that I just accepted it is what it is while I ebf and once I got over that I just savored each slow progression- lo started sleeping longer stretches as she got older then sometimes sttn. It helped me just to be at peace with it since I couldn't change anything and just hoping for when lo sttn.

My husband would get the baby and do a diaper change and then bring him to me so I didn't really have to move. After I was done nursing and burping, I'd put him back to bed.

Around 5 weeks though, we were introducing a bottle, so after the evening clusterfeed, I'd go to bed and Hubs would do that first night feeding and then bring him to me for the second one, so I got a good 5-6 hours of uninterrupted sleep.

We also split kids, though the 3 year old slept really well so it didn't mean much other than him getting her up and taking her to daycare in the morning. Once DD2 was 6-7 months, though, I put him in charge of helping sleep train. So if DD2 woke up before 4:30am or so, I sent DH in to pat her until she went back to sleep. After 4:30am I would get up and nurse her since she'd been without milk for 10 hours or so at that point.

One other thing that might help is DH would take DD1 along to run errands with him or just to the playground/for a walk so I could rest while DD2 napped. Maybe this might be an occasional option for you?

I feel for you, though - it is so hard in the beginning!

We had a great system that has continued on very successfully. Our situation might be a little different as I started pumping at 1mo, and I'm not sure if you are going to do bottles at all, but this is what we did:

DH would get home from work at 6:30, and as soon as he walked in the door, he was in charge of the baby.
I would pump and then go to bed. DH was then in charge of baby until midnight. He would often give two bottles, one right around 7, and then do her bedtime routine. She would then sleep in his arms or in the bassinet in the living room. Should would be up for another bottle/diaper change around 11 and he would then put her down again. At midnight we would switch. He went to bed and I would take over baby care.

We did this from the beginning, so before he could give her a bottle, he would take care of everything and just come in to wake me up for feeding. As soon as feeding was done he took her away and I would go back to sleep.
This way I could get a solid 2 hours of sleep, nurse, another solid 2 hours without having to think/worry/listen for the baby. Which then turned into a solid 4 hours of sleep (amazing!) once she took a bottle.

This continued until she started sleeping through the night (6mo). Then we switched to each being responsible for a whole night. A whole night sleep without having to listen for the baby monitor! And we still continue this now, DD is 17 mo. This allows each of us to sleep in one day each weekend.

This worked out great for us because I got to sleep for a few solid hours, DH still got several solid hours of sleep so that he could function at work.
It also gave DH the confidence to take care of DD, he couldn't come to me with questions, he had to just handle whatever the problem was. That was the best thing.

So tell your husband he is on duty until midnight. If the baby is crying he needs to do the diaper, and try to soothe unless he knows the baby is hungry and its time to eat. As soon as the baby is done eating, he takes the baby away and you go back to sleep.
I used to feel like I was missing out on sweet baby snuggles when DH would take the baby away, but just remember that you have the baby all day long to snuggle with, and baby needs Daddy snuggles too!

Don't feel resentful of your husband. Tell him to take on more responsibility!

Once the babies no longer needed diaper changes he didn’t help out. There really wasn’t anything he could do. DD2 is 9 months old now and primarily FF. I feel so free. We split bedtime and any MOTN wakings.

ETA: if there was ever a night where DD1 or DD2 just wouldn’t go back down I would wake him and he’d take a turn holding and rocking until they wanted to nurse again. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to help out, it was just limited on what he could do.

There's not much he can do to help with middle of the night wakings since I breastfeed. My supply is just enough/a little short so I don't want to replace a feed with a bottle unless I pump for it...

However, if the baby really won't settle and I'm just dying being awake for two hours in the middle of the night, I don't hesitate to call him. He also now does bedtime around 7:30 while I take care of dishes, and gives the baby a dreamfeed while I pump before bed around 10 (baby doesn't stay awake well for a dreamfeed from the breast).

With the first he would sometimes do diaper changes, but once he was back at work it seemed best if he just slept as much as he could (I SAH).

With the second he actually didn't even sleep in the room with us for a while, but slept on the couch and always got up with our older kid (or helped her if she needed something in the MOTN) so I could always sleep in with the baby

I was staying at home, so I decided that I could handle the wakeups on my own. My husband had offered to get up with me, but it wasn't the best idea because he and I were both tired and we would argue about how to do things, which didn't help the situation. Since I only had the one child, I slept a lot during the day. I would often be asleep at 5 pm when my husband came home from work, but it was what we needed to do during that time.

I think a conversation is always best, no one is a mind reader and if you need help, sometimes you have to ask for it.

For both our kids we started doing dreamfeeds around 4 weeks. So I would pump and then go to bed around 9pm, and DH would use that bottle to feed LOs around 11pm. Then they would usually sleep till about 4am after that, so by the time I had the first wake up I'd had 6-7 solid hours of sleep. If you're open to pumping and bottle-feeding I'd highly recommend it.

@muffinsmuffins: Thanks for the input from the non-breastfeeding side!

I just wanted to add two more things, I pumped just enough milk during that time for DH to use, I was breastfeeding the rest of the time.

I am the more high-sleep needs person in our relationship, so being able to fully turn-off to sleep really helped. My body adjusted well to sleeping deeply and quickly for those 2/4 hours stretches. My husband sleeps badly, so when he was off duty he wore earplugs.

This worked well for us because it also transitioned easily into me going back to work.

@ineebee: are you 100% EBF, or are you planning on introducing a bottle at some point? I didn't realize the amount of stress I felt about breastfeeding until DH gave that first bottle. I felt relieved and a little lighter because it wasn't my sole responsibility anymore. Until that moment, I didn't realize the extra weight that I felt on my shoulders.
I went back to work at 10 weeks, so we knew bottles were in DD's future. However I breastfed/pumped until DD was 14 months. I am all for an EBF relationship if that is what you want, but please think about pumping/bottle feeding for your own piece of mind too.

DH got up with me the first two weeks after A was born. Then when he returned to work he slept through it all.

Now with K, DH deals with all of A’s middle of the night business up to 230am when he leaves for work and both kids are mine. K still wakes up a minimum of two times a night and A is back and forth between sleeping ok or having a total meltdown once DH is gone.