Oh ladies, I'm in serious need of help, or at least commiseration. This is going to be long and I apologize in advance. I'm a FTM with a six week old. DS was born at 36 plus 2 due to me having pre-e. My BP was consistently floating around 190/110, so I was induced. I feel like other than the forceps 
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Hugs!
My little guy was diagnosed with MSPI at 10weeks.
Keep doing what you are doing. Start trying to have a bed time routine....even if he doesn't sleep right away. See if taking him out during the day helps. Walks outside or around the mall would keep my son entertained and break up the day a bit.Good luck!! It is hard to believe but we are so much further along with sleeping at 8m than I ever thought possible.
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I have a 6 week old too and things that I have tried and got me 3-5 Hr stretches are the miracle blanket and automatic rock n play....i also hold her upright for 30 min after her feeding and wait till she is dead asleep. Hopefully you can take catnaps - I can't. Also did you watch the happiest baby YouTube video? You have to shush really loud. I also use the happiest baby on the block soundtrack on the Amazon prime music app. Good luck and hang in there! Just wanted to share what works for me.
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Hang in there, you are at the toughest part and it gets better, I promise! Weeks 6-8 were roughest for every mom I know, and then it starts getting a little easier...and then a little easier still after 12 weeks.
We did the 90minute sleep program starting around 6 weeks, which was a really good fit for LO. We had definitely been waiting too long to try to get her to nap. But, she still never slept more than 20-45 minutes until after the 3 month mark.
You're doing great!
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No first hand experience, but if you're breastfeeding this link has some ideas on what to eat to ease your babies discomfort (& hopefully sleep a bit better). http://www.refluxrebels.com/feeding-mspi-baby/
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I know I spent a lot of time in the car driving around with my newborns! Does he like the car??
Do you use loud white noise? That helped both of mine. I use a loud fan.
Where is he sleeping? Rock n play great for reflux babies.
It WILL get better, you're in the thick of it.... A few more weeks and you will see an improvement. Hang in there!!!
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How long after he wakes for the day do you wait to put him down for another nap? At six weeks my son could barely go more than an hour awake! Which sounds insane but it's very normal for that age.
My son screamed and screamed for the first 4 weeks because I didn't know that he was overtired. I wasn't aware of sleepy signals and I was waiting way to long to try and put him in a dark room to nap. I was over stimulating him.
It sounds like you have lots of other factors so I can't speak to that (we did have reflux but it wasn't as severe). But it was my ped who finally after many frantic calls and a couple of "sick" visits looked at my kid and said "he is overtired" and she gave me the sleepy signals, Max awake time, etc and it CHANGED MY LIFE! He started napping instead of screaming because I put him down to nap after an hour awake.
I became a recluse becasue he napped so much and they really recommend naps to be at home. But I was a happy and sane and well rested recluse.
Being overtired could also be what's helping him to be up too long at night.
Read your age group in Dr Weissbluth's book "Healthy Sleep, Happy Child". It's short and will help tremendously! That's also the book my ped recommended.Hang in there! It's super hard (you can see my old posts from that stage!) but it does get better and easier (in some ways). You won't always feel like you're in the ocean without floaters, I promise
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First of all, you are doing an awesome job!!! Seriously, go you.
Secondly, I'm just going to echo others and try to assure you that 6 weeks SUCKS. It should get better in a week or two.
My DD had reflux and being slightly tilted helped. She slept best in her carseat, so I either took her on walks or drove somewhere for a lot of naps in the early days.
Hang in there!
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Oh you poor thing. My son had silent reflux and colic and literally kicked out asses until the colic part peaked at 12 weeks and then it was "just" reflux until 6 months. My son screamed and screamed and slept maybe a total of 8 hours in a 24 hour period and his witching hours were like 9pm to 1am or later.
Weeks 6-8 were tough, but weeks 10-11 were the worst for us. Get help - the sleep deprivation brought on terrible PPA/PPD for me and I had to be medicated until 6 months (when surprise the reflux was gone). Hire someone if your husband can't help and sleep as much as you can.
Get the baby to sleep as much as they can however you can get them to do it. I agree at this age barely staying up an hour including the time it takes to eat is the norm. My son spent 45 minutes eating, and the have a diaper change, and that would be it. Your baby is chronically overtired on top of feeling unwell so however you can get him to sleep is really going to help his little body.
A lot of this is also personality. My son is easily over stimulated so I think all the rocking, bouncing, shushing and patting made him really touched out and frazzled. A lot of times we just held him silently in the dark not moving while he screamed and eventually he sorta grumpily settled and snoozed, whereas he never stopped crying when we rocked and bounced and all that. We had our son "play" in the FP sit me up chair after daytime feedings to help digest without being touched by anyone.
When we switched from Zantac to Prevacid it actually made things worse for like a week and then it kicked in and made things a whole lot better. The constipation could be the meds but it could also be the formula too - the iron can be tough for little guys. As your ped if you can mix a little bit of prune juice into the bottles to help. We did have to give my son the Pedi-Lax suppositories once or twice when it got really bad and that worked really fast.
Once I knew my son's reflux was under control with the meds (i.e. it might not completely stop the spitting up but I know it doesn't burn him anymore because he's not screaming bloody murder after his bottles) we implemented sleep training because of the overtired issue. We tried it as a hunch because of how much calmer he seemed when we weren't messing with him all the time and because my husband was like he's not going to stop crying no matter what we do so let's see if we can make the crying productive and teach him to sleep. Sleeptraining itself sucked BUT within a week he was sleeping 2 hour naps and 4 hour stretches and a few weeks after he was STTN. My baby went from sleeping 8 hours in 30 minute intervals to 16+ hours. We had his crib elevated for 6 months.
Anyways, it passed! It sucked and I wouldn't want to wish that season on my worst enemy but it will pass!
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@Mama Ek: thank you! I'm definitly looking into the miracle blanket and I hadn't watched the video yet, but I did read an article on it.
@MsHangry: I recently bought a baby carrier, so now we walk around outside in that and it really seems to help!with it being Texas it's like 73 today! And I'm sorry you had to go through MSPI also
@Mrs. Lemon-Lime: thank you for the link, I've been doing a lot of reading on the refluxrebels site.
@Rocker2014: what's the 90 min sleep program? Sounds like something I need
@hellobeeboston: I have a white noise app on my phone that I play for hours on end lol, he's very partial to the air conditioner noise. Hates the car seat so that option is out
@SweetiePie: I think your right, he is definitly overtired, which I know , but I think that the Nexium is making it harder for me to get him to sleep. The other morning he didn't even nap in between his 9:30 and 1:30 feeding. I rocked the crap out of this kid, but he was not having it! But the baby carrier I bought a couple of days ago seems to do the trick. When he was fussing yesterday I put him in it while I washed dishes and he was out within 10 mins, so I'm hoping that's my sleep cure for now. I'm going to get on Amazon and check that book out also! Thank you for the recommendation.Thank you ladies for your replies! I just keep telling myself it gets better, and since the Nexium has kicked in it is WAY better. He's actually been sleeping 3 hour stretches at night for the past 2 days, half of it in the rocking chair, but I'll take it!
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@gingerbebe:
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@Jackiedavis87: I totally understand not asking for help - it's just now in retrospect I realize how badly I needed it. Schedule help. I always dreaded dinner time bc I knew the 9pm witching hour was coming. If I could do it over I would shove food down my throat at like 4pm, feed the baby, and then hand him over to someone while I slept for a few hours.
Take advantage of your MIL!We implemented a bedtime routine at 6 weeks even though we knew he wouldn't sleep just to get that association going. And we fell into a 3 hour feeding schedule since I had to keep track of his ounces and eliminate "screaming because I'm hungry" as a reason for his unhappiness. We put gas drops in every bottle and changed bottles 4 times before settling on Dr. Brown's.
Remember to take care of yourself and eat!
You're doing a good job, you're doing everything right, and your anxiety and worry is because you love him. You are doing a good job. You are doing a good job. You are doing a good job.
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@gingerbebe:
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@Jackiedavis87: Here's the book, though I admit I didn't read all of it
http://www.amazon.com/The-90-Minute-Baby-Sleep-Program/dp/0761143114
The gist is basically what @SweetiePie wrote about, that newborns only have awake times of 45 to 90 minutes between naps. It talks about recognizing early tired cues, and starting nap prep before baby seems tired. A lot of the ladies in my new moms group were using it, and it started being really effective for us right around 6 weeks. My LO started with a wake time of right around 60 minutes, once I figured out her cues. That stretched to.almost 90 minutes by 12 weeks. Once she was getting more sleep during the day (25-45 minute naps), night sleep was better. If I pushed past that time or missed her cue, she would have much more trouble falling asleep.
My LO also had severe reflux, and she slept most of her naps and all night sleep in a Rock&Play, the incline really helped. Crib sleep didn't happen until past 5 months.
My only other thought is that the winning combination for my LO was Zantac plus gas drops before every feed. We didn't have constipation, but gas was a huge issue.
Hang in there, friend!
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