I slept through from 7 weeks. My parents' method was to use a darning needle to enlarge the hole in the teat of a bottle, and to dissolve half a rusk into the 11oz of formula milk. I think this would be frowned upon today 🙂

Ours slept when we cuddled them in our bed, so we cuddled them in our bed.

They are in a cot next to our bed!

Get them in the own room!!!! Then they can waken, chatter or whatever and you can sleep. If they are not crying there's no problem. I know that are really precious to you, but so is your sleep and sanity!

Wheeler – do you change at every feed? My wife insists on it (so they are comfortable) but I don't think we should unless the nappy is very wet or soiled.

Our breast-fed baby (Izzi) now goes for the same 6 or 7 hours after her final evening feed as the bottle fed girl. The bottle fed girl does the same time irrespective of whether she had formula (Cow & Gate) or expressed breast milk. We are going to try leaving her as she is normally asleep for the 3am feed when Izzi wakes, but up till now we have woken her so they are fed together and disrupting our sleep a bit less.

Get them in the own room!!!!

But advice is not to put them in their own room till 6 months – at least the advice we have been given!

As a farther of a 2yo and a 4 1/2 mo I agree that routine is important a lesson we didn't learn with our first early enough. After a couple of months (with the 2nd) of rocking to sleep back pain we decided to try something different. She used to have a late afternoon nap and then go down between 8 and 9 then wake up around 7, now we don't let her have this and try to keep her happy by entertaining her (just getting to that age) and she will sleep from just before 7 to between 6 and 7:30. She has been waking up earlier recently but we think that's because she is ready for food.

On a separate note we started potty training and weaning yesterday (the joy). It went surprisingly well with the eldest having many more hits than misses and the youngest eating a good helping of baby rice. Feel a bit bad leaving my wife to deal with it all today while I am at work tho.

Who gave you that advice?
Do you always act on advice from others? 😉

My friend did just what you are doing…and she ended up with a 2yr old toddler in a cot next to her bed!!! She was also told to have the house at a certain temperature so she had a thermometer next to his moses basket and adjusted the heating accordingly!! Poor thing was so hot he never slept duing the day, as he was so uncomfortable!

Some of the advice I was given by health visitors/midwives was a complete load of old tosh!
Most of our generation spent most days as babies in the garden wrapped up in a pram and we survived!!

Ignore all advice (including this if you want) and just do what makes sense. At 6 months they will recognise their surroundings and may not take to kindly to being de-camped!

At first I read that as a 2yr old and a 4.5 year old and was trying to figure which was being weaned and which potty trained at those ages 🙂

We don't change at every feed at night (but it works out every other feed). If you think about, when they are sleeping through, they won't get changed till morning. I'm convinced they don't seem to mind having a dirty nappy but I find I can't just leave it if I know it needs doing!

The general advice for all babies is 6 months in the same room. I'm not sure where this comes from but I expect it's from statistics concerning SIDS. I know very few people who have managed to stick out the full 6 months.

The only time we don't do them at every feed is when they cluster so closely that the second feed almost immediately follows the first. I get your thinking on the night-time nappies, but my wife just won't have them in any (perceived) discomfort. It must be the maternal thing and I am not going to challenge her on it – she is being wonderful with everything else so it would be silly of me to question her on the one thing I don't entirely agree with.

I bet it will be difficult at 4 months when I am pressing for them to go in their room though…

Saw some friends yesterday who have just had their third baby. They have a swing cot (bought from Germany about £200) which they reckon is the best thing ever – they like us suffered sleepless nights for about 6 years with their first two.

Basically as the baby wakes and starts moving, so the cot starts to gently swing them back to sleep! Wonders of modern technology eh?

but as someone said above never ever let them sleep in your bed!

in many cultures leaving babies alone is considered cruel…

Oh and was this own room advice from the Health Nazis (visitors)? Our first was in her own room from 3 months and our second 2 months. That was the turning point for their sleeping. One of the reasons they suggest keeping them in your room is that they regulate their breathing to yours but if you have the two of them in the same room in different cots they will regulate each others breathing and be ok. A little tip my wife heard was to put an analogue clock in the room with them and it helps them keep their breathing even.

Oh and as regards to changing them during the night only if they have poohed or the nappy is full. The changing wakes them up even more.

Don't listen to the Health Nazis all they are allowed to speak is government rubbish. Midwives are allowed their own opinions but that's not to say they are the correct ones.

No its 2 years and 4.5 months.

The swing cot sounds great. We have ours in separate moses baskets (next to each) with stands that rock and I was thinking the other day why someone hadn't invented an 'auto-rock' motorised feature.

One thing you might try is a 'Slumber Bear'. It has a noise and motion sensor so that it will play 'womb noises' when triggered (also has a melody, ocean waves and a static hiss). One of ours finds this quite soothing on the static white noise setting (the other is indifferent to it).

Our gets his nappy changed when he needs it – this usually requires the smell test or sometimes a poke about to see how much the front has swollen. However on Sunday it was obvious he needed changing when he sh@t so much it came over the neck of his shirt!!!!! I'm not exaggerating, I think he blew it out with such force and since he was sitting on my leg it only had one direction to go…..up…..fortunatly we were not at home and the house we were in had wooden floors.

he sh@t so much it came over the neck of his shirt!!!!!

For the first 8 weeks every dirty nappy was like that for us – sh*t seeping through vest and babygrow, out of the side of clothes, on their hands etc.

This was mainly because they only went every week so when it came, it came.

Fortunately their systems have matured a bit now and they are going every other day or so and nappies are easy(er) 🙂

The whole breathing regulating thing seems like nonsense to me. I mean if there's another baby and 2 adults in the room all breathing in different rhythms, how does that help?

So if I was to be getting jiggy* with Mrs M whilst they were in the room, will their breathing speed up to match?

*Fat chance 🙂

Hugo goes every day at 7-8am so we were surprised when he lasted until the afternoon without going……..at least it was obvious when he went though. I don't know where it all comes from!!!!

It reminds me of those PlayDoh toys where you wind the handle and it squirts out…

If you can get jiggy with Mrs M with those two whining, chirping and snuffling whilst you have the imminent crying in the back of your mind, I salute you!

Yep i had my first escaping poo while trying to change a nappy last week, I couldn't do any thing for laughing. It's not helped now by Hugo laughing at me while I change him – he finds it really funny, I'll get my own back when I'm 90 and he's changing 😀

As I said – fat chance 😉

To be fair, I don't have the energy to think about s3x, never mind actually participate in it right now 🙂

The breathing regulating thing apparently is because small baby's havn't developed that sense that keeps them breathing and often at night stop breathing for a little bit then carry on again. I have heard that it has something to do with cot death but I don't know how true that is.

m_f you wont be getting jiggy until they move out of the room because as soon as one of them grunts it will be hello mr floppy.

I couldn't do any thing for laughing.

LOL – I am the same – it doesn't bother me in the slightest – I find it fascinating. We have to remove vests down over their shoulders/hips to avoid wiping their faces in faeces 🙂

as soon as one of them grunts it will be hello mr floppy.

🙂 I must admit it would feel wrong to be doing anything with them just inches away from us!

Have you had the joy of them farting while they're still covered in poop during a change yet? Amazing force from such a little thing, usually into your face.

One downside of having them in our bed was occasionally being woken by them being sick onto the back of my neck. That was fun, but not as unpleasant as one of them hurling into my mouth as I was playing about lying on the floor and lifting them up into the air.

The joys of parenthood.

Have you had the joy of them farting while they're still covered in poop during a change yet?

Not that one, but I have felt the full force of their wind as I change them – remarkably powerful 🙂

Theres a reason I'm not a parent, it seems!

We're following Gina Ford with our little 4 week old. She is now sleeping from 11pm through to 6:20am with a 30 minute feed (which is slowly being phased out) happening sometime bewtween 4am and 5:30am.

Reference the original post, Gina is keen on babies being able to lie in their beds and amuse themselves if they wake up before feeding time, but is also a very big believer in rooms being dark – like pitch black dark. She says this helps babies sleep better. Maybe you could darken the room? We've put blackout curtains in our room and the nursery. Baby has all daytime sleeps in nursery and then sleeps in moses basket in our room overnight. Will sleep in it's room overnight at 6 weeks, we think.

In fact, on the baby learning front, the only reason she sleeps with us now is that otherwise I'd wake-up at least twice each night and go into her room to kae sure she was okay! Wife thought it better this way!

Another learning? After your baby has just had her biggest ever morning feed, do not – no matter how much she likes it – roll your baby around on top of a swiss ball for 10 minutes, holding her by her ankles and rolling her head towards the floor and back up, then holding by arms and the same in the other direction. When you pick her back up it will lead to the biggest ever vomit. Far out!

Final tip (and the only one that really matters, cause the swiss ball was fun and the baby didn't mind even after the vomit!) – if you have a baby monitor that has a setting where you don't directly hear the baby noises, but rather lights to show how much noise the baby is making (I guess for when you're overwhelmed by crying) do NOT use it… we'd just put our little one to bed and were hanging out downstairs when over the monitor we heard three hidous choking cries. On the light setting we just would have heard thee buzzes (what it does for 'red light' level noise. As it was we sprinted upstairs to find our little one having a seizure. Ambulance arrived in eight minutes and the NHS were wonderful (and all is now well), but as well as thanks to them, also thankful we were listening to her.

On a side note, with the Gina routine the baby is sleeping in her own bed between 7pm and 10:30pm. This provides a handy amount of time for both dinner and a prvate sharing of the parental bed. Sweet, sweet naptime!

A 'lights only' setting on a baby monitor sounds rather pointless unless you happen to be staring at it!

m_f says he has black-out blinds already. We don't, but I think I will this week.

We're not following Gina Ford but have a book called 'Baby Secrets' which seems to have some very similar advice to Gina Ford (and it's co-written by a lady with twins so has a twin-specific chapter).

Bet the seizures scarred the living cr@p out of you – glad it's fine now.

Gina Ford – you'll find she splits opinions quite a bit!

We went to NCT classes – teacher when asked what she thought about the book said teh NCT thought it should be banned. Mate who is a midwife (and now 22 weeks preggers) said all the older more experianced midwifes at her work disagree with her strongly. My brothers wife has been following Gina's teachings and for the first 5 months, she is now not following it as strictly as it's not worked out.

My nephew can now only sleep in a blacked out room – not so handy when your in the car, away from home etc, it's also quite nice to have them sleeping downstairs int eh lounge/kitchen while you get on doing stuff. Don't know how long he will need to blackout curtians to sleep?

I personnally don't think it's a good idea to restrict a babys food to certian times – what if it doesn't get enough……I've not read the book though so I'm not fully informed.

Gina ford is a load of Balls IMHO

not a big fan of gina ford here either.

My nephew can now only sleep in a blacked out room

I know a few like that. Seems like ford's approach is mainly to give the parents as little hassle as possible rather than focusing both parents and children adapting to each other.

also the sleeping with your children thing – I know about the increased risk of SIDS etc and keeping the room temp low etc but how the f*ck do people in hot countries cope? Our lads both spent approx 9 months in a cot in our room and regularly got brought into bed with us (not under the covers) and both are now sleeping through in their own rooms with no probs (thin curtains, windows open, plenty of noise etc etc)

Gina Ford isn't even a parent I believe.

I have read bits of her books but find it all a little bit too restrictive and almost impossible to keep to the timings – especially with twins.

Cheers Lucas – the four minutes or so the baby was locked rigid weer among the worst I can ever remember.

Agree totally with the 'lights only' setting… it makes a buzzing noise if the sound reaches 'strong crying' levels, but even with that we would've missed it.

Sorry I missed the bit about OP already having blackout curtains.

Unsure if I've read full book myself – it seems very badly organized, to the point where sections contradict each other! Gina didn't split opinion in our NCT group – there was us who were going to give it a go and then everyone else! We have other friends who are trying Gina – worked for three of them, not at all for another. And it seems to be working for us.

We share the concern with raising an 'inflexible' baby, one who needs a dark room and set times and all the rest and so are making an effort to fit loosely in with Gina's timings but also doing our own thing (for example baby slept in pram outside with me working in the garden for after lunch snoozes over weekend). Feeding time wise we have to gnore Gina – the baby wants way more food than would be possible in the allocated slot!

Had phoned midwife at 6 this morning to say baby hadn't pooed for at least 24 hours. Midwife said no problem, they can go for days (as noted above). Wife emailed 20 or so minutes ago describing scene of carnage when poo did arrive. Nappy was unable to contain, and so instead channeled!

Edited to add Gina has a separate book for twins. Likely to be as impenetrable as the solo child book, but again (and most I can say), is working for us.

Had phoned midwife at 6 this morning to say baby hadn't pooed for at least 24 hours.

Yeah – I think the most ours have gone is 9 days without a BM. Some babies do one at every feed!

Apparently the line is 'as long as the stool is any colour from light yellow to dark brown, is anything from milk to treacle in consistency and appears anything from every 2 hours to every two weeks, you have little to worry about'. It is only when they are hard and black or with blood in them that you should be concerned.

Although a little bit of concern when the baby hasn't done a poo for >24 hours and is naked on the changing when its stomach starts to rumble is probably allowed aswell! >.<

Just emailed wife to make sure this ok. Mastiles, (totally understanding that Gina routines are nowhere you're going!) if you'd like to borrow our copy of Gina's baby sleep book you'd be more than welcome. Lots of info in it outside of the routines, apparently (I haven't even opened it to say).

We have been given the gina ford twins book but I can't face it as it seems a touch inflexible. I think some sort of routine is key, though.

We did the whole worry over constipation thing (but were reassured by the mid-wife). We both cheered when the drought was audibly over….

I read the thread title and thought to myself, here's a chance to help a newbie parent with some of my small person wisdom. Then I got to the line "At the moment they are having a final feed around 8.30/9pm and sleeping well until around 3.30/4am".
The next two words that entered my head were a naughty swear follwed by an 'off'. Ten weeks old and you're getting a six hour block like that, blooming luxury!
I've not read any of the replies but you could try a 'dream feed'. Just bang a tit in their gobs, it works for me.

Completely agree with FoxyChick! Well said!

What's with this nonsense about babies sleeping in the same room as the parents until 6 months old? That is ridiculous!

Take charge of the situation – put them in their own room.