PARENTHOOD IS EXHAUSTING Young babies need almost-constant care: They need to be fed every couple of hours; they wake up multiple times per night (making a good night's sleep a thing of the past for you); and they may require specific (and bizarre) rituals to get them to eat, stop crying, or fall asleep.
Being a parent to a new baby can be hard. The joy you get from coos and cuddles is mixed in with the hard work of infant care. It's normal to feel frustrated and exhausted.
Teenage Years:
Teenage kids are portrayed to be the most difficult stage of parenting to deal with. I'm not sure why, but most parents tend to overthink things when it comes to teenagers. In this stage, we deal with the same things as in the preteen years but with stronger feelings and a sense of individuality.
The rigors of labor and delivery can take a significant toll on your body. Plus add in the stress of caring for a newborn and the lack of sleep and it's not surprising that the majority of women experience fatigue and exhaustion during the postpartum period.
The newborn stage is difficult for most parents, whether you're a first-time or seasoned mom. The abrupt change to your lifestyle, the sleep deprivation, and the demands of a baby make these weeks and months one of the hardest for any parent. But we get through it. We organize our days and take much-needed breaks.
Around this time, most babies cry and fuss more. This is a typical part of development and will pass in time. It usually peaks around 6-8 weeks and starts to settle at around 12-16 weeks.
1-3 Months
The first three months with your baby often seem the hardest.
Another sleepless night? You're not alone. Entirely too many parents get way, way too little sleep. A survey from Owlet Baby Care found that nearly half of all parents with children six months or younger get just one to three hours of uninterrupted sleep a night.
This leads us to believe that shooting for 6 hours per night as a breastfeeding mom is a good goal. Some will do fine with a bit less, some will still feel like they didn't get enough with more than 6.
Sleepless nights are common in new parenthood, but they do not last forever. Most babies will begin to sleep for longer periods at night from the age of 6 months old. Newborn babies need to feed every few hours until the age of 3 months. After this, it is normal for infants to feed once or twice during the night.
Most people find the first six to eight weeks to be the hardest with a new baby. And, although people may not openly discuss many of the challenges in these early weeks of parenthood (if at all), there are a number of common hurdles you may face at this time.
However, many research studies—and an awful lot of parents if you ask them to be candid—paint another picture. While there's certainly a lot of joy involved in parenthood, it is not unusual to also feel overwhelmed with negative feelings: anxiety, confusion, frustration, depression.
These little ones are developing their language, memory and imagination, and it's a time of discovery, as parents begin to see their kid's personality shine. It's also a time when both kids and parents struggle with unpredictability, expectations and boundary setting, particularly in uncertain situations.
A new mom struggles with lots of hormonal issues, mood swings and fatigue. The baby needs all the attention and time as it is completely dependent on parents for every need. But, just because you have a baby, doesn't mean you can't enjoy dates like before. Dress up, get a sitter and get going.
While it'll get easier with each passing day, you can expect caring for your newborn will be much easier by the time they're about 3 months old. As you're waiting with anticipation for when caring for your newborn gets easier, it's important to make sure you're taking good care of yourself.
If you are feeling overwhelmed as a mom, you are not alone. The “depleted mother syndrome” is a term used to describe the feeling of exhaustion and depletion that many mothers experience. It is a very real phenomenon, and it can have a significant impact on a mother's ability to function.
In our practice as lactation consultants working with nursing babies young and old, many start sleeping through the night around 9 months. They may continue to occasionally wake and need to be settled after a bad dream or other sleep disturbance, but are no longer nursing at night on a regular basis.
A child might still enjoy breastfeeding to sleep for two or three years or longer because it would still be developmentally normal to breastfeed until then, but it definitely won't be “forever”. It takes only a short time in your day to settle your child to sleep this way.
Overall, babies simply find it easier to fall and stay asleep next to mom than they do dad. Mothers are also the source of breastfeeding which makes it much more natural to continue the night when milk is available.
Generally, newborns sleep about 8 to 9 hours in the daytime and about 8 hours at night. But they may not sleep more than 1 to 2 hours at a time. Most babies don't start sleeping through the night (6 to 8 hours) without waking until they are about 3 months old, or until they weigh 12 to 13 pounds.
This arrangement thus helps to regulate the infant's breathing, sleep state, arousal patterns, heart rates and body temperature. The mother's proximity also stimulates the infant to feed more frequently, thus receiving more antibodies to fight disease.
Second Night Syndrome
Generally occurs about 24 hours after birth for almost every baby. Your baby will want to be on the breast constantly but quickly fall asleep. If you put him down, he will probably wake up. If you put him back to breast, he will feed for a short time and fall asleep.
Night two can bring way more crying that the first 24 hours. The theory is that during the second to third day postpartum, your newborn is discovering they are no longer in the comforts of your womb. They are experiencing many new firsts – the feeling of hunger, cold air across their skin, lights and stimulation etc…
However, researchers have found that infant crying typically tends to increase rapidly from 2-6 weeks, then drop off significantly by 12-16 weeks; this is known as the “crying curve.” So, if you find that your mellow newborn has turned into a fussy 3-month-old, take heart.