How to get sleep with a newborn

Before Alexandria was even born, my wife and I often discussed how we were going to deal with the topic of sleeping since the one thing everyone with kids can agree on is that sleep becomes a luxury when the newborn comes home.

Since my wife’s sister had a baby 8 months before Alex was born, we had an idea of what to expect. My sister in law and her husband, started out by keeping the baby in their bedroom. Every time the baby would wake up and cry, both of them would get woken up and both would be up until the baby went back to sleep, even though only one of them was actually changing or feeding her.

While this is very noble and full of camaraderie, I am completely against it. The two of them both looked like zombies for months.

Wifey and I talked about it and decided the best approach for us to try is for us to split up. Since my company allowed me to take a couple of months off after the baby was born to help my wife, we were able to get more creative than we would have been had I needed to go back to work right away.

Since we had converted our guest room into the baby’s room, we already had a bed in there. Instead of both of us getting up all night, we’d split the duties. One of us would sleep in the room with the baby and take night duty.

In the morning, the one that slept through the night would take over and let the other one sleep late to catch up on sleep. This way, at least one of us is always fairly fresh and functional.

The first night mommy and baby were home from the hospital, I decided to try being the overnight caretaker so wifey could get a full night’s sleep. It didn’t go well. First off, I was paranoid so kept waking up to check on the baby. Then, I had apparently done a crap job hooking up the anti SIDS (movement monitor) and as a result, I got woken up no less than three times by false alarms which scared me senseless. I finally got up and corrected my mistake of only connecting one of the movement pads, which solved that issue. Then came the issue of feeding the baby. Since we were trying to breastfeed only, I had to bring the baby to wifey. Since this was waking her up anyway, both of us wound up suffering.

By the morning, I was totally destroyed and so was my wife.

We decided to regroup and come up with a new plan. Wifey said that since she hadn’t been sleeping well at the end of the pregnancy and had also been getting broken sleep in the hospital, she could deal better with it than I could. Our new plan was formed. Wifey would be dedicated to the night shift and I would take the day shift as well as keep up with house work since I’d be better rested.

The second night, wifey went to bed in the baby’s room early around 9pm and I stayed up with the baby. We were feeding the baby every three hours and her next feeding would be at midnight. I decided I would stay up with her until about 1am so that wifey could get at least 4 hours of continuous sleep.

The plan actually worked beautifully. I put the baby to sleep in her room without waking my wife at around 1am. The baby got up for her feeding at 3am and went back to sleep until 6am. I got up at 7am and took over and let wifey sleep until 10am. The bottom line is that I felt great because I got 7 hours of undisturbed sleep and wifey felt pretty good since she got to sleep for a few extra hours despite it being broken sleep.

We have stuck with this plan since then and it has continued to work. Since the last time the baby gets up with my wife is at 6am, as long as I get her before her 9am feeding, wifey doesn’t get woken up and gets her rest and so do I.

I’m writing this post on the couch with baby Alexandria in her bassinet sleeping. I’m going to wake her up in about a half hour to change and feed her, which will give her a little time to settle back down before I put her to bed with mommy. I do get sleepy towards the end of my night, but it’s not terrible and is a heck of a lot better than being woken up every couple of hours all night and then being z0nked the next day.

UPDATE:

We have officially abandoned the two shift sleeping arrangement. After about a month of wifey doing the night shift, she was pretty much ready to crack mentally. Although she had felt fine about it at first, the constant broken sleep eventually got to her.

We now split the night. We go to bed between 10pm and 11pm. The baby will usually sleep until 2am or 3am. I take that feeding and go back to bed. When the baby wakes up next around 6am or 7am, she takes that feeding. While it does make my night a bit rough, the difference was immediate and dramatic for my wife. She woke up the next day feeling like a brand new person and her attitude came right along with it.

At the end of the day, you have to do whatever works for you, but my advice for the guys that have their wives doing all of the overnight work, give her a break and either take a whole night from time to time or offer to split the work. It’ll help your wife’s whole state of mind and is the right thing to do.

Do you have any tips or tricks on getting your newborn to sleep better? Please leave a comment below!

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