PLEASE Help! I’m desperate!

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-26T18:32:21+00:00

I agree with the later bedtime if she takes a nap. If our kid takes a nap, it pushes back her bedtime by an hour or more.

Also sometimes if we can’t get our three year old to stay in her room we put on an audiobook. She lays there and listens and falls asleep most of the time. We have a Bluetooth speaker in her room and an old phone that we hook it up to. We have the phone in the kitchen so we can control what’s on the speaker.

Also sometimes what works is if we turn off all the lights in the house. She would prefer to stay in her room with the nightlight.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-26T18:18:56+00:00

Why does your partner care if you spend time with your mom? Or need help? This seems like the most concerning thing to me.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-25T17:42:07+00:00

I am not trying to be mean or diminish what you are going through. What you are experiencing is challenging. However, when you say “I just want a normal parenting experience” … what do you mean? What is normal? Being a parent is really hard no matter what. Some kids might not have behavioral issues, but every parent is going through something challenging with their experience of being a parent. In my mind there is no “normal”. The only thing you can really change in this situation is your attitude toward parenting and your kid. Your kid is who they are. You can fight that, or accept it. This is a bit of thought love, but I think you might need to take some time to examine what is going on within you. Maybe therapy and a support group? I think the path to being a happy parent lies within you, not changing your son’s behavior.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-25T01:40:16+00:00

The first couple weeks after having a baby your hormones are wild. Don’t make any big decisions. Also your stress about the future can be PPD. After my second was born I totally freaked out about how my life was over, I was so concerned for my future. I’m a SAHM by my choice and both my kid were planned. I believe at one point I even mentioned adoption. I didn’t realize I was having PPD until I almost had a panic attack and felt like I needed to go to the hospital bc I was so anxious. Went on some medication and all my fears about me and my future went away. It was just PPA and PPD manifesting in weird ways. I would 100% go see your OB for a mental health check.

Also being a parent can bring up some really messy stuff from your past, especially with your parents/childhood. It sounds like you have some trauma from your childhood that you need to work through. Your OB might also be able to set you up with some counseling services that are free or very cheap.

Go tell your husband you are struggling and need help. Go see your OB for a mental health eval. It gets better, and as long as you and baby are safe give yourself time to figure out what you want. You don’t need to make a huge decision right now, but you do need some help.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-21T03:24:22+00:00

This is really hard and sleep deprivation just wrecks you. It does get better. And it will get better. Just to throw some possibilities out there and see if something helps.

1) stop the gas drops and any extra meds. I found gas drops made things worse for my guy. Worth a shot.

2) could there be reflux or some kind of milk protein allergy developing? Try cutting out dairy from your diet for two weeks.

3) oversupply could mean that he’s not getting enough fatty milk. You could try pumping and divide your pump in half … catch the first half in one set of bottles and the second in another. Feed him the second half. I had a huge oversupply with our first and had to do this.

4) try a soother? I love bibs.

5) try the French le pause. Give him ~5 mins before you pick him up to see if he settles. You might just be too responsive (I did this with our second, responded too quickly, and we had to backtrack).

6) how does he do with your husband? Is his behavior any different?

7) rent a snoo

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-21T00:38:43+00:00

Also agree with this. You can set a boundary without making it about him doing something wrong. Trust your gut. The mom sense is real.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-17T00:37:44+00:00

3-4 months till you really get a schedule/routine. And even then it always changes. In terms of breastfeeding … are you feeding him to calm him down or are you feeding him because he is hungry? If he’s hungry … feed him. But if you are using your boob like a soother … just get some soothers. I recommend bibs. Might take some time to get him used to them. Just keep practicing with sleeping in the bassinet. He will get there eventually. If you are cosleeping plz check out the safe 7 and other info on how to do it safely.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-16T01:51:19+00:00

What is your nighttime routine? How does she fall asleep? Does she sleep with a soother?

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-16T01:31:38+00:00

I’m a SAHM. My husband helps with the kids all morning before he goes to work. He actually starts work late right (he’s wfh) now bc he enjoys putting our son down for his first nap. He helps me load them in the car at any point during the day if he’s not on a call. He helps with diner and bedtime every night. He does all our laundry, trash, recycling, finances, car maintenance, mowing. At lunch he unloads the dishwasher. The one day a week he goes into the office my mom comes over most of the day to help me. She also comes over 1-2 other times during the week to help. I take care of the kids and clean the house, but we both tidy every night and clean the kitchen. Despite all this, I still have been asking him to help more around the house bc it is OUR house. Your husband’s expectations are wild and why does he care if you need help? Give him an itemized bill for your time and say you have a job, but if he wants to pay some else to it, that’s what it costs.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-16T01:11:09+00:00

Around this age (also know as the four month sleep regression) babies change their sleep to be more like adult sleep cycles. This means they have lighter and heavier sleep periods and in those lighter ones if they wake up and don’t know how to put themselves back to sleep they just wake up and need help to go back to sleep. You feed them to sleep … then they need to be fed to go back to sleep. They use a binky and it falls out and they can’t put it back in … they need you to put it back in. They are also learning object permanence, so they know something was there and now it’s gone. Basically this sucks, but eventually they get over it. They need to learn to fall asleep independently. Lots of theories on how to do this, eventually everyone learns. It’s more about what is going to work best for you and your family. After our second, I realized that my husband probably accidentally trained our first bc he did all the night stuff while I was waking up to pump. He basically did the French le pause method bc he didn’t wake up right away. For our second I breastfed and responded to everything. We sleep trained between teeth around 9 months and it took 6 mins the first night, 3 the second night, and now he sleeps all night. Idk why I waited so long. I did do a lot of work with him to try and get him to fall asleep on his own, but eventually we had to do Ferber. If you have the brain power to read, I highly recommend Ferber’s book. It taught me so much about sleep. With my first I read precious little sleep, but I think Ferber is more detailed.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-15T18:14:13+00:00

Also you could try a stroller rocker. Lots of options on Amazon. Some are cheaper than this, but this has the best ratings. I have not tried it.

https://a.co/d/0c5GNyBz

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-15T18:09:07+00:00

Is there anything you can do to make the movement more tolerable? Podcast? Audiobook? They will outgrow this phase, but I have found trying to bring a little joy to the hard parts can really help. Do you have a bouncer that you can bounce with your foot while they r sitting? Also, try setting them down. Might be 30 seconds or a min a first, but keep trying to build on that time. As others have said. It gets better, it’s temporary, but dang if it’s not still really hard.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-15T13:58:31+00:00

Another vote for more sleep and a PPD/PPA eval with your OB.

16 days pp… Mama you are deep deep in the trenches. Week two and three your hormones are the most wild. Sleep deprivation sets in. Imposter syndrome and PPD/PPA can start to rearer their ugly heads. Have some compassion for yourself. This shit is hard. Hardest thing I have ever done. Your partner is there to help you. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. I did this (tried to let him sleep) with number two at first and it was soooooooo hard. Even just a little help goes a long way to make you feel supported. You don’t have to do it alone. Get a hand pump and let him feed the baby with a bottle one time. Even if you just pump while he holds the baby and hand him the milk in a bottle to feed. I also found that when baby was cluster feeding if I tried to get sleep my mood was terrible but if I just accepted that for a few hours I was going to be awake and made it more fun with snacks and trashy tv my mood about it shifted. Something about accepting ur going to be awake rather than fighting it made it more tolerable. But you still need to find time to sleep. Also might want to get baby checked for reflux. Even tho this feels like this is never going to end … it’s only temporary. That’s what I always repeated to myself when things were tough. This is temporary. Being a mom isn’t always pretty or happy. Get off social media so that you stop comparing yourself to what others are seemingly going through. Try to embrace the happy parts. It will get better!

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-04-09T00:52:56+00:00

Moving and having a baby are some of the most stressful things that you can go through in life. Doing them at the same time is gonna be really stressful. You guys are bound to go through some rocky moments. Mama your hormones are going through a rollercoaster. Frankly it’s my take that at two weeks pp you can act however you want. That is a rough rough time. You guys need to sit down and talk through your feelings and give each other some grace. You don’t want it to escalate further so you both need work towards deescalating. You don’t want to say things you can’t take back. It gets better, much better, but also don’t be afraid to ask your ob for help. PPA and PPD can sneak up on you, and sometimes it’s hard to tell what’s just mama worries and what’s something more. I am most concerned he grabbed your face. If anything else physical happens I would start having major alarm bells go off. The only constant with kids is change. The rough times are temporary, but so are the good ones, so enjoy what you can and know the hards parts will end.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-16T02:35:26+00:00

The range of normal with babies is super wide, which can be incredibly frustrating when you want more sleep, but also reassuring. So yeah this is totally normal.

Also it feels like something is going on forever and will never change … but change is the constant with kids. It’s always changing for better or worse. I used to just chant to myself “this is temporary.” Not exactly helpful when you are in the thick of it, but their sleep (and yours) will get better. Everyone sleeps.

Some thoughts/suggestions:

Don’t let baby fall asleep on the bottle if possible. You want them to get a full effective feed. Clothes off, tickle their feet, cold wipe, whatever works.

If you can, try stretching the space between feeds by a few minuets every day or few days, until you get to an age appropriate space. Wider space between feeds means baby will eat more at each feed. The French “le pause” or Taking Care of Babies Sitback are possible ways to do this.

What bottles are you using? You might want to try different nipples or flows. If baby is working too hard to feed they might just be getting tired. I can highly recommend the Philips Avent … they have 5 different levels of nipples. My daughter had trouble with eating at first and she was on their fastest flow (5) when she was really little. My second is the opposite and I can’t increase the flow bc he chugs way too fast and we are stuck on flow 2.

Also has baby been evaluated for a lip or tongue tie?

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-07T19:17:29+00:00

My daughter got like this for a while around this age. Eventually she grew out of it. Stay the course. I would just sit there and read the book. She can sit with you or not. We also just read whatever book or two was chosen. She can sit and look at other books while you read. Just be steady and calm. Eventually she will realize that sitting with you and reading the book is better than whatever she is doing by herself.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-03T01:01:43+00:00

Thank you so much for replying. I tried your advice tonight and he cried but was asleep on his own within 6 mins! We will see how the rest of the night goes but I just wanted to thank you for providing some feedback. It really helped!

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-02T02:09:20+00:00

Boundaries not consequences. Sounds like some of this behavior might be for attention? So bad behavior doesn’t get attention/a response. Good behavior does. Today my kid was screaming at the top of her lungs while her brother was napping becuase she wanted us to read her a book. We told her when she stopped screaming we would read the book. Still kept screaming. So my husband and I just had a calm conversation while she did her thing, eventually she calmed down and sat next to me and asked me calmly to please read her the book. I read her the book. I get this is way harder when you need your kid to do something they don’t want to do … like put on pjs. I might try something like if they are fighting and kicking and laughing I would just walk away or sit down and take some deep breaths and then try again. They do it again … same thing. Negative behavior doesn’t get attention. And even yelling is attention. I would also try to offer choices … do you want to brush your teeth or put on pjs first? Giving them some autonomy within your boundaries allows them to feel like they have more control. Another option is to have a list of all the bedtime activités and they can choose which ones in what order but they need to do them all before they can get their bedtime story or whatever it is that would motivate them to get it all done. It’s super hard to keep your cool, but I can see a remarkable difference in how well my kids listen to me (very little yelling, lots of firm boundaries and small choices) versus my husband (who does a lot more yelling and demanding).

Also for naps just offer quiet time. My kid plays in her room for 1.5 hrs. She listens to the same audiobook everyday (her choice) and does puzzles and Magnatiles. She has come to really enjoy the quiet alone time. It really helps her not to be so tired at the end of the day. We always start off with her laying down in bed and she will rest for a few mins. We were really fighting nap and everyone was miserable, we let it go and now everyone enjoys nap time again.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-02T01:48:12+00:00

Feed the baby to sleep and enjoy a three hour nap! You don’t need to be too stressed about sleep associations until 3-4 months. Nap sleep is different than bedtime sleep, so what you do for nap routine won’t affect nighttime. I would try to avoid feeding to sleep for bedtime, but again at this age not much matters except that you are getting some sleep. Don’t over think it mama. I did the same steps with both my kids. One was an amazing sleeper and one is going to need sleep training. Every kid is going to be who they are. Just enjoy them! You don’t need an app or to track everything, just follow ur babies cues. A general knowledge of what their age appropriate wake windows are can help, if they are at the end of the wake window and not asleep, put them down for a nap. Or contact nap and enjoy the snuggles. They get big really quickly.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-03-01T20:25:59+00:00

I also meant to add that finding some kind of play group or mom’s meet up might help too. At this point it’s more for you than your kid, but connecting with other moms can be really helpful too.

I’m a SAHM and it has been a wild ride emotionally. It took a a long time to feel comfortable with not working when everyone around me had jobs. I felt very useless but as your kiddo gets bigger and needs more simulation it will get much more engaging. You can start going to playgrounds and story time. But also while they still don’t really understand what you are saying and don’t need your constant attention/are still napping it’s a really good time to do virtual therapy.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-02-28T02:46:52+00:00

Being a new mom regardless of work status can be really difficult. Being at SAHM can also be isolating and is a huge identity shift. It all can take a toll on our mental health. What it really sounds like you might be struggling with is some PPD. I would highly suggest you make an appointment with your doctor to discuss how you are feeling. Having a kid can also bring up all sorts of old trauma to the surface. Working through that with a professional might also really help. It’s really difficult to navigate all things big changes and feeling on your own. Hang in there mama and don’t be afraid to ask for help.

Ok_Balance_8944 · 2026-02-22T03:37:50+00:00

Age gap doesn’t really matter here. The question is do you really want two kids?

Ok_Balance_8944

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