Please excuse any typos as I have my newborn in my lap and typing one handed! I have fogotten everything about getting a baby to sleep through the night! When my first son was born I made it my life's mission to get him to sleep. He slept through the night at 8 weeks. Well, I just don't remember how I did this. I know I put him on a feeding schedule and felt like that helped so he was filling up during hte day. What have others done that you felt worked. I am so not a good nighttime parent and the sooner he can sleep more than 2-2.5 hours at a time the better!

__________________

I have no advice for you as I never 'tried' to get my kids to sleep through the night or tried to get them on my schedule. I just went with their schedule and eventually they were sleeping through the night. #1 by 3 months, #2 by 22 months (longest of them all), #3 by 4 months and #4 by 2 months. They each did it in their own time. I feel that getting up in the middle of the night, every 2 hours or however they wake up, is my job as their mother. Eventually they will sleep for longer stretches of time, leading up to sleeping through the night.

Good luck with your little one!

I have small babies, but once they grow to about 11 lbs they sleep through the night, and once they've done it once, I make them cry it out the other nights. It takes about 4 days of hours of screaming at night, 2-3 days of fussing in the middle of the night, but after that they sleep pretty well. It really helps me to not sleep with the baby in my room-ever! and to keep my door shut and the baby's door shut. I always wake up when he actually is crying, but it doesn't jar me awake when he is just fussing, and that has helped tremendously. Good luck!

I put DS down before he was asleep, so he'd learn to sleep on his own. I tacked blankets up on his window so it was dark in his room when he was sleeping, either nap or bedtime. He was sleeping soundly through the night before 3 months.

Are you bathing him right before bed? The slight increase in body temperature may help him sleep longer. Also, is there a fan or some sort of white noise in his room? I know that when I put a fan in DS's room, it made a world of difference. He didn't wake from strange random noises (house creaking, dog barking outside, car going by). It also kept the air circulating in his room so it wasn't stale and too warm/cold.

__________________

when mine were newborns, and there tummies were small I nursed so they fed every two hours. It wasn't until they were about 3 mos old that they slept mostly through the night maybe getting up once to eat then back to sleep. Just try to sleep when the baby is!

__________________
"Before I was a Mom I didn't know the feeling of having my heart outside my body." ~Anonymous

This is going to echo what some others have said. Try to maintain a regular schedule with feedings. I think it is good for the baby to eat when he first wakes up, then have some play time then learn to go back to sleep, so they are not learning to go to sleep by drinking a bottle or nursing. Also, put the baby down before he goes to sleep so he learns to 'put himself to sleep' instead of being held or rocked to sleep. I also had to move my first son out of our room because I would wake up whenever he made a noise and he was a noisy sleeper! The other two weren't so noisy...or I was just used to the noise by then. I learned so much from a book called "BabyWise" by Gary Ezzo after my first was born. I reread it before each newborn to refresh my memory about scheduling. I am about to have number 4 in September.

Hang in there....it does get easier and you will eventually get to sleep again!

Sorry to say but babies need at least one nighttime feeding until they are around 3 months. DD never woke up more than twice and once she reached 3 months she started sleeping through the night. I can't remember if she choose to on her own or if I just let her cry if she woke up, but my DR said that at 3 mo they can start storing away enough food to keep them satasfied at night.

Since your little one isn't even 3 weeks yet, I think you might have a few more off and on nights ahead of you.

__________________

Good Luck with the sleep! My dd is a month old and I let her just sleep whenever...she tends to sleep a lot. Normally, 2-3 hour intervals. Sometimes during the night she may go 3-5...if I am lucky. I just try to rest when she is sleeping, and have books close by so that I can read to my son while I am feeding her. Wish that I had some magical advice to offer.

__________________
Jen

I was also not a good nighttime parent, one thing that helped was having a bottle of expressed milk for my dh to feed ds. Dh was much better at 2 am, he can always fall back asleep no matter what time, so I took 11 pm and 5 am and was able to get 5-6 hours of sleep in between. Can your dh help like that?

Besides that, when ds was about 1-2 months old, I started feeding him more frequently at night. Instead of every 3 hours, I fed him every 2 hours, like 6, 8 and 10 pm. Then his little belly was super full and he would sleep until 5-6 am when he was 8 weeks old. Remember that "sleeping through the night" is technically a 6-7 hour stretch, so aim for that middle of the night sleep (11-5/6)
Good luck!

My baby is almost 5 months old now. She still wakes at least once a night, sometimes twice. She has slept through the night only twice since she was born. She is not small either. I asked my Pediatrician and he said breast fed babies just need to eat more often. So, I just keep feeding my little girl on demand.

Hang in there! It will get better. It never lasts forever.
My tips would be to put them in the bed drowsy not asleep.
Then when baby is about 3 months, then see if you can't just lay your hand on their tummy when they wake up the first time in the night. I try this and sometimes my baby will go back to sleep.
Also, swaddling has helped my kids tremendously!!!!
My baby just started rolling over so I put a sleep positioner in her bed. She has been sleeping better. I think she likes having the sides of the sleep positioner up next to her keeping her all snuggled in one spot.

Good luck!