This may be a godsend!

[MDT]

My name is Melissa and I recently had my first baby, Andrew, last December.  We've been having problems with fussiness since he was about 1.5 months old and I have no idea why I waited until now to look for support on the Internet from moms who share similar experiences.

Our family situation is difficult.  My husband is an airline pilot who goes away for 3, 4 sometimes 5 days at a time which leaves me as a part-time single parent to a fussy baby.  People tell me that I knew what I was getting myself into before we had a baby (him being gone all the time), but I never knew it could be this hard.  We don't have much support where we live, either, so that complicates things even more.  All of this on top of the fact that I'm still dealing with some postpartum depression has been enough to make me want to pull my hair out.  What really kills me is that this is beginning to take a toll on my marriage.  Any time my husband is gone, we argue because all I want is to be able to go away for a few days and not have to deal with the baby and all he wants is to be able to be home to help me.  I just wish I could have his physical support every day and knowing that that's something I can't have is hard for me to come to terms with.

I'm so glad to have found this forum.  My husband has been gone for two days now and I don't think I've had an hour to myself since then.  I'm practically at my wits end with the crying and constant need of attention/comfort and feel like we're never going to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm just glad to know I'm not the only one.

[Hollyadmin]

Hi Melissa!

I'm so glad you found us too. It's not quite as good as having a whole bunch of 'in real life' friends with fussy babies, but it does help

I can't imagine how you're doing this with having your husband gone so much!  Sometimes even getting an hour's break can make a huge difference, as I'm sure you've discovered.  And when you don't even have that...I can see why you're nearly losing it.

I've also had people say to me, 'Well dear, having a baby is hard work!'. Um ya, I always knew that, but they've never had a Sammy!  It's 10x as hard as having some other babies. And besides all the extra time, patience, and work involved in soothing/entertaining/distracting a fussy or high need baby, there's all the guilt, frustration, sleep deprivation, etc, etc, etc that goes along with it.

Feel free to come here and vent anytime, we all understand

[MDT]

The real life friends with fussy babies don't exist!  It seems as though everyone I know with a baby has a perfect little angel and I must admit that it makes me extremely jealous!  All I do is tell myself that whenever I have #2, chances are it won't be fussy like this one.  But you never know.

Thanks for the welcome.  I'm sure I'll be spending plenty of time venting on here.  I've needed to do this for so long, but it's hard to vent to people who just don't get it and I'm tired of feeling like a weirdo because I might not always have positive things to say about my baby.

[DolphineGirl]

Welcome on the forum! I joined recently, and I have already discovered what a great place it is! I can relate to your problem, although my husband comes home every night after work I have no other help available besides him. And since he is away for most of the day he does not understand fully what it means to be with a high need baby. He said that I should carry him a lot, yes and I do that a lot indeed, but what if my back is killing me? I had to convince him to go and buy a swing for the baby so that at least I could get my hands free. Thank God, we have the swing and baby seems to like it, and now my husband agrees with it.
I remember sending a picture of the baby to my cousin, and she replied something about she was sure the baby would let me relax, since he looked sooo cute. I wanted to scream, since at the beginning the baby would do anything but sleep! My mom was here with me for 6 weeks, and my mom who is the strongest person I have ever seen, had quite a few meltdowns because of the baby.
I know I should not complain a lot, at least my baby learned how to sleep through the night! And I mean it, 6-7-8-9 hours straight. But during the day he only sleeps 30-40 minute stretches, after each feeding (he is bottle fed) he cries because of gas, since he does not want to sleep during the day after having been awake for over an hour he gets tied, and the fussines starts....

[MDT]

It's a good thing you found the swing.  It's so hard to find things that work to calm our babies so once you do find something, the relief is amazing.  I've been using both a swing and a bouncy, vibrating chair for my baby, but he goes through stages where he'll love one and hate the other, then vice versa.  It's hard to figure out what he wants and sometimes he doesn't want either.

I'm sorry to hear that your husband doesn't understand what it really means to handle a high needs baby.  I got lucky with a husband who takes the energy to see things from my perspective and I really appreciate that.  I don't know what I would do without him.

Your baby's sleep patterns are exactly like mine.  He's been sleeping through the night for a long time now and that's one thing I love about him.  Naps, on the other hand, now that's a completely different story!

[Hollyadmin]

Once we got through the initial newborn stage with Sammy, he actually slept really well at night too. What a difference that made! If I had any advice to parents it's work HARD on nighttime sleep, so at least you get that break.

When Sammy was 5 weeks old, I remember being up until after midnight trying to calm him and get him to sleep. He was absolutely exhausted (as was I), and I had been trying for hours and hours to get him to sleep. Finally I swaddled him up, put him in his swing, put on the white noise, and put the swing on full blast. Of course, he didn't like that. I said 'Good night Sammy', and shut the door, fully intending to come back in a few minutes and keep trying. I was just so at the end of my rope.  5 minutes later, my husband says, 'Is it quiet in there???', and sure enough, he was fast asleep!  We couldn't believe it. He slept 12 FREAKIN' HOURS!!! After that, we did the same routine every night, and he would either sleep through, or wake up once.

While I'm NOT an advocate of letting babies 'cry it out' at that young age, sometimes you do have to give them a chance to fall asleep on their own. Especially if you've tried everything and it's not working!

[DolphineGirl]

I tried the white noise too. It did wonders, but only once. The little fussy one fell asleep on his own, and had an afternoon nap of 3 hours. The next day the same white noise made him even fussier. So he is unpredictable.

As for my husband, he tries to help me at the weekend, and also in the evening, but he does not have to go through what I do. He thinks that a full time job like his is the most demanding one, and taking care of a baby must be some much easier and more pleasant thing to do. Maybe I should ask him to pick a Saturday and then I would go out for the whole day, and then we should see what he thinks!  From my own experience no other job I had before (and I had a few demanding ones) were as stressful as taking care of a high need baby.
In two weeks from now I will attend a conference, only a couple of hours, but I cannot wait to get a break. Even if it's only a few hours, I know that I will be free, and since meal will be served there I know that finally I would be able to enjoy eating something, instead of quickly grab a bite here and there. Okay I also know that I will miss my little fussy one like crazy.
Now I have to go, feeding time again, and in the last 20 minutes or so I just let him fuss in his crib, he would do the same in my arms too, and my arms and back are just killing me.

[MDT]

I used to feel guilty when my husband went away for work and I couldn't seem to handle my only job of taking care of the baby.  He works his butt off when he's away from home, dealing with all sorts of crap while I sit at home on the couch.  I had to keep reminding myself, though, that while his work might have been more physically tiring, mine was more mentally tiring.  It takes a lot of control to not lose it when you're constantly trying to soothe a fussy baby.  It takes a toll on you mentally which ends up affecting you physically when you factor in all of the sleep loss.

Maybe giving your husband a full day with the baby would be good for the two of you.  Maybe then he'd understand more where you're coming from.  Even though my husband has only ever been home alone with the baby once or twice, he's been able to see first hand just how frustrating and tiring it can become.  Plus, you can get the satisfaction of telling him, "I told you so!"

[fbsurvivor]

Melissa- Wow!  I thought it was hard just having no family around.  I can't imagine not having someone to relieve me in the evenings.  That's brutal.
One thing that struck me was that you said the fussiness started at 1.5 months.  Usually it starts around the 2-3 week mark.  I just wanted to point that out in case there is in fact a medical issue or something in his environment that changed at 1.5 months.  Or was he a preemie? 
I can totally relate to feeling like it shouldn't be THIS hard.  My mother-in-law told me that when she had her 3rd baby she was teaching and working and she didn't feel like a martyr.  (Months later when she saw my work/commute schedule she changed her tune.)  I really felt like everyone thought I was crazy.  My husband certainly was suffering right along with me, though, so I knew it wasn't me.
Naps-You can try playing soft music once they have fallen asleep to keep them asleep.On the dad thing- At 3 months my husband took paternity leave while I went back to work.  I was terrified that he was just going to let our daughter cry, but it turned out to be a real bonding experience and he discovered things that I didn't.
Holly-We totally used the swaddling plus swing method, although it made me nervous because we couldn't stap her in.  We used a pacifier, held in lightly with a sun hat strap, swaddling, and the swing.  But even that sometimes wouldn't work. 

[Hollyadmin]

Hey Melissa!

I've just been wondering how things are going?

Also, I've been thinking about one thing you mentioned...was Andrew fussy at all his first 6 weeks? In my experience, babies who are simply 'fussy' tend to be that way from birth or shortly thereafter. Not saying anything is wrong with him, I just found it curious. Was it all of a sudden?  Was he a preemie? If he was even 3 weeks early, 6 weeks adjusted age would be exactly the norm for colic to begin.

[MDT]

I'm doing okay.  Just haven't been online much since my husband had a good stretch of days off at home.  He just went back to work this morning so I'll be around more often for the next few days

I know I mentioned a few times that the fussiness seemed to start around 1.5 months, but when I look back on it, it really did seem to start more around the one month mark.  He wasn't a preemie, but he did come a little over a week early.

One thing that I think was a big problem was having to switch to formula.  I did this at about one month.  He lost too much weight on my milk alone so the doctor had us supplement with formula and things seemed to go downhill from there.  To make a VERY long story short, milk-based formula was a no-go.  We have him on soy now and even though he seems to be a completely different baby from before, he still has bouts of crankiness.  It's really weird because it's almost like an on and off kind of thing.  Last week and the few weeks prior were horrible, but now this week he doesn't seem nearly as bad.  We really can't figure out what it is.

[Hollyadmin]

I'm doing okay.  Just haven't been online much since my husband had a good stretch of days off at home.  He just went back to work this morning so I'll be around more often for the next few days

I know I mentioned a few times that the fussiness seemed to start around 1.5 months, but when I look back on it, it really did seem to start more around the one month mark.  He wasn't a preemie, but he did come a little over a week early.

One thing that I think was a big problem was having to switch to formula.  I did this at about one month.  He lost too much weight on my milk alone so the doctor had us supplement with formula and things seemed to go downhill from there.  To make a VERY long story short, milk-based formula was a no-go.  We have him on soy now and even though he seems to be a completely different baby from before, he still has bouts of crankiness.  It's really weird because it's almost like an on and off kind of thing.  Last week and the few weeks prior were horrible, but now this week he doesn't seem nearly as bad.  We really can't figure out what it is.

Ahhhh, that sounds very familiar!  Sammy has always been 'on again off again' fussy too. At the very beginning, it was always ON but then after the newborn stage, he would have good weeks and bad weeks. Even now he has that....he will go several weeks where he's really easy to get along with, then weeks where everything is a battle. I think this is typical 'high need' behaviour. Definitely when there were any changes going on or stressors in our life, we would find he would have bad weeks. Or, if he would not eat or sleep as well, that would be followed by bad days/weeks. As Mary Sheedy Kurcinka said to me, 'These kids are absolute emotional barometers of the family'.  SO true!!

[fbsurvivor]

During my daughter's fussy period I was rarely online.  5 minutes to spare was a huge break.

My daughter also had poor weight gain, below 5%.  We also had to supplement, but she just threw it back up and a gastroenterologist told us to stop stuffing her.  She started gaining normally on her own at about 8 weeks, but it was very scary.  It took 5 weeks to get to birth weight.  I've heard quite a few times about fussy babies having trouble gaining weight, so I wouldn't be surprised if there's a connection.  To me it just seemed like my daughter liked the breast so much that she'd fall asleep the minute she had any milk.  Then if I woke her up, the same pattern would repeat.  I think sometimes these babies are just spending too much energy screaming when other babies are sleeping and eating.

Does your son have stomach troubles?  My daughter had a lot of gas.  Just the other night she was just filled to the brim with gas and the only thing she would do is sit in my lap.  Fortunately with the gas, it got much better as she matured.  Unfortunately there wasn't a whole lot that helped before then.  The one thing we found is if I had garlic it got into the breast milk, caused horrible gas, and my daughter went off the deep end.

I noticed that my daughter's worst weeks often preceded a developmental milestone.  I guess it goes along with the theory that these babies don't like change.  Maybe it includes developmental changes.

I know there's not much you can do about your husband's schedule, but do you think that instability is making it hard for your son?  My daughter had a major meltdown with the grandparents leaving a couple weeks ago.  I think one thing that has kind of helped is that we've been Skype-ing with the grandparents as often as possible, just so she maintains that connection.  I don't know if at such a young age that would help with your son, but it might.

Keep hanging in there.  It will get better and you'll be so much stronger for it.

[MDT]

My son did have bad gas when he was younger, but that seems to have gotten better through the months.

It's funny you bring up the instability aspect of my husband's schedule.  I've told my husband for weeks now that I think that is a big problem for the baby.  He always seems worse when my husband is gone and at first I thought it was just me making it out to be that way since I did not have help, but in the back of my mind, I've always had a suspicion that there was something more going on there.  He doesn't eat the same, won't sleep the same and definitely gets fussier.  My son is also very sensitive to who is around him.  He only likes who he is familiar with and people have told us that 4 months is too young for a baby to tell, but every time a stranger is around, he throws a fit.  My inlaws were over the other day and only see the baby once or twice a month and he screamed until they left.  He knows who he likes just as I think he knows when his dad is gone.  He probably also senses the stress I'm dealing with just from having my husband gone.  I bet it all plays a part in why he acts the way he does.

[fbsurvivor]

Trust me.  My daughter is 18 months.  Her grandparents visited and then left.  She was a disaster for a week and a half.  She was a totally different kid.  It was like she returned to her fussiness.

I totally think that a baby can tell at 4 months something like which people are around, otherwise how would they know who mommy is?  Also, these babies tend to be hyper alert and aware of their surroundings.