You should get one of those positioner things so you can put her on her side and she'll be supported. like this

http://www.toysrus.com/product/index...ductId=2341851

Sounds like you got a crybaby. Not unusual. The-baby-who-sits-happy-and-quiet-in-a-bouncy-seat-all-day-and-sleeps-all-night is a myth. We can all give tips, but you're going to have to find, by trial and error, what works specifically for Ava.

You'll probably have to hold her most of the time that she's awake. Again, not unusual. I think I held each of my kids the entire first year. When she falls asleep in your arms, I think it's important to go put her down in her crib (even if she wakes a little bit in the process), and just rock or pat her back to sleep. This will teach her to put herself to sleep from a drowsy state. I'd wake her for feedings in the daytime, at least every 2-3 hours. All babies are born with their days/nights confused, but most will sleep a solid 3-6 hours at some point during the day. Your job is to gradually move that chunk of sleep time to the time of day that you really need to sleep...for me it was midnight-6am. This is done by keeping baby awake in the daytime as much as possible and trying to reform her current sleep pattern into a semblence of a schedule that includes 2 daytime naps of 2ish hours each and a 4-6 hour night-time stretch of sleeping that gradually increases up to 12 hours over the next few months, all of which are done in the crib. I allowed little catnaps at other times of the day in the bouncy seat, but I didn't count that as part of their "real" sleep and I was woke them for feedings during their bouncy-seat sleeps.

If she's not sleeping for a large chunk of time, you need to figure out why...most likely it's because she's startling herself awake because you're listening to the "experts" who say you're supposed to put babies to sleep on their backs. I find parents who follow those rules are very, very tired, because newborns do not sleep well on their backs. It activates the newborn startle reflex and they wake up every 20 minutes. Most parents soon realize that if they want any sleep themselves at all, they need to relax those rules or at least bend them a little. You could try flipping her over onto her tummy and see if she sleeps better that way. Back sleeping is only one of the risk factors for SIDS. A cool sleeping room, with minimal loose blankets, and a firm mattress are other things that greatly reduce SIDS risk. If you really are adverse to putting her on her tummy, try swaddling (tightly, with arms swaddled also) and/or placing her (propped with a rolled blanket or two) on her side. Or try sleeping with her, with you on your back and her on her tummy on your chest.

The "5 S's" really do work well for soothing a fussy baby. Sometimes, though, babies just need to cry. It's normal and natural and, much as you want to, you can't cure everything for them. I held my babies during their fussy times (and I had 2 colicky babies who cried for 6 hours straight every night for months), and I tried to soothe them, and they were happier in my arms than just left to cry in a seat or crib, but they still cried and fussed. Then, suddenly, at around 12 weeks, they stopped doing that and turned into fat happy cherubs. That's the pattern with most crybabies, and I think your crybaby will be better by then too. Hang in there. It's a journey, not a destination, so enjoy the trip. Babyhood is so very precious...and so fleeting. Savor every moment, even the crybaby moments, because they don't last but a minute.

Oh, another thing I found to facilitate good sleeping habits was music. I used it as a conditioning method. Every time I put them down to sleep in the crib, I turned on the music...the same music, at the same volume, every time, and played it softly for about 15 minutes, sometimes putting it on again. Over time, this conditioned them to know that the music and crib meant sleep and I could put them in there awake, turn on the music, and they would just put their heads down. It has to be started very young to really work though. So, if you're interested in doing that, start doing it now.

- my baby hates a paci. Hates it. She spits it out as though it's vile and then squalls. Oh, how many times now I have longed for her to take it. I've tried about 4 different types. She sometimes sucks on her index or middle finger, but that's usually just when hungry.

I had to "teach" a couple of my babies to love the paci. I'd wiggle it back and forth very quickly to get them to take it, and once they were sucking I'd "tap" on the outside to keep them sucking. This training went on for a long time. It was weeks (or months?) til I was able to just stick the paci in their face without also having to hold them and tap the paci at the same time, but it was worth the time investment. And it also enabled me to get them to hold off on a feeding for a little while (important for breastfed babies, since I didn't want to end up being the paci, and breastmilk is better quality if 2 hours pass between feedings).

Forgive yourself about the breastfeeding and move on. You won't hear any criticism from me about it. I know how difficult it is to establish a breastfeeding relationship in the beginning, and 2 of my kids were formula fed because of it. Babies thrive very well on formula.

I have that exact same thing. I had been using it to keep her on her back because she sometimes rolls to her side. I'm a moron and I didn't even think about using it to hold her on her side. Duh.

Yes, yes, yes. You did what was best for you and your child.

The pediatrician said for her weight/size/age she shouldn't sleep more than 5 or so hours right now because at that point, her blood sugar starts to drop. She only weighs just over 7 pounds right now. I would be thrilled if she slept 4-5 hours though, rather than 2-3. And I would be especially thrilled if she slept 6+ hours by 6 weeks. I can deal with her waking up every 3 or so hours even if only I could get her to sleep earlier. Like I said earlier, she refuses to sleep, or really to do anything but cluster feed, from 10-11 until 1 am and then she's out like a light. I keep trying to keep her awake to resolve that, but she's been stuck in that habit for a bit now. At first she was awake from midnight until 5 am, so it's better than it was. I know it takes time to get them on a routine. But I have to go back to work in 3 1/2 weeks, so I want to get her on some sort of routine ASAP so I can function at work all day.

As far as her naps go, she obviously spends a lot of time sleeping during the day at this point. I wake her up for feeding and I try to keep her awake for a bit, especially in the evening, hoping it will make her tired earlier. It has gotten a bit better as I mentioned, but there's still that rough period where she won't sleep. But when she sleeps during the day, do you recommend I always put her where I want her to sleep at night (in her bassinet)? If I put her in her swing awake, should I move her when she falls asleep and put her in the bassinet so she'll associate that with sleep? And on the music conditioning, is white noise okay too? As long as it's something that's the same every night? That's what I've been using and it seems to soothe her, but I'm not adverse to switching to music if it will work better.

Yeah, at 7 pounds, I wouldn't expect her to sleep more than 5 hours...if that. More like 3-4 would be considered an accomplishment. She won't be 7 pounds for long though. She'll be up over 10 pounds in just a couple of weeks and once babies get to the magical 12 pounds, they can sleep 6 hours and, IF those 6 hours are in the middle of the night, you can consider her sleeping-through-the-night. It can be done. Mine all did it by 10-12 weeks...1 of them did it by 2 weeks.

Cluster feeding is good in the evening. Keep encouraging that. Don't try to get her to sleep "earlier". That comes later. Try to get her sleeping her longest period around midnight til 4-5am. Then, once she is doing that consistently, you can gradually move back her bedtime to 11pm, 10pm, 9pm, etc. She will probably do it on her own. Kids don't usually sleep early-evening-til-morning til they are 8-12 months old.

I wouldn't move a sleeping baby from swing to bed, but if she was getting sleepy in your arms, I would definitely put her in her bed. Try for 2 daytime naps and 1 nighttime chunk of sleep in her bed and go from there.

I like music better than white noise, just because I think it's better for "conditioning" training, but use what you like. My kids really reacted well to music. By the time they were toddlers, all they had to do was hear the first few notes of their music and they would put their heads down automatically.

I had to "teach" a couple of my babies to love the paci. I'd wiggle it back and forth very quickly to get them to take it, and once they were sucking I'd "tap" on the outside to keep them sucking. This training went on for a long time. It was weeks (or months?) til I was able to just stick the paci in their face without also having to hold them and tap the paci at the same time, but it was worth the time investment. And it also enabled me to get them to hold off on a feeding for a little while (important for breastfed babies, since I didn't want to end up being the paci, and breastmilk is better quality if 2 hours pass between feedings).

Forgive yourself about the breastfeeding and move on. You won't hear any criticism from me about it. I know how difficult it is to establish a breastfeeding relationship in the beginning, and 2 of my kids were formula fed because of it. Babies thrive very well on formula.

I would tightly swaddle Luke, rock him to sleep, then lay him on his side in a positioner like that. Worked great.

Definitely agree here. I had a similar experience to you with my first and I still remember how heartbroken I was that we couldn't BF but I made peace with it and we were all much happier.

I can't imagine taking months to make a baby get the hang of a pacifier. Frankly, I'm glad neither one of my girls took to it. I think they're disgusting, personally. And even if they did take it, they don't need to be pacified after the first few months anyway, so it seems kind of self defeating - you're just creating a habit that needs to be broken in the future anyway.

But to each their own. My little one is a thumb sucker, and has been since the beginning. I don't find that gross at all - and some people prefer pacifiers to thumbs, so whateves.

I can't imagine taking months to make a baby get the hang of a pacifier. Frankly, I'm glad neither one of my girls took to it. I think they're disgusting, personally. And even if they did take it, they don't need to be pacified after the first few months anyway, so it seems kind of self defeating - you're just creating a habit that needs to be broken in the future anyway.

But to each their own. My little one is a thumb sucker, and has been since the beginning. I don't find that gross at all - and some people prefer pacifiers to thumbs, so whateves.

I'm glad to know 3-4 hours of sleeping is good right now, because that's what she generally does at night. Well, more like 3. Last night she clusterfed from 10:30 until 12:50, slept from 1 until 4:10, was back out by 4:40, and slept til 7:30. If she wakes up more often, it's because she's hungry, but that's pretty typical except for a couple really rough days.

The good thing about pacifiers vs. the thumb/fingers is that you can take the paci away. I sucked my thumb til I was ridiculously old and it's amazing my teeth aren't screwed up, lol.

Perhaps you haven't experienced colic then. I did a lot of binky-tapping the first 3 months with my colicky babies. They needed a binky, and I just did not want to BE the binky. My kids all gave up the binky before a year anyway, so it wasn't a long-term issue. I loved the bink.

But I did breast feed constantly. Sometimes every hour and a half. Frequently every 2 to 3 hours.