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The Sleepy Newborn

© Jessica Williams

When I went into labor with my first son, I was unprepared for the birth. I had been having pre-term labor for nearly eight weeks, and could not make it to childbirth classes because I was on bed rest. Being my first child, I really didn't know what to expect. During labor, I finally asked for an epidural. Unfortunately, my nurses didn't check my progress before the medication was administered, and I ended up receiving the epidural during transition. I believe Chris was affected by the medication.

Needless to say, he didn't nurse during the first hour after the birth. In fact, our first nursing session wasn't until about six hours later. The nurses had given him glucose supplements, so even our first nursing wasn't the greatest. Chris slept a lot. I mean, a lot. When we brought him home, he slept. When my milk came in three days later, he slept. He slept through everything. We would joke about how he was in denial about being born. He wanted to be back in his warm, dark environment. Getting this boy to nurse was very difficult.

I didn't know it then, but this is actually pretty common. Newborns can be very sleepy, which can make nursing a little more challenging. But as long as your baby doesn't have any health problems that are causing his slumber state, there is no reason why you can't nurse him. You just have to be more creative about how to get him interested!

For our son, the only way to really get him to be alert enough to nurse for a long period was to give him a warm bath. It's funny, but giving a bath is a usually a common way to relax babies, not wake them up. But for us, it worked. I also remember my mother constantly unwrapping Chris's feet from the swaddling blanket so that she could stroke them. She told me this always worked for me, and I have talked to other moms who swear it stimulates their baby to suck.

Some other common, gentle stimulation ideas follow:

• Switch to the other breast. If baby is taking a few sucks and then falling into dreamland, try switching to the other breast. Going through the latch-on procedure again may be enough to wake him for a few more minutes. You can keep switching breasts throughout the feeding if this seems to work.
• Unswaddle baby and lay him on the floor or bed. Some babies love the comfort of being wrapped in a blanket. Unwrap them, and their normal reflexes take over. The movement of stretching their legs or finding a fist to suck on may wake them enough to nurse. Keep baby warm, but don't swaddle before a feeding.

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