Help! - Ames,IA

I agree with the "Happiest Baby on the Block". Those techniques really worked. If you don't have time to read I think it's avaiable on CD/DVD. Good luck!

How is the environment around her at these times. 6 can be hectic and 12 can be calm. She may be feeling the business around her and may be uneasy with it.

Tha tis called the witching hour ;)

A nursing baby that age really isn't on a scheudle of naps and bedtimes and feedings. However, I would suggest doing what you can to get her to go to sleep shy of 6pm. Sleep begets sleep. At 6 pm she sonds like she is probably our of her mind with frustration and tiredness. If you can get her to sleep at the time that normally sets her off if might help with the rest of the evening. But if she is already inconsolable, then you have missed the window and it is too late.

I know it doesn't help to hear, but this sort of thing is pretty normal. It will pass to be replaced by some new way to torture Mommy!

GRIPE WATER! seriously, it's like 7.99 at Target, a couple more bucks at walgreens, go get it! My first baby was like that and I wish I'd have known about it then. I used it with my 3rd, and it worked so much better than gas drops. Evenings are the worst, and the only thing I could do with my first, was to put him in the carrier/wrap and strap him on me so he could hear my heartbeat. It saved my arms,and we would go for a walk outside. (That's how I got a jumpstart on losing the baby weight :) Another thing you could try is to swaddle her up snug, flip her belly down onto your arm, SHHHHH, and jiggle/rock back and forth quickly. You gotta do it fast: Swaddle -Flip-Shhhh-Jiggle, do it to the tempo of her crying and keep it going until she breaks throught he panic, then you can slow the bounce down. The pressure on her belly may help her. Hang in there!

I agree that is sounds like collic. Try putting her on your knee's and bouncing her slightly or you might want to try rice water this sounds really strange but a girl I knew was told by an Eskimo lady to do this and it really worked. Take rice and burn it in a frying pan yes burn it without any oils or anything then add water and make a tea out of it add a couple of tablespoons of the tea in a bottle of water and it will help. I tried it on my daughter it worked great and the collic only lasted a couple of weeks. Good Luck.
Kay

My daughter did the exact same thing when she was a newborn! It's colic. Every night exactly at 5pm she would scream solid until 8pm and then pass out for the night. It's horrible, I know. It was one of the most difficult times of my life. It stopped when she turned 3 months old.

Some things that helped a little were taking her outside. For some reason that calmed her a little. Also, this may sound strange, but loud music helped calm her down during this "screaming" time. We would blare country music and she would stop crying. And I mean, we BLARED the music and it really helped! They say it is extremely loud in the womb, so maybe the loud noise makes them feel more comfortable? Every baby is different, so experiment with different things. Think outside the box and you might find some off the wall thing that helps calm her.

Good luck, I know how horrible the screaming is! Just hang in there because I promise it does eventually stop :)

Sorry I haven't read other responses. My son had this and my 8 week old daughter has this now. My son ended up having reflux. He also was spitting up very frequently with some projectile vomiting. His dr. put him on Zantac and it made a night and day difference. My daughter, I think, just gets over tired. We see a cranio sacral therapist who said babies this small get over tired after 2 hours. What has worked for us is to take her into her room, turn off the lights and rock her or nurse her where it's quiet and dark. Good luck, it does get better! :)

This is very common and doesn't necessarily mean colic. She will grow out of this stage but it still doesn't make it any easier. We actually found bouncing our LO while sitting on an exercise ball was the one thing that consoled her during the witching hour.

We have had a lot of success using the Baby Whisperer book and started using some of the techniques very early more to train ourselves on how we'd handle certain situations. The first few weeks are really tough but it really does get easier. Hang in there!

It does sounds like colic. My babies had a three hour screaming period in the middle of the night. I used to rock/dance/pace/cry with them for hours. It really does end out of nowhere about 3 months. Good luck, i know it is not fun!

I agree with the other responses; it sounds like colic. My first son had it...only it started later--like 10:00ish, and would last till 2 or 3 in the morning! What worked best for us was also the gripe water--you can get it at Walgreen's or Target--and either swaddling or swinging. Sometimes lying baby on her tummy on your lap helps, too, as being on the tummy is warm and soothing. You can also try some lavender-scented massage oil or balm that you can either massage your daughter with (techniques can be found online under google video "infant massage" or we like the "badger balm" which you can get at Ulta, and rub that on her chest, tummy, and even the bottoms of her feet.

I'm sorry but I didn't get a chance to read the other responses. To me, it sounds like colic. When my son was about 6 weeks old, he would be awake from midnight-5am every morning screaming. Nothing helped. He wouldn't cry as hard when I strapped him in his car seat and swung him with my arm (he didn't like the regular baby swings and wanted to be swung harder). That was the only thing that would help in the least. It went on for 3 or 4 months. I would take your baby to the pedi and make sure nothing is wrong first. Good luck.

Have you read The Happiest Baby on the Block? It helped a little with my daughter. She was classic colic. There's 5 S's - swaddle, swing (any movement - swing, bouncing on tummy on my lap is what my daughter preferred, rocking...), suck (paci, nursing), side/stomach, and shhh'ing. There is aan order to it but I can't remember!!! If your nursing may need to change your diet a little. I had to cut out caffeine. Good Luck! It's hard!

It sounds like it could be colic. I have read and heard many people say that mysteriously it starts around 6pm and goes til around 11pm. Have you tried Hyland's homeopathic colic tablets. They're safe to use, even if it's not colic, and they work wonders with our daughter anytime she has an upset tummy. They can be found at many natural food stores and online at Amazon.com.

The very best of luck to you. I know how distressing it can be to not know what is happening with your baby.

my son did the same thing and I am so sorry you are dealing with this also. We found out that our son was having seizures at 6 months old and we didn't know it. Not the typical body jerking type but ones in his brain. THis was his way of telling us something was not right. I dont want to scare you because it could just be something like colic. However I would call your pediatrician or a neurologist just to talk to them and see what they have to say.

this is normal for a 3 week old; and one solution is noise! babies come from inside your body; its a noisy place! just place your ear on someone else's stomach, and you can clearly hear a lot of noise in there! when baby gets into the real world, its actually rather quiet!

so run a vacuum, or a fan (especially if its a loud one...) play nice music, run the washer or dryer, whatever.
we found a cd called "for crying out loud" that has 8 different tracks of white noise on it. its awesome. our son had to have the vacuum running all night long when he was first born; that lasted TWO MONTHS before we found this cd! its a lifesaver!!

the reason she doesnt like suckers is because she is too young for them yet. shes not strong enough to hold them in. if you are ok with them, dont give up on them yet.

she might be having a growth spurt also; that would explain the near constant nursing! :) BTW: THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR BREASTFEEDING!! :) :)

go to www.llli.org and find a la leche league group in your area. this will also be a lifesaver for you; support is a must have! dont give up! :)

she might have some tummy troubles also; mylecon drops will help with that. i used that a lot with my son, and if you get the hylands brand its natural so you dont have to worry about overdose or anything. :)

anyway, good luck. this is so normal for a baby her age, just have patience and relax. put aside other responsibilities. just rest with your baby and get to know her and stuff. :)

The typical witching hour. Or hours! I got my daughter on a routine/schedule early, and was able to avoid this for the most part. At least it was less severe than others I have heard of. She does the eat, wake, sleep cycle, about every 3 hours. When she would get beside herself with upset, I could usually "reboot" her with a feeding, give her wake time, and put her down for a nap. Sometimes it worked, sometimes I would have to "reboot" again. But it does get better as they get older.

My daughter did the same... the ONLY thing that worked to calm her was to swaddle her, then stick her in her bouncy seat and bounce her as fast/hard as we could WITHOUT letting her head bounce or flop (or worry about SBS). We tried car rides, walking singing, nursing, all the usual things. lol.

Yup, the ladies are right. It's the colic. It's truly horrible because they can be, and often are inconsolable. Things that helped our son:

Swaddling him - some babies don't like it but he LOVED the feeling of being really secure in thr blanket.

Car rides: I can't tell you how many hours we spent in the car. If the car was in motion, he was asleep. As soon as the car stopped, he woke up screaming.

The swing: this was 19 years ago and all I had was a crank swing. I made it my sole focus to sit and wind that swing.

My husband: thank God there was someone to "tag in" and he had a particular way of holding him high up on his shoulder so that it offered counter pressure to my sons belly. He would hold him up there and pace and bounce a little and pat his bottom.

The good news is that, when compared to 18 years, three months (it's usually over by 3 months) is a relatively short span of time. Creating a system that allows you to find coping mechanisms for YOU will be just as imortant as what you do for your daughter, so work on those, too.

Hope this helps,

L.

I would have her examined by your pediatrician just to rule out anything more serious, but until about 8 weeks this is a fussy time for newborn babies. Colic often starts about this age. I had two colicky infants. Try white noise. I used a vibrating bouncy seat; it worked for one baby, but not the other. I had a sling or baby carrier too so I could carry the crying baby, but still have my hands free. Baby massage and chiropractic are other options I've heard can work. Finally, I just heard last week on the news that they think probiotics now help colicky infants. Good luck--I know how exhausting and frustrating it can be. When my oldest was 8 weeks old he cried hard 14 hours a day--really. He cried so much he wasn't gaining weight and growing properly. Fourteen years later, we all survived and he's a healthy, normal teenager!

All of my kids were like this to some extent and I didn't know it was normal so I felt like I must be a bad mother and doing something wrong. Why did my kids have "colic" and nobody elses?

But it is normal and LOTS of babies have this "colicky" time at night. I tried everything to help them calm down, but honestly nothing made much of a difference and it's just something we had to get thru until it eventually and slowly went away bit by bit on it's own. I really feel for you, I know this is an impossibly time but she really will get over this as she gets older.

Swaddling helped us a little and loud "white" noise (I sat by the vacuum cleaner and rocked them). I was nursing and my youngest wanted a bottle - that helped her fall asleep easier at night. I saw an educational bit about this - I think there's an acronym for it "PURPLE" or something like that - try to google it and see what comes up.

Good luck and hang in there!

It sounds like colic. Both of my kids had it and it is miserable!!! You can find several "remedies" on line but I didn't seem to have much luck with any of them. Gripe water did help my daughter a little. You can find it at Babies r Us and places like Target. I tried a colic pad with our son. It's a pad that has a massaging ball in it. Unfortunately I didn't get it untill about the time he was out growing the colic so I don't know if it really worked. I got it at Babies r Us for about $30 and only used it once or twice. My sister-in-law had good results doing infant massage with our niece. One thing that did help our daughter was for me to hold her really tight against me with a warm pad between us on her tummy. Our son wouldn't take a pacifier, but if I dipped it in a sugar solution he would take it and that seemed to help a little. It also helped as a last resort for both of our kids if we put them in the car seat and went for a short drive. I know that can be a bad habit to get into but sometimes you just need to do whatever works for you at that time. She will eventually grow out of it but it might seem like it will take forever. Hang on. Try to find someway that you can walk away for a little while. Can Dad hold her for 30 min so that you can take a quick walk outside or run to get a cup of coffee? It's relly important for you to get a break too.

I agree with the other answers....colic, however, I never tried the rice water. I would have been interested in that. My son did the same thing during the same hours and my husband mostly, as I had a difficult c-section recovery, paced the floor with pressure on my son's belly. He still cried and it broke my heart. I tried the tablets with little to no effect but they may work for you. I just want to encourage you to hang in there. I know it seems like it will last forever but I promise it will stop and you will be able to enjoy those very same hours eventually! Hugs to you!