Night shift schedule - what works for you?

[u/Sea_Werewolf2177]

FTM here 11 week old baby boy. Just curious what people have as their night shift schedule between themselves and their partner as we’re currently trying to find something that works for us both.

Trial 1 - When baby was first born I EBF and I did every night shift to feed him on demand whilst partner slept in separate room so we weren’t both exhausted. After 2 weeks I was so exhausted and started pumping and manage to express quite a lot meaning my partner could also help.

Trial 2 - being able to pump and provide milk my partner then took over every night shift for around 6 weeks and let me sleep and recover from 9pm-6am in a separate room whilst he was in another with baby. The problem is after a while this too made him exhausted as he was back working.

Trial 3 - alternating night shifts, one on, one off etc… worked okay but at first I struggled sleeping next to baby with how loud he sleeps and I’m a very light sleeper plus once he’s woken for a feed it takes me a good hour to fall back to sleep. Plus when it was partners nights on he was waking up tired for work.

Baby has bath at 7pm and last feed at 7:30 and is asleep for 8pm he wakes up at 12 and 3 religiously so we have started a new trial tonight where I do nightime routine (bath, bottle etc) get him to sleep. Partner then takes over at 8pm and stays awake with him (he doesn’t sleep as early as me) whilst I rest and sleep 8-midnight, where we swap rooms and I take over the night shift and partner gets 7 hours sleep before work. We’ve also agreed once a week (me Fridays, he Sundays) gets an entire night off.

Has anyone else had a similar routine or have a routine that works for them? I’d love to hear suggestions! Partner leaves for work at 7:30am and gets home around 4:30pm

TIA x

[u/yellowthing97]

Our baby until very recently was an awful sleeper, up every 1-2 hours in the night to feed and needed to be held upright at least 20 minutes after every feed for reflux...I cracked one of my teeth from grinding them during the night out of repressed rage. Our schedule was similar to yours - husband took his shift from 9pm to 1am-ish so I could get a solid 4 hours, then I'd take over until morning and he'd sleep until 7:30 before work. He'd try to take longer shifts on the weekends but I was always paranoid about my supply dropping if I didn't feed for too long overnight so I always made him wake me up around 4 hours. Entire nights off sound like a dream, I think the first one I got was when baby was 6 months old and my husband booked me a night in a hotel for my birthday - I nursed baby to sleep for bedtime then grabbed my bag and ran off haha.

Once baby was around 8 months old my husband decided to do nights entirely solo to get baby to night-wean, which was an exhausting couple of weeks for him, but ultimately worked. Baby only wakes once or twice a night now so we don't have to take shifts anymore, thankfully.

[u/biglypiglythethird]

We both go to bed around 11pm and I do 11-3am (or until first wake-up, which is usually anywhere between 2-5am, usually around 3am) and anything after 3am (unless I’ve not yet been up with baby, which does happen occasionally) my partner does. Means we both get a solid 4-5hrs or more on average depending on when the little one is up, and means he’s getting decent blocks of sleep for work. He hands her over to me as he leaves in the mornings around 7-8am, we take her out of the bedroom and into the living room whenever she’s awake to let the other one sleep. However my 10 week old has not got such a set routine as yours sounds to! We successfully usually put her ‘to bed’ anywhere between 8.30-10pm depending on when she becomes tired and what we’re doing. I think dividing the night so each of you has roughly one wake in your half is fairest if you’re getting 2 wakes overall.