Why won't he eat but he's hungry from 2am-7am?!

Lisa, it sounds like you're very tired AND the mom of a baby! He's only 5 weeks, right? And you've had a rocky start to breastfeeding, and so this must feel like one more awful thing. But it's NOT! He's just adjusting.

It's possible it's a dairy thing--my second son got very, very fussy at night--would only sleep attached to the nipple--on and off until we took him and me off dairy--within a week (he was 7 months old then) he was sleeping 5 hours straight. He was older than Orion then, but the pattern of fussiness had stretched back a long time.

Is he taking the breast fine during other times? Could the introduction of a bottle nipple be confusing him, so now he's just rejecting EVERYTHING at his most vulnerable time (2-7am is EVERYONE's nmost vulnerable time lol!)?

Have you considered a nurse-in in bed? 24 hours in bed, just you and Orion, with your dh waiting on you, to help you relax and to give him complete access, on demand?

I don't have much else for advice--just a recomendation that you get as much rest as possible whenever you can so you can handle these tough stretches. Let the dishes pile up, the laundry too--this is more important.

s

Mel

I second trying to get rid of dairy. Orion sounds a lot like my ds was for the entire first 5 weeks of his life, he wouldn't sleep more than 1/2 hour at a time for 5 weeks straight. I could have written your post, right down to dh's lack of help and ds's refusal to take a bottle. Then I called a lactation consultant who determined that I had oversupply issues, we worked out how to deal with those and I took dairy out of my diet altogether (it was VERY hard for me but well worth it). Both helped enormously. Is there a LLL leader you can call in your area to help you figure it out? I know when you are that tired that research is impossible and getting an objective third party opinion is important.

If you can, try to tell dh exactly what you need him to do for you. Our problem was that I would complain (and cry) about being tired and what happened at night or day when he was working without saying "I need you to do...", so he didn't know what to do for us. It took a very good friend to come rescue me, tell me to get back into my own bed to sleep with our son and let/tell Dh to move if he had to. Tell him that you need him to help you do x. Sometimes when men don't have any baby experience, they really don't have any idea how to be helpful. You are postpartum right now (well duh, you say), so do not minimize your needs for the sake of dh and the baby. Make sure you are eating and drinking well (get Dh to make you sandwiches and snacks before he goes to work if he does during the day so you can just grab them out of the frige). Tell him what it is exactly that he can do to make your life better. Even if they are little things.

to you and Orion. Take care of yourself so that you can take care of your baby!

ETA: P.S. If you do take dairy out of your diet, I believe it takes 2-3 weeks to actually start seeing the results because that's how long it takes to get it completely out of your system