Crib Notes Consulting

Hi there, totally get it. We felt the same way. I've heard it gets better as the kids get older. Apparently that's why people have more than one kid. Once it gets better they forget how hard it was. There are a few things we did. I hope they help:
1. The biggest issue is sleep - our daughter was always a pretty good sleeper but needed constant sleep training. The book Precious Little Sleep did an amazing job. Several other parents have recommended this book. We followed the advice from the book for the most part. Your biggest return-on-investment though is trying to fix sleep. We did also hire a sleep consultant - Randi Johnson [Crib Notes Consulting]- she's local in the East Bay and did an amazing job helping us train our daughter as young as 3 months old. Her rates are pretty consistent with how much sleep trainers charge.
2. We have no family nearby, but when grandparents visit, we just ask them to watch our daughter while we rest or do chores around the house.
3. Hiring a cleaner is a good decision. I would consider meal services also - three stone hearth, olivesf, tiffinbay are all good options. If you have friends or family who can do a meal train for you that would be even better.
4. We do very simple groceries. I've got it down to 1.5 hours/week including travel, purchasing and putting them away. We have a running list of about 20 or so different meals that we just cycle through. So i always know what groceries to look for. It makes cooking easier too.
5. I've heard from parents of older children that it doe get easier around 3-5 years old. Far fewer illnesses, they can eat by themselves and even help a little bit around the house if you start early enough.
6. I work from home while my wife's work requires her to go into the office 4 days a week. I take on a lot of the chores around the house which i get done during lunch time or slow days at work. If one of you could work from home, that'll solve some of this.

Hello, I'm so sorry you are going through this. We went through it too. We finally caved and hired a sleep consultant at about 13 weeks. Randi Johnson from cribnotesconsulting.com came highly recommended from our neighbors because she follows a no-cry method. She did what's called sleep-training lite because you're right - you cannot do formal sleep training before 4 months because babies cannot self-soothe until then. It did cost $400 total for an in-person 4-hour session plus unlimited text support for a month. What works varies based on the baby. That's why Randi needs to come in, see what you're doing and what works for your LO. For our neighbors, it turns out he just needed the parents in the room until he slept (no contact) and then he'd go to sleep by himself. For our daughter, turns out we were waiting too long before putting her to sleep. We also needed to tightly swaddle and then leave her in the crib for a few mins to let her calm herself down. We also had to give her a pacifier. The room had to be dark, the white noise turned on pretty loud. Then, we had to leave the room. She'd fuss, but not cry. Most days, she was asleep in a few mins. If not, we would go over and pat her butt for a few mins and then she'd sleep by herself. $400 is steep but it was well worth it. In the past 1 month, we have done exactly 4 contact naps in total (and those were days she had bad reflux). Our daughter is going through a regression right now so it's been hard, but we're still able to manage without contact sleeping. Our sleep problems are by no means over, but our quality of life has certainly improved. Baby naps well on her own and as long as we are around to give her a paci when she wakes up, she goes right back to sleep. Also, if it helps, we sometimes miss the days our daughter would just go to sleep on us. She simply does not do it anymore and prefers to sleep on her own. The days are long but the years are short. Pretty soon, your LO will be able to sleep on his own. Until then, you can try what our neighbors did and what we did. If neither of those works, and you have $400 that you can pay, a formal sleep trainer is definitely worth it.