Breastfeeding
My newborn twins sleep schedule (& how I’m navigating the nights, 6 weeks in)
Eloise Edington, CEO and Founder, in partnership with Ickle Bubba | 17 May 2024
In April this year, TRB CEO and Founder Eloise welcomed her second set of IVF twins – that’s babies 4 and 5!
Read her hospital birth bag checklist and newborn feeding support faves to get caught up.
After a short stay in the NICU, the twins have been getting settled at home, enjoying all of the cuddles, and getting into the swing of all things feeding and sleeping.
We sat down with Eloise to get the latest on her newborn twins sleep schedule and support tips, six weeks in.
Gearing up for nights with newborn twins
From hormonal night sweats, pivoting on sleeping arrangements, and a bout of mastitis, the first month or so of nights with newborn twins has been a ride so far! With all of my previous kiddos, I’ve always dreaded the newborn nights the most, and this time round was no different.
Like most of us, I don’t do well on limited sleep, and being out of the newborn game for five years and rapidly approaching age 40, the incoming nights of hazy broken sleep were something I tried to block out during the later days of my pregnancy.
I worried about feeling out of control and keeping on top of the house, life admin and my business – all whilst remembering to relish the all too ephemeral newborn stage.
Knowing I would need to get up at 6am with my three older children to help get them ready for school also added another layer of anxiety that I hadn’t felt before.
So, this time round, I decided I wanted to draw on things that had worked for me in the past, try some new support products, and mindfully ease into my groove from the get-go.
And whilst these things aren’t always straightforward – far from it! – here’s where we’re at, right now.
Our newborn twins sleep schedule to date
The days – The twins sleep schedule hasn’t quite crystallised yet in terms of times as the they’re still small, but at the moment they’ll sleep for 2-3 hours in the day, between feeds.
They both tend to wake up around the same time, which has its perks but can also be a real challenge as feeding both at the same time is a handful!
In the last two weeks, they’ve become much more alert, but we’re still feeding them on demand, and they’re fairly tired most of the time. After looking around a bit and listening to our voices during feeds, their eyes start rolling to go back to sleep!
The evenings – As the day moves on, they’ve started being quite unsettled between 6pm and 10pm. This is because they can get colicky in the evenings, which necessitates lots of crying, cuddles, feeding and burping.
We’re finding that adding Infacol – a special formula to relieve wind, colic and griping pain – to their bottle feeds works well to support this.
The nights – Throughout the nights they probably wake every 2-4 hours, which is challenging with two at the same time. More on this below.
Newborn twins sleeping arrangements
The twins sleeping arrangements have changed a bit since they cam home. We started off having one twin on each side of our shared bed, but we were finding that one would wake the other up with crying, which meant hardly any sleep for either of us.
My husband and I now have one baby each per night. He sleeps in our bedroom with one and I sleep in the spare room with the other, and it’s just more manageable that way.
The Bubba and Me bedside cribs from Ickle Bubba have been a lifesaver in juggling everything. They’ve basically been able to support us with closer, safer sleeping by easily attaching to our beds so we can keep tabs on the babies throughout the night.
They’re perfect for those 2am feeds, and we alternate who has which twin each night so they get their fair share of breast milk from me.
With the cribs, I’ve been using the Ickle Bubba crib-fitted sheets. They are oh-so soft 100% cotton, and come in a handy two-pack which is ideal for the twins. Depending on how cold it is, I’ll also swaddle them with large muslins and or blankets when we put them down.
Twin night feeding, sorted
I’d pretty much been doing all the twins night feeding in bed to start with. Depending on how tired I am, I’ll still either sit up and bottle feed, or lie down and breastfeed.
Prep is so key for night feeds with twins, and I keep a big cup of water on my nightstand to keep me to top me up during breastfeeding as well as having bottles of expressed milk ready.
The Twin Feeding Pillow by Things for Twins is what I’ve been using every minute of every day, and this has also come in handy during the nights if they’re both awake at the same time.
It works so well for both breast and bottle feeding and has supported us during so many of the early days feeding challenges.
Extra bits and bobs we lean on
We also use dummies at night for soothing when the twins are really unsettled.
The nanobébé flexy soothers for 0-3 months have been great as they’re so soft, but we’re using them more as a last resort. Our eldest daughter got a bit obsessed with her dummy so we’re trying to avoid overreliance on them, like we did with our last set of newborn twins!
I’ll sometimes also use the Ickle Bubba Eden Deluxe Nursery Chair and Stool to help rock the babies to sleep.
It’s a lovely cosy space for soothing the twins at the same time, and I’ve noticed it has amazing back support too so I’ll definitely be using it for feeding as they get a bit older and have their own nursery.
There we have it – our current newborn twins sleep schedule, set up, and go-to support products.
Feel free to pop me any questions over on Instagram, or just reach out and connect if you’re up feeding by yourself at night. Our DMs are always open, and, chances are, I’ll be up feeding at the moment, too!
