Kid has a penis and is 1wk old. I feel like the day to day right now is just making sure he's not sitting in his own piss/shit and feeding him until he passes out every 2-3 hrs. He's 1wk old so I don't know when I'm supposed to start stimulating him, but there's very little awake time that isn't either "I'm sitting in my own peepoo"..."my ping pong sized stomach is empty"...or just crying for whatever reason other than the first two. It seems every time he feeds, he conks out until the next feeding/diaper change so I take great pride in creating a tit milk drunk baby that passes tfo (pumping only *will explain below). We put him on his stomach to piss him off and develop some neck/back muscles every now and then when he's not full of my wife's liquid gold. I sing to him (I'm a vocalist/amateur musician sort of) when I'm doing the war crime of changing or swaddling (I roll tight burritos) but that's about it. Mild case of jaundice but rebounded hard after we started pumping/bottle feeding. Most likely related to not getting enough food. See *
I come from a moderately high performing family (doctors/stem professionals and such) so theres a lot of pressure to make sure this kid isnt a dipshit. I'm playing all kinds of music while he sleeps (doesn't seem to be affected by noise while sleeping) but I can't teach the kid math until he at least understands object permanence right? I also feel like all that classical music Montessori stuff isbcomplete horseshit and I'm much more concerned with just making sure the kid is a good person but I also want onto pull the right levers and flip the right switches where I can.
The bottom line is: Am I doing it wrong or is this it for a while until he can stay awake while changed and fed? Is it normal? I feel like I'm just drugging a child to sleep. Looking for any input. Thanks.
Also, if there's any words of wisdom for my anxious wife (see *) that would be helpful. She's struggling with the whole breast feeding issue even though she's creating a massive surplus at day 7 and we've only supplemented with formula for 3 feeds total. I'm super proud of her for pushing through cracked sensitive nips and I'm stoked that this kid is getting anything natural but she feels like a failure for not direct feeding which i guess i understand is "ideal" but shes killing it pumping. My reassurances don't seem to comfort her unfortunately
*Kid falls asleep 1min after he latches without fail and my wife is super anxious about not breast feeding but she pumps out a surplus of milk. He wasnt getting enough sustenance after birth but he's ravenous on the bottle. 2-4 oz every feed maybe 2.50z average.
Edit: my biggest gripe is that I'm killing 24/7 and this kid has literally no sense of humor. I was hoping for paternal instinct but all I got was killer dad jokes.
TL;DR Check if they have full neck mobility and didn't get too strained in the birth (if natural), and if they have a tongue tie sooner rather than later.
https://www.nct.org.uk/information/baby-toddler/feeding-your-baby-or-toddler/tongue-tie-babies
Loads of other advice here and falling sleep on the breast sounds like a comfort thing but I'll share some recent experience on feeding issues just in case.
Baby had a mild tongue tie, fed on the breast the first few feeds weirdly enough but after then they would get frustrated as they couldn't latch properly.
We had a lot of luck with silicone nipple shields as instructed by the midwife, which helped with latching but no luck retiring them, so they became permanent for a while (they're recommended as temporary).
Even after that we still experienced a lot of fussing and stress with feeding which put a lot of pressure on my SO for the same reasons you mention.
Doctor recommended we go to an osteopath to get their neck and back massaged because getting squeezed out during birth had put a lot of pressure on the neck and restricted turning the head which also caused feeding issues. After this their tongue was a lot more mobile and feeding got a lot easier because they use their tongue to support latching.
Unfortunately this was already 2 months in and they were pretty hooked on nipple shields/bottle feeding at this point so they were still stressed about natural breast feeding which felt like it was a lost cause to go back.
Finally after lots of back and forth with different opinions from medical professionals, lactation consultants etc the agreement was that the baby had a mild tongue tie and we decided to get the frenulum cut/lasered which gave more tongue mobility but at this point the baby seems to have forgotten that milk comes from the breast so after almost 5 months we have just stuck with bottle feeding and pumping.
I'd suggest ruling these out ASAP as it was pretty stressful and especially left my SO with feelings of inadequacy not being able to breastfeed. Hope it helps.