Life Saver (…kind of…)
Sleep is a very valuable good during times when a new baby has arrived in your house. You can usually expect 2-5 months of very minimum sleep at least. In some case this continues to go on for an even longer period. From my own experience I know that the lack of sleep really can stress you out and puts many other things on hold. As an example for me – I had to cut back hours on my own small business a bit. Instead of working until 11.30 PM every night I am now done working at around 9.30 PM. I know that sounds horrible but I also do have a full-time job and the time between the job and starting to work on the business is reserved for the family.
Anyway – we bought a bassinet to have the baby sleep in our bedroom for a while. The bassinet came with a small device which turns out to be a small lamp and sound machine. This thing place music or makes noises like a forest at night with all the stuff your when being near mother nature. It also simulates the heartbeat of Mom so that the baby feels relaxed like still being in Mom’s tummy. This little sound machine was a free add-on that came with the bassinet and I got to say: it is a life saver. Its sounds soothe the baby whenever he is fussy or even crying. It does not work in every situation but overall our experience with the device is positive. Especially during the nights it helps us to get about 1 to 1.5 hours more sleep out of the baby. I know it sounds almost desperate when talking about one hour of sleep but with a newborn around every minute counts.
So, if you can get your hands on something similar – go for it. It will eventually help you as much as it is helping us.