Despite a ‘Rocky Start,’ This Baby ‘Slept Like an Angel’ in SNOO
First-time mom Sara Borden stumbled upon SNOO while putting together her baby registry. She was intrigued by what she read, but she wasn’t immediately sure if it would be worth the investment.
“My first thought was that the price is a lot for something baby can only use for about six months. But I really wanted it for my baby girl because of how safe and responsive and highly rated it was,” Sara says.
She and her husband decided to put SNOO on their registry and see what happened. Soon, they discovered that Sara’s mother, a member of the U.S. Public Health Service (which is part of the Navy), was eligible for Happiest Baby’s military discount.
“Luckily for me, the military discount knocked the price down,” Sara says. “However, if I’d known then what I have seen and experienced—mainly how safe and how helpful and comforting the SNOO is to my little one—I would have paid full price. It is clear to me that it’s worth every penny, even without the military discount.”
Once Sara and her husband made the decision, she says they never looked back.
When Sara’s daughter arrived, she spent about a month in the hospital due to feeding issues. Sara remembers feeling unnerved by having her daughter sleep in the standard-issue baby bed, given that Sara’s daughter was able to roll onto her side within a couple weeks of her birth.
“While my daughter was in the hospital bassinet, I was constantly checking on her. When we put her in SNOO at home, that was the first peace of mind I got,” she says. “Especially because we had a rocky start, I never really felt safe until we got her zipped into the SNOO Sack and attached to SNOO. Then, I could actually fully fall asleep without every second popping up to see if she’d rolled.”
Once Sara and her little one were safely at home, SNOO helped Sara manage her daughter’s feeding issues and cut down on the time Sara needed to spend soothing her after nighttime feeds.
“The whole feeding process was long and stressful for both of us,” Sara says.
Her daughter took 30 to 40 minutes to finish a bottle…and then she needed to be upright for at least 30 minutes to keep her from throwing up. Typically, after a feeding, Sara would hold her daughter on her body in a skin-to-skin top.
“The only problem is that when it’s time to take her out of the top, it’s like putting her through the C-section all over again,” Sara says. “She’ll often fall asleep in my arms. She’ll get so comfortable that when I decide it’s time to put her in bed, she hates it. Often she’s very fussy and upset from being woken. But I put her in SNOO with a pacifier for a few minutes, and then she’s out like a light. She sleeps like an angel until her next meal."
Sara feels relieved that SNOO’s ability to lull her daughter back to sleep means that she can get rest too.
“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve almost fallen asleep holding her on the couch, so it’s been a huge help that I can get through the middle of night feedings,” Sara says. “When she’s happily tucked into SNOO she’ll still be asleep when I wake up to feed her, which is great because it gives me time to get my bottle and get my pumping equipment ready. That’s a gift SNOO gave me because I know if she weren’t comfortable she’d be waking up sooner.”
Once Sara’s daughter no longer needed frequent nighttime feedings, she started sleeping in longer and longer stretches, sleeping from roughly 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. around two months.
“At this point I would recommend SNOO to anyone, even people who couldn’t benefit from the military discount. Although, I’m thrilled, thrilled that you have that. I think it’s so important to give those discounts to people in the military who serve our country,” she says.
“SNOO has been so helpful from the beginning, and every stage as she grows, it becomes more and more helpful and gives us more and more sleep. We are extremely happy.”
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