I accidentally sleep deprived my baby for 2 months

The title is a little dramatic, but not untrue. I'm mostly laughing at myself and sharing the biggest blunder of my parenthood so far.

I had never been around a baby longer than an hour at a time before my LO was born.

When we came home, he contact napped during the day. He was rarely fussy during the newborn phase, unless he was hungry or needed comfort. I had to check his diaper constantly because he could poop without me knowing since it didn't bother him. If he cried, I usually just breastfed him or cuddled and he stopped.

After a few weeks, he started sleeping way less. He went from about 22 hours a day to 14-16. Still, he didn't seem to have problems.

Around the same time, he started having problems nursing. Most of the time he would latch/unlatch over and over until he fussed and cried. If he didn't do this, he nursed right to sleep. If I tried to feed him in the bedroom at any time, he fussed like that almost immediately. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out why he did this.

He took two naps a day starting at 3-4 weeks. One hour long nap in the morning, one 3 hour nap in the evening, then bed until morning. He woke up every couple hours at least through the night.

I knew this was unusual, but he didn't seem sleepy, right? So he was fine.

About a month ago (so 2 months later) I moved in with my mother. I also discovered a pattern around his nursing issues. When he fussed at the breast, I started putting him on my chest and patting his back. Almost immediately he would fall asleep, after a bit more fussing.

Moving to my mom's, and he's different. He fusses much more, but rarely fusses at the breast. When he fusses, I pat his back or rock him and he passes right out. He takes 4-6 naps a day, each an hour long at least.

This entire time I had been trying to feed him and he was sleepy. He fought sleep and I assumed he was having nursing issues. He only slept if he couldn't stay awake anymore. I had inadvertently not let my baby sleep for the majority of his newborn stage.

When he fussed and showed signs of tiredness/fighting sleep, I played with him until he stopped(thinking I was calming him down from being frustrated after a rough nursing session), leading to a wide awake (but exhausted) baby. I feel awful that he missed out on such important sleep, but now I also feel bad making him sleep when he clearly hates it, lol. Little dude fights it so hard. I did not know babies did that. I begged so many people for advice, saw lactation consultants, asked his pediatrician to check him for lip ties and never once did it occur to me that he was tired.

I feel like a new parent all over again because I'm adjusting to a proper baby sleep schedule. The naps are constant it seems! I'm soaking up the cuddles and reminding myself that he's fussing because he's tired, not because I'm being mean lol.