After you are handed your precious bundle of joy, the journey begins; and often, we know very little about how to put our babies to sleep or how to define realistic expectations about sleep. And if we don’t foster positive sleep habits early on, it can become a real household problem.
What a lot of us don’t realise is that sleep is a learned skill and we have to teach our babies to develop healthy sleep habits. This can be done early on, without compromising your parenting values. Sleep is vital to health and development: getting enough sleep will help your baby grow, learn and stay well.
In the first few months of life, while you get to know and bond with your new baby, you can also concentrate on establishing basic sleep rhythms and feeding balances that will help babies learn to sleep better from the start.
I’ve put together some useful tips and suggestions to help your infant sleep longer and wake less during the night as soon as they are physically able.
1. Create a flexible feeding and sleeping routine
Establish a predictable framework of feeding, sleeping and waking. It’s important not to underestimate how much sleep your infant really needs - as much as 12 - 17 hours in a 24-hour period.
In the beginning, they don’t have much stamina to stay awake for long periods of time; and when they do stay awake for too long, this can result in extreme fussiness and crying. Learn to recognise your child’s sleepy cues: yawning, rubbing eyes, zoning out; subtle signs that they are ready to go to sleep. If you miss your child’s sleep window, the stress hormone cortisol floods their system, giving them that 'wired', 'second wind' that, in turn, makes it hard for them to go to sleep and to stay asleep.
2. Allow your baby the opportunity to put himself to sleep at bedtime
As I’ve already mentioned, learning to go to sleep is a skill your baby can develop, and a key emotional skill. Using my 'percentage of wakefulness' approach can help here. They may not be able to master this if you always feed them or rock them or walk them to go to sleep. The benefits of a having some sort of predictable schedule is that you will have a good idea when your baby is hungry and when they are tired.
At least once a day at bedtime, you could aim to put your infant into their moses basket or cot when it’s sleep time, and allow them some space to learn how to go to sleep. This is a great learning experience for your baby and will help them to be able to sleep for longer periods at night, as soon as they are physically capable. During this time, stay with your baby, being emotionally, physically and verbally responsive to them as they perfect the skill. If they are not open to it, wait a while longer and try again. In the meantime, practise the other components as listed.
3. Create a calm, peaceful bedtime routine
A pre-sleep ritual, one that you can adapt and lengthen as your baby gets older, can be implemented in the early days. They’ll soon learn to connect the steps of what happens 'when it’s time for me to go to sleep'.
4. Ensure a peaceful sleeping environment
Create a sleeping environment that is conducive to sleep for day and night - adequately dark, without distractions.
5. Be consistent in your responses during the night
An inconsistent response at night will result in frequent night-time waking. Changing your child’s sleeping location throughout the night, lying down with them, sometimes feeding them, and sometimes allowing them to play when they should be asleep will confuse them. Give them mixed messages and ingrain night time activity. Be predictable and loving every time.
6. Ensure adequate daytime sleep appropriate for your child’s age
Parents often are not sure how much sleep their baby should have during the day. The following guidelines might help:
- 6 - 12 months: 2.5 - 3 hours
- 12 - 18 months: 2¼ - 2.5 hours
- 18 - 24 months: 2 ¼ hours
- 2 years: 2 hours
- 3 years: 1.5 hours
Remember, we want to enjoy our parenting experience, and without sleep that may be harder to do. Children who are sleep-deprived feel similar to how we feel without a good night’s sleep, and that can result in increased fussiness; irritability; inability to play independently or with others; decreased capacity for learning; memory and reasoning; behavioural problems; aggressive behaviour; obesity and poor immune systems.
Establishing positive sleep practises for the whole family is an essential component in parenting and overall wellbeing.
