Baby Sleep Made Easy

As the parent of a child who may have developmental issues or who have not met specific developmental milestones, baby sleep may be affected more than other aspects of your life. It can be frustrating to the most patient parents, and when you add developmental issues into the mix, it can be a literal nightmare to get your child to bed. Most of the millions of children with developmental issues, such as autism, have sleep problems. There are ways to help your situation and enable your child to get to sleep more easily and soundly.

Before you can really get into changing the behaviour of your child, it is important for you to narrow down why your child is having problems. There is usually one of three main reasons for this. The first can be neurological, like issues with brain waves getting the child to stay in certain sleep cycles. Physical problems can also affect the child, such as irregular breathing. For instance, if your child has a condition like Down ’s syndrome, they may have trouble breathing and they naturally wake up if they are not getting enough air through their noses. The third reason is commonly undefined and encompasses everything else.

You will likely be working closely with your doctor throughout this process; especially if it is determined your child’s developmental delays are causing lack of sleep or trouble staying asleep. If the problems fall into the third category, some may be mental and you will want to see a good therapist or psychologist who specializes in sleep disorders for assistance.

Treatment options, once it is determined what is causing sleepless nights, will obviously depend on the diagnosis. Some opportunities for treatment will include therapy for mental issues, medical procedures, for those of a physical nature and the possibility of medications for those that are undefined. There are also some herbal treatments that have shown some laboratory success. It is important for you, as the parent of a developmentally delayed baby to know, is that there may not be one treatment that will work for everyone and it may take a combination of treatments available to your child.

Having a child with these special needs can be frustrating, but ensuring your child has a set bedtime routine is extremely important. It can set some structure in your child’s life and even that small gesture may make bed time easier. You should also talk to your child and get their interpretation as to why they are not sleeping well. As long as your child is old enough and able to speak, they may have their own insights as to why they have difficulties.

You may also want to consider a reward system for sleeping and staying in bed, especially if the problems stem from non-physical reasons. Mentally, your child may be able to change this on their own with prompting from mum and dad or their doctor. No matter what, it will be beneficially to change these patterns as much as you can sooner rather than later. Ensuring enough baby sleep is important to all growth, physical and mental, for your child.

It is important, as a parent, that you ensure baby sleep is as consistent as possible from the time of birth. When a baby does not get enough sleep, there can be both mental and physical consequences. Though there is only so much a parent can do, getting a sleep deprived child the help they need can ensure proper growth and development throughout their early years.

Sleep problems are extremely common in young children and if they lose enough sleep, this can translate into a lack of mental development. Knowing how much sleep your baby needs can help you make sure your child is getting enough. Form new born to about 3 months old, your child will sleep anywhere from 16- 18 hours a day, but this is definitely not all at one time. They will be up every few hours for the first few months. By the time your baby is 4-6 months they should be sleeping 6-8 hours at a time and by 6-9 months, about 10-12 hours. A few hours here or there will not make a huge difference, but for instance, if your child is 8 months old and only sleeping 5 hours a day total, this could be a problem.

When a child is sleep deprived, they are more apt to develop physical and emotional problems, and this can start from birth. Since every function of the body is affected by sleep, one way or another, you can trace many ailments back to lack of sleep.

Since these early months and years are so significant when it comes to brain development and learning skills, when a child is sleep deprived, their brains are not working as well as they should, which could cause problems later in life. What do you do about this?

You can start at home if you suspect your child is sleep deprived. Setting up a bedtime routine or schedule can help your child get more sleep, especially as a younger baby. When your child is a few years old, a reward system may work well. You may find offering small rewards or treats for full nights of sleep will be enough for many children.

Once your child is older, you may find that you are able to discuss this problem with your child and work together to find a solution to their sleep problems. Is there too much on their mind? Make sure you are only doing positive things before bed. Are they frightened of something in their room? It is fine to have a night light and to discuss their fears.
Perhaps a stuffed animal friend or blanket my offer security.

If none of this works and you still feel your child is experiencing sleep deprivation, you should make an appointment with their physician. Having a professional work with your child may be able to turn the problem around completely. Don’t be afraid of getting to the bottom of this, as problems with baby sleep could affect your child throughout his or her life.

Everyone knows that newborn baby sleep needs to be very consistent and regular throughout the day. Most newborns need to have between 16 and 18 hours of sleep per day! As a baby ages, they will need less sleep and at some point, you will eliminate a nap from their schedule. Before you do that though, you need to make sure your baby is getting enough sleep
and proper naps throughout the day.

Of all the naps, the mid day nap is usually the most important and usually causes the most distress if missed! Even up to age 2, research shows that a lunchtime nap is important to both mental and physical development. Though younger children need several naps per day, the toddler may just need the mid day nap. This nap will allow your child to rest after a busy morning and be ready to go for the rest of the day until their bedtime. Even if you think your child doesn’t need a nap, it is still beneficial to attempt a lunchtime nap. Usually children of any age will be settled down and a bit sleepy after lunch anyway, so sleeping for an hour or two may be just what they need.

As babies, it is usually pretty easy to get them settled on a schedule and you usually won’t have much of a problem getting them to go to sleep. As they age though, you may need to set up a routine or special reward system in order to make them take a nap. Toddlers will try to charm and manoeuvre their way out of a nap in any way they can! If you can get them to sleep, even a 45 minute to an hour nap will be beneficial.

When younger babies won’t go to sleep at a lunchtime nap, it is important to make sure they are getting enough to eat. If your child is still hungry, you will likely never get them to sleep! Thirst can also be a factor that may stop your child from successfully laying down for a mid day nap. Another reason your child may not sleep is the room is too loud, not dark enough or not comfortable enough. Even at nap time, you may want to read a short story or sing a quiet song to settle your child into bed. For young babies, making sure they are adequately secured on their back in a baby sleeping bag or wearable blanket can help as well.

Additionally, if you are still having problems getting your child to sleep, you may want to consider some type of sleep training or totally changing their schedule. Your baby may be getting too much sleep at night or at other nap times. If this is the case, eliminate one of the other naps from your child’s schedule and rearrange the schedule for an easier lunchtime nap. Even putting your child to sleep a half hour later can make a difference. No matter what you do, keep in mind that the lunchtime nap is probably the most important when it comes to baby sleep.

There is usually crying in baby sleep. There is no way around it, if you have a baby, he or she is going to cry. When you try to get a baby to sleep, especially if you are a first time parent, you may be wondering what the best way is to get baby to sleep. There are two main schools of thought: Cry it out or No crying. There are positive and negative aspects
to both methods and only you can decide what is better for you and your baby. There is no “right” method and both can be effective if done correctly.

The “No Crying” method is essentially the method where you will do all you can to stop your child from crying when you put them to bed. This is typically thought of as “attached parenting”. You will sit with your child, gently coaxing them to sleep. Though it sounds like a wonderful way to sleep, many children never fall asleep or it can take a very long
time to make the method work. Many parents just don’t have the time to sit with their child for hours during the day trying to get them to sleep.

The “Cry it Out” method is just the opposite. This is where you put your child in their bed and let them cry themselves to sleep. This is typically known as “self-soothing”. Though it doesn’t seem exactly soothing to leave a screaming baby in their crib alone, this method can be quicker and with frequent check-ins from the parent, can also be highly successful.

The method individual parents choose depend entirely on the parent and their philosophy on parenting. Both methods have strong advocates and strong opponents. Advocates of the “No Crying” method, for instance, say children of this method grow up well adjusted and attached to their parents in a positive way. Opponents say children are overly detached and will always be dependent on their parents for common needs. On the other hand, advocates of the “Cry it Out” method say this method teaches a child independence and self-reliance. Opponents disagree and note these children may be traumatized by bed time and sleeping for life.

Though these are the main two methods for getting your child to sleep, it is important to note, until about 4 months old, neither method will be effective nor should they be used. Once the child is awake more during the day and giving you legitimate defiance when being put down to sleep, you are free to start one of the methods.

According to various statistics, both methods have a 40 – 50% success rate, meaning 40-50% of babies will fall asleep using one method or another. The rest of the statistics show some sort of combination method. Some experts say a combination method is ineffective as it confuses children. For instance, sometimes they will cry and cry and no one will come in their room, and other times, at the first whimper and mum is at their side. Whatever you decide to do, always ensure there is enough baby sleep.

The proper amount of baby sleep and the importance of keeping a schedule are integral parts of childhood development. Bedtime battles between you and your child are a fact of raising children. At some point in your child’s life, they will start testing the waters, as well as your patience, to see how far they can go with you. Bedtime will be no exception and halting these behaviors sooner, rather than later, can save hours of tantrums and clashes in the future.

It is totally normal for your child to explore boundaries, especially at bedtime. Children have a difficult time sometimes when there is so much to explore and do in the world, that they just can’t be bothered with going to bed when there are more books to read, games to play and television shows to watch. Unfortunately for them, they need to get sleep and if they don’t, it can lead to developmental and growth delays down the road.

Lucky for you, there are things you can do to coax your child to sleep and to stop these nightly battles between you and your child. The first thing you should do is observe your child for a few days. Watch and not when your child is actually tired. Putting your child to bed too early or too late may be one of the triggers to battling you at bedtime.

Once you have an idea of when your child is getting tired, you need to make a plan and stick to it. Setting a routine will not only prepare your child for bed with an entire schedule, but it will mentally prepare your child for bed. They will know, once the routine begins, that this is the way it needs to be and you will not waver. You need to be absolutely firm on the schedule and continuously remind your child, that this is their bedtime routine. The actual routine can include bathing, brushing teeth, a story, talking about the day, cuddling time or saying prayers together. Try to give your child some input on this schedule, like allowing them to choose their own story.

This is enough for some children and they will start being less combative at bedtime. When you keep urging and reminding your child that bedtime is not negotiable, many children will more easily stick to the new routine. If they don’t, you may want to add some kind of reward system, like giving them a special treat when they wake up the next day or an extra
story the next night. You can also have a bedtime chart where you reward your child with stickers. For instance, each night they go to bed without a battle, they can have a sticker. When the stickers add up, they can turn the stickers in for a trip to the park, for instance. Be creative with this process and make it fun for your child to go to bed. Fun is probably what is keeping them up in the first place! Getting enough baby sleep is essential to growth and development.

When you bring a new child into your home, the child already established in the home may have their baby sleep disrupted for a variety of reasons. Since sleep is so important to physical and mental development, it is essential that you, as the parents find out the reasons your child is not sleeping when they hear about their new baby brother or sister.

Though there are several possible behaviors that may arise with your toddler during the time a new baby arrives in the home, sleep issues are quite common. If your family is typical, you will have a toddler and a new born at the same time…and your toddler is probably on a pretty good schedule at this point. More often than not, your toddler will start having sleeping problems when the new baby arrives, both on purpose and unintentionally.

When your toddler figures out that the new baby is taking more of mum and dad’s time, they will get jealous and probably exhibit less than perfect behavior. They will often test limits and usually one of these will be temporarily forgetting their bed time routine. Unintentionally, they will usually wake more in the night and may need more prompting than usual to get back to sleep.

What to do about this situation? If your toddler is drawing out their bed time, for instance, try putting them to bed a bit earlier. You should also specifically involve your child in caring for their new sibling, especially focusing on the baby’s bedtime. If you are nursing, you can also include your toddler in that. Read them as story while nursing the baby, for instance. Additionally you should make sure you are spending special time, one on one with your toddler without the new baby involved. It will give your toddler a sense of excitement that you are focusing on them as well as the baby.

You should be explaining that the baby isn’t old enough to do anything on their own, so he or she needs the help of mummy and daddy until they get big like the toddler. Depending on the sleeping arrangements at your home, your toddler may want to sleep where you are sleeping, especially if the newborn is in a bassinet in your own room. You simply need to explain that the baby needs to be close to mum and dad for feeding in the night and he or she will cry and wake up, making it sound unpleasant and ensuring your toddler that they are better off in their own bed. If your newborn is in a crib, your toddler may want to be in a crib too if they are in a “big bed”. Again, you should always focus on staying in their bed and getting a good sleep.

Spending time focusing on sleep during this transition time will prove to be the best thing you can do. Make sure you are really spending special and loving time as you put your toddler to sleep. The importance of a full night of baby sleep doesn’t fade as your child ages.

Ensuring your child gets all the baby sleep they need can be a daunting task for any parent. It can be difficult to get your child to sleep or can be hard to get your baby to sleep for an extended period of time. Average sleep time for newborns is 1-3 hours. By 3-6 months, your baby should be sleeping 3-6 hours a night and by 6 months, 5-9 hours is the norm. The older your child gets the longer they will sleep in most cases. Unfortunately, not every child follows the norm!

By the time your child is about three years old, they are cognitively able to understand positive reinforcement and how being good and doing as they are told will reward them with good things! Also around this age is when children really start testing the boundaries and see how far they can go with you! When it comes to sleep, using these reward systems and positive reinforcement can really help set your child into a routine ensuring a good night’s sleep for both of you!

Starting a reward system is quite easy, as long as your child truly understands what this process is. They do a behaviour they may not particularly want to do, but if they do it, they will be rewarded with a coveted object, action or activity. This works great when bed time comes around. As toddlers, they tend to fight sleep because if they stay up, they can play longer! Start by setting a schedule where they pick up their toys at a certain time, get a bath at a certain time, brush their teeth at a certain time and so on.

Start with small goals and work up. For instance, make a deal with your baby that if they stay and sleep in their bed for one night, in the morning, they can have a special toy or special time with mum or dad. Work up to bigger treats, like if they do it for a week, they will be able to have a special dinner or take a special trip to the park or zoo!

Sticker charts seem to work well, and toddlers will be able to understand the concept. Adding a sticker to a chart allows your child to visually see their progress and see how close they are to their coveted reward. Once your child earns a reward, they should be able to keep it. Once it is taken back from them, it confuses them and they question the validity of this whole reward system!

Another form of positive reinforcement is the “sleep fairy” or whatever you like to call it. Similar to a “tooth fairy” idea, explain to your child that a very nice fairy who is in charge of sleep visits sleeping children and leaves them presents at night. You can have a specific place for the sleep fairy to leave gifts, like a sweet, each time your child sleeps through the night without getting up unnecessarily. Using these methods, baby sleep will soon visit your child again!

When you are a parent, setting a routing and schedule can help your baby sleep at night. Knowing how a routine and schedule will benefit your baby as well as yourself can make bed time and night time pleasant experiences. Though your newborn will be the most volatile with their sleep schedule, as your baby grows up, setting up a routine and sleep schedule will be highly beneficial for several reasons.

The more comfortable your baby is, the easier it will be for your baby to get on a schedule. When your child aware of what is coming next with their schedule, it is easier for them to fall into the routine of successful sleep. Getting this schedule set is where the work comes in, but once that is done, even as your child grows, their sleep habits will grow along with them.

The sooner you start setting a schedule, the better off you will be and the quicker your baby will learn the appropriate time to sleep. You can start setting a schedule at about 6-8 weeks of age and follow that pattern every night. Within days you should notice your baby catching on to the new routine. With consistency and ritual, you will soon find your child knowing they need to sleep at night and be awake during the day.

Establishing a bedtime routine is easy enough in itself. Starting a few hours before the scheduled bedtime will start settling your child down enough where they will start getting sleepy. Keeping loud activities and play to a minimum after a certain time will also settle your child down in the evening. Get the loud and playful activity out before hand. It may actually settle your child down when they get out their energy. Doing a whole routine with a bath, story or song and small snack before bed is not only fun and comforting for your child, but also a time where you, as the parent, can bond and get to know your child even better. It also triggers to your child, when you do this every day, that it is time to sleep.

Other tricks you can try or add to your bedtime routine includes brushing gums and new teeth as they come in, talking to your child in a quiet voice, and even playing soft, soothing music and gently lull your baby to sleep. When you are starting this routine, always expect your child to take days and likely weeks to fully catch on to the new routine. The actual schedule is important as well, as putting your child to bed at the same time each night will teach your child the importance of keeping time and as they age, this is a useful tool for teaching them to tell time!

You should note that any time you leave your baby with someone else, such as a babysitter or family member, they should always stick to the schedule you provide as well. When there are too many times you go off the schedule, the more times your child will mess up their baby sleep.

As the parent of a baby, you may find that as your child ages, night time feeding may be affecting baby sleep. You may not know if you should stop feeding and risk a hungry baby in a few hours, or should you wake your baby in the middle of the night for feeding. If you are breast feeding, you may need to wake up in the middle of the night just for your own comfort.

For the first three months, no matter what, you will need to almost always feed your baby at night. After that, baby may stop feeding at night on their own, or you may need to start prompting this to happen by spacing out night time feedings from, for example, every 3 hours to every 5 hours. Research shows that waking your child up for extra feedings at night, could very well be causing your child to wake more than they should.

At a certain point, your child may wake in the night only to take a few bites of food, and then quickly fall back into their sleep cycle. If this is the case with your child, this is the perfect time to eliminate night time feedings. If your child is still drinking 8 ounces or more per night, then they are in a pattern of being used to night time feedings and you should not abruptly stop them. In this case, you can taper them off on feeding at night, but start giving them more food during the day.

You may also notice your child waking up in the night because of dirty nappies. If you are finding that you must wake up to change your child, this is probably directly related to feeding your baby at night. Once you eliminate your night time feedings, your night time changing will stop too! Though there will always be exceptions to the rules, by the time your child is 6 months old, they should be sleeping a full 5-6 hours per night with no feeding and no bathroom breaks!

In addition to eliminating your feedings at night, you should try to set up a new routine for your child, but giving them another association during sleep that has nothing to do with being held, fed from a bottle or breast. This would be a great time, if your child is still waking, to start a routine of reading a quick story or starting another creative night time routine. When your child stops associating sleep with food, you have won the battle against sleeplessness due to night time feedings.

If you have tried the tricks and eliminated night time feedings by the time your child is 6 months or older, but they are still waking in the night, it may be another issue all together and you should consider speaking to your child’s doctor. It may be a medical problem that can only be solved with physician intervention. Take steps now to get into a new routine. Night time feedings can affect baby sleep.

Trying to get your baby to have adequate and proper baby sleep during the first few months after bringing him or her home can be a challenge even for the most patient parent. Until you are established in a routine with your child, settling your new baby to sleep will test your nerves, no matter how much you love this baby! You are likely reading this because you are in this exact situation and want to know the tricks of settling your baby into bed.

Newborns typically only sleep in short segments of time, from 1-3 hours on average. Though they will sleep up to 18 hours a day, this definitely isn’t all at once! A newborn has no concept of day or night and it is up to you, as the parent, to establish sleeping routines. Starting from day one of life, it is entirely possible to train your baby to sleep as soon as you bring your bundle of joy home.

You may be thinking: Why do babies wake up so much? There are a few reasons for this. The obvious reasons are hunger and dirty nappies, but another, less known reason, is a baby’s nervous system isn’t totally developed at birth. As your baby continues to grow and age, tiny pulses from the nervous system are prompting your child to wake. Typically newborns are not awoken by sounds or ambient noises, but as your child ages, these could wake your child from sleep as well.

What can you do to settle your baby in? Two words: consistency and routine! The way to set up consistency and routine, as mentioned above, is to start from the day you bring your baby home. Setting as regular a bed time as you can as a newborn will put in motion a lifelong pattern of sleep. When your baby wakes in the middle of the night, it is important you try to get him or her back to sleep as soon as you can. Easier said than done, that is true, but the sooner baby goes to sleep, the sooner you can get baby established in a routine.

When dealing with a newborn, you may want to try to keep the baby up a bit longer than normal and with fingers crossed, they will sleep longer during their next nap time. Your baby still needs to eat about every four hours, but sleeping just one hour as opposed to four will not only be better for your baby, but it will help your sanity as well! Rocking and cuddling a newborn seems to help most babies and you should keep the room as dark as possible at night, and lighted in the day. Additionally during the day, stimulate and speak to your baby in normal voices…at night, whisper and keep things very quiet.

If your newborn gets to be 4-6 months and still only sleeping in 1-3 hour increments, you should contact a doctor for more medical based advice. You should also see a doctor if there is no baby sleep at all or irritable and active baby sleep.