There's a lot of misinformation out there about baby sleep. I'm here to clear it up in one clear and easy blog post! You're so welcome!
1. Wake Times
If your baby is awake longer or shorter than his little developmentally-appropriate window will allow, you've blown it. This will vary according to your baby's age, activity-level of wake time, personality, moon phase, astrological sign, and how many cups of coffee you have had if you breastfeed.*
If you end up with an overtired baby, do whatever it takes to get that baby to sleep...rocking, swing, carrier, nursing, pacifier, vibration, car ride, hypnosis, cash bribes...Just remember that whatever you do is going to create a sleep "crutch" you will have to undo. While using this "crutch," feel extremely guilty and consumed with panic over the next time you'll have to get your baby to sleep without it. It will be embarrassing for your child to need to sleep in a death trap baby swing in college.
2. Skipped Naps
If your baby refuses a nap (defined by not getting to sleep within 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, or 45 minutes of being put down drowsy but awake--see below), you need to try earlier for the next nap, but you should wait until they would normally go down for the next one or they'll be screwed up schedule-wise for the rest of the day. Also, wait a little longer and push them so they won't take a short nap, but don't push them too much because you'll miss the magical moment when they will drift off to sleep without fussing. If your older child poops and needs his or her butt wiped at the exact nanosecond your younger child needs to go down, you're screwed for the rest of the day...maybe week...actually, he/she might have trouble napping in college.
3. Eat-Sleep-Play
You should have your baby follow a strict eat, sleep, play routine. Routine is more important than schedule. You need flexibility based on how long the baby naps. However, if you don't have that baby on a schedule, you will never get your life back, and your little one won't know what to expect. Do things at the exact same time every day and your baby will eventually get the hang of it within a day or two or a hundred. Wake the baby if she sleeps longer than you planned. Leave her to cry if she wakes early. Never wake a sleeping baby, and never let a baby cry longer than 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, or 45 minutes. Give that baby a chance to go back to sleep and sleep through another sleep cycle, but respond immediately to crying or you will have attachment issues.
If you want to make a HUGE sleep association between nursing/eating and falling asleep, go ahead because it's your decision and there are no wrong ways to do it, but you will regret it and it's wrong. In this case, you will be following an eat, sleep, play schedule. Don't do it. Your child will still need to eat to sleep in college.
4. Drowsy But Awake
Put your baby down drowsy but awake so he knows how to put himself to sleep. But don't let him be too drowsy because then you're doing too much of the work for him. He should be completely awake but showing "sleepy signs" that fall into the range of doing everything babies normally do whether they're tired or not.
Start putting your baby down in the crib awake immediately after birth, but wait until 2, 4, or 6 months. You're cruel if you do it before he's a year old, but it might not work unless you start earlier. Swaddle the living daylights out of him (unless he's over 2, 4, or 6 months or is showing signs of rolling over in the near or distant future) and don't put ANYTHING in the crib with him (except for certified organic cotton sheets that won't leech chemicals into his system) because SIDS. Put him on his back because SIDS. Use a pacifier because SIDS (even though he won't be able to keep it in himself). Replace the pacifier when it falls out because SIDS. Don't replace it because he's going to get dependent upon it and will expect you to replace it every time he wakes up. You're giving him nipple confusion. You're a terrible parent. Now he's gonna sleep with a bunny rabbit Wubbanub in college.
5. Sleeping Environment
Speaking of SIDS, your baby needs to be able to "self soothe" herself to sleep on her back on a FIRM mattress without use of her straightjacketed hands, a lovey/blankie, a pacifier, or anything else but white noise in a completely dark and properly cool room. Think cave with a running dishwasher in it. But the white noise could ruin her hearing, and you need to be sure it's not drowning out the noises of the household so that she can learn to sleep though those. Vacuum under her bed while she's sleeping so she can learn to sleep through normal sounds. Drown out all noise or she'll never be able to sleep. Same with light. The room should be pitch black but have enough light that the baby can distinguish between day and night sleep. They should obviously be enough the same that the baby understands the routine and gets the cues that it's time to sleep, but babies can't read those cues until 2, 4, or 6 months, so it's moot anyway.
Introduce a lovey at 2, 4, or 6 months. Wait until a year, though, so that it's safe. Remove it when the baby is asleep, but don't wake the baby. He or she should fall asleep with it but not have it as a crutch to fall BACK to sleep when waking at night. Explain to the baby that it's a "cue" and not a "crutch." I don't need to tell you the ramifications of doing this wrong your child will experience by the time he or she is in college.
6. Night Wakings
If your baby isn't sleeping through the night (defined by a 5, 7, or 12 hour stretch or uninterrupted sleep) by 2, 4, or 6 months or maybe a year or up to 18 months, you should question whether or not you should have procreated in the first place. It's absolutely normal for babies to wake throughout the night to eat and snuggle for comfort, but you should respond to their needs JUST enough.
Feed the baby back to sleep every time (you could just co-sleep**), but don't do it every time. Just do it if it's been x number of hours since they last ate. But don't do it at all because they should be sleeping through the night. If you do decide to give in and feed them, use a bottle because you can control the amount. Back off the amount every night and put your baby down hungrier and hungrier so he gets the idea that it's not worth it to cry for food at night. He wasn't hungry anyway. Don't you know that baby's dependence upon a bottle for sleep will lead to eating disorders and obesity in later life? And if you feed your baby formula, why are you feeding your baby that toxic waste, anyway? Rock them or shush-pat them back to sleep (at the correct tempo and volume) instead of feeding, but remember that that will become yet another sleep crutch, you failure! They will need help getting back to sleep when they wake up in college.
7. Short Naps
If your baby takes a short nap (aka "cat nap" or "crap nap"), you're doing something wrong. Try all the things. It will take a few days to figure out which thing you were doing wrong. Possibly a few weeks. By which time your baby will have moved on to new habits and wake times anyway. You really suck at this. Did you even go to college?
8. Crying it Out
Though briefly mentioned above, we will now address crying babies. You can let them cry if you don't love them because you can view it as a normal part of learning how to sleep, but there are ways to train babies to sleep that don't involve crying if you don't want your baby to just suck it up and be a man/woman. Well, that don't involve much crying. Well, that just involve you crying because you're so tired from repeatedly giving your baby what they want, you freaking pushover. For example, if your baby cries, just sit by them and shush and pat them. This is guaranteed not to infuriate your baby. Move farther away each night. We recommend putting a tape measure on the floor to keep track of progress. Their choice of colleges will someday be limited by the length of said tape measure, so keep that in mind.
If you do let your baby cry, be prepared to cry a lot yourself because of your unbearable guilt at needing two minutes to move the laundry along, wash the dishes, trim a rough fingernail, reheat your coffee (sinner!) for the fourth time, and grab a snack from the selection of rejected food from under the toddler's booster seat. Better hope it's an organic, gluten-free, refined sugar free, non-GMO snack if you're breastfeeding (which you had better be). If it's not, what is WRONG with you???
Conclusion
Really, what is WRONG with you??? Billions of people have been raising babies for thousands of years and you didn't know how to get a baby to sleep? Good thing I have written this handy guide so you and your baby stand a chance. Come back soon for my definitive guide on cloth diapering. I've been cloth diapering part time for a week, so I can't wait to share my expertise with all my faithful Internet followers! If you're using disposables, your son or daughter will still hate the earth and contribute to global warming in college.
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| Don't let this happen to you! Don't let a snuggly baby fall asleep you you! You can't spoil a baby, but this will spoil a baby. |
**Co-sleeping is for lazy moms who don't care about SIDS and have an unhealthy attachment to their babies. You just don't want to train your baby to be independent. You'll have to sleep with them in college.
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