Healthy Sleep For Babies
Do all babies exhibit the same sleep patterns?
Not all infants of the same age exhibit the same sleep patterns, because we're all different; we're all individuals. Now, it's not that the sleep patterns are going to be widely different; some infants may actually get by with maybe one or two hours less sleep than another infant of the same age, and they may have different napping patterns. Generally speaking, I think if we look at the amount of sleep babies get in twenty-four hours, there may be a variation between say one to two hours for comparable ages. However, how they sleep may certainly vary in terms of temperament. Childhood temperament plays a big role in how you sleep. If you have what I call an easy temperament, you tend to be very clock-driven. You can almost predict it; you can set your watch according to their temperament: this is when they're going to be sleepy, this is when they're going to wake up to eat, and this is when they are going to nap. However, a child who has what we call a difficult temperament is a much more irregular child internally, and so they're unpredictable. So, their naptimes may be unpredictable, and when they're naturally sleepy may be unpredictable.
Should I put my baby's crib in my bedroom?
Whether you should put the baby's crib in your room or whether you should put your baby's crib in a bedroom really depends on what you are comfortable with. Again, I don't believe that there should be different rules, because it has to work. For instance, if you are nursing your baby, it's a lot easier to get up and walk a couple of paces to a crib than to walk down a hallway and stab your toe or trip over the cat or something, whatever the case may be. But the essence here is the child being used to sleeping in a crib. At some point, if the crib is in your room, you are going to want to move the crib into another room if you can do that. When moving the child into another room, the timing is important. For instance, it's easier to move the baby's crib when the baby is still quite young than when they are a year and a half or two years of age.
When should I move my baby's crib out of my bedroom?
At some point you are going to want to move your baby's crib out of your own room into the baby's own room, if the baby doesn't sleep in his or her own room already. If you don't mind having your baby's crib in another room from the start, that would really be the ideal. But it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. You have to bear in mind that if the crib is in your room, at some point the baby is going to be used to the proximity to you and then it might be difficult to move them away. The baby might object. Generally speaking, if you want to move your baby's crib to another room with the least amount of fuss, you probably want to move the crib before six months of age. Because usually from six to eight months of age, the baby starts to become more aware of their near surroundings. I would certainly say from eight months of age moving your baby's crib out of your bedroom could become a sticky problem.
Why can't my baby sleep through the night?
There are multiple reasons why babies don't sleep through the night. I think one's got to look at it in different categories, if you like. The first thing is they may wake up because of physical need. They may be hungry; it may be a young baby that's actually hungry. They may have physical discomfort. They may be unwell; they may have a cold, they may have a blocked nose. Remember that in young babies under six months of age, if their noses are blocked, they can't really breathe because they're what we call “obligatory nose breathers.” So, for many of them, the only way they can breathe in that situation is actually by crying. So: health issues, pain, discomfort, and hunger issues. That would be sort of the physical category. Then what's going on in the environment? Is the cat crawling all over their head? Is there noise? Is the TV blaring? Are the parents arguing? There may be some environmental issues that could be waking the baby up. The third category is really habit. If the baby has this sequence of associations and has been put to bed in a certain way with all the habitual things that they “need” to fall asleep, they wake up naturally (because we all wake up naturally at night) and they find that these associations are not present, they are going to make a noise. They are going to signal to Mum to come back, or that they want the bottle, or that they want to be nursed, or that they can't find their pacifier, or that they need the TV on. So, those are probably the three main reasons why children wake up and don't put themselves back to sleep at night.
When should my baby start a bedtime routine for my baby?
You can start healthy habits or a healthy sleep routine from the beginning, from day one. In other words, you can get a baby used to sleeping in a crib if that's what you so choose,you can set a routine, try and routinize as much as you can in terms of going to bed. Even if it's a young baby with a demand feeding for instance, just the way you put them down, what you do, it's almost the same type of thing, will instill a kind of sameness, and it's the sameness that you want to do. You also want to be careful that you don't induce a sleep onset association where you do things. You want to teach your child to be able to go to sleep on their own, so be very careful that you don't rock your baby to sleep, or let your baby nurse until they fall asleep, or do things for your child that your child can do for themselves in order for them to fall asleep.
Is it normal for my baby to mumble and move while she sleeps?
During certain sleep stages you are more active and alert. You can toss and turn a lot during a non-REM sleep. During a REM sleep you are dreaming a lot. Especially in young children, you may be doing some twitching movements. There is a very interesting phenomenon called hypnagogic hallucinations that you can have. As you fall asleep you may go through a phase of very vivid emotions. It's not really dreaming but it's actually hallucinations such as you may be hearing things or there may be a lot of movements there as well. You may be doing some twitching. Twitching can occur, especially in young babies during REM sleep.
What do I do if my baby is active at night and tired during the day?
Say if you have a situation where your child, your young baby, is sleeping more in the day and is awake at night; you notice that their cycle is reversed. It's a big problem because we want to sleep at night-time, don't we? What you can do is you can morph; you can adjust their sleep cycle by doing a couple of things. No. 1: if they're in a feeding routine, you need to look at what they're being fed, because usually babies fall asleep after feeding. Now, we have got to just understand one thing. If we're talking about a baby say under three or four months of age they may not have established a good sleep routine. From about three months onward we would expect the baby to be sleeping more at night-time than in the day. So, at night-time they would have longer stretches of night-time sleep. If you have a situation where that is reversed, then perhaps try waking your baby up in the daytime just a little bit; even just by half an hour or 15 minutes to half an hour. When you wake them up from their nap, you help them build up more sleep debt. So, if you're constantly delaying their nap later, waking them up a little bit earlier from their nap, and then delaying their next nap, over a period of a day or two you may be able to resynchronise their sleep cycle.
When can I expect my baby to sleep through the night?
Generally speaking, if all goes well and you have a good sleep routine and good sleep hygiene, a child from about six months of age should be able to start sleeping through the night. Again, it's not a definite, definite time, but a baby should usually start to sleep through the night from about six months (sometimes five months if you're lucky). At six, seven, eight months, you should expect your child to sleep through the night.