The Sleep Nanny Podcast

How can I teach my baby to self-soothe without crying?

https://youtu.be/r8ex-XlojNQ
This week I want to look at one of the reasons that could be behind your little one’s night wakings, and that is sleep onset. I will explain what that is, what it means and how this could absolutely be the game-changing nugget of wisdom that resolves your little one’s sleep in a really, really big way. So make sure you read until the end so you fully understand what sleep onset is all about.
First of all, what does it mean? What does sleep onset even mean?
It means falling to sleep. It’s the way that sleep comes about. So what could that include? When we fall to sleep, our body goes through a certain sensation of closing down. We close our eyes, our breathing becomes slower, and there are all kinds of things that happen to us physiologically and biologically, but there are also external things that happen as well. So once we understand how we’re falling asleep at the sleep onset, it actually plays a really significant role in how we sustain our sleep throughout the night.
Now, of course, we do wake up. It’s really important to know that nobody just sleeps the whole night without waking. But the wakings are so minimal, sometimes you don’t even know you’ve had one. They can be so partial, so subconscious, semiconscious, you just have this slight arousal and on back off into sleep. They are cycles of sleep.
So you go down into deep sleep, you cycle up, you come through, lighter sleep, and then this is the point where you might just wake up. But, oh, no, we’re down into another sleep cycle. We go down, we’ll go into deep sleep, and we cycle through sleep like this all night long. But it’s when we are in that lighter sleep that we do actually slightly wake and go back off. We have to, our bodies need to do that to regulate and to keep us alive.
And so babies and children are the same, but when they’re tiny, when they’re really little and they don’t actually know how to get to sleep and they haven’t really grasped the sleep onset yet, when they have those cycles that they’re coming into that light sleep and they’re just about to tip over into the next cycle. They find themselves awake and they find themselves and they don’t know how to get back to sleep, because they didn’t know how they got there in the first place. And they cry and they look for your help because they need to get back to sleep.
So this is why the sleep onset is key because once they’re doing it, once their body is in that rhythm and it knows the body just does it and they fall to sleep, then the body and the mind will be trained. They will be efficient and effective at going back to sleep when we have those stirrings and wakings or partial wakings in the night.
So hopefully you feel reassured that, “Oh, okay, waking up is normal,” and it is completely. But it’s the getting back to sleep that matters, and when your little one is doing that, they’re not going to cry out or look for you or look for help because they’re able to do it themselves. So you won’t know that they’ve had two, three, five wakings in the night because they’ve resettled themself when they’ve had those stirrings. And that is when it feels so lovely and like they are sleeping through the night, which is what we all aim for, don’t we, for as soon as possible.
So the thing we need to look at is the sleep onset associations. Now, some people will talk about these as sleep crutches or sleep props, and they’re not all bad. To be honest, you can have healthy, positive sleep onset associations, as well as unhelpful destructive sleep onset associations, and it’s really important that we know the difference between the two.
So a sleep onset association is something that puts your little one to sleep. It’s something, an association that helps them to go to sleep. But some things will help, whereas other things will do the job for them.
For instance, if you rock your baby and you rock, rock, rock, rock, rock all the way to sleep, that’s done it for them. They haven’t really done anything. But if they have a cuddly teddy and they cuddle that teddy, but then they fall asleep, the teddy’s just helped them. It’s given them an element of comfort, but the rest of the job they did and they put themselves to sleep with that cuddling.
If they’re sucking on a dummy or pacifier all the way to sleep, that might be the thing that’s soothing them off to sleep. And this is why when it drops out naturally, because the jaw naturally opens, they’re fine for a while. But then they go into light sleep and they start to immediately do that sucking motion and wait, it’s gone. It’s not there. And what? Hang on, something’s up. And then boom, I’m awake and crying, because they’re missing that thing that got them to sleep before.
However, if they didn’t suckle all the way to sleep, maybe they suckled for calming and comfort, but then it is taken out, if they didn’t suckle all the way to sleep, they wouldn’t be seeking. Their body wouldn’t naturally reactively seek that thing in order to get back to sleep.
Now, some of the things don’t matter at all in the early weeks. With newborns, you can’t spoil them and you can’t get it wrong. Honestly, instinctively, you’re going to rock and cuddle your baby to sleep. You’re probably going to feed them to leave. You’re going to do all these things. Please do not worry about that in those early weeks.
But an awareness of it will pay dividends. Because if you’re aware of how much you’re doing that, you can, around four months in, sometimes sooner, but you can start to just spot and be aware of how much you’re doing for them and how much they’re doing and you can gradually start to tip the scale. So you’re doing a bit less and they’re doing a bit more when they’re getting a bit more practice until they get really, really good at it.
But certainly between four and six months, I would pay a lot more conscious attention to their sleep onset so you can help them to develop that and for that to come through. Because so long as you do it for them, they’ll need you to do it for them. And this is why for some parents that goes on for years, actual years. And it’s like anything, you don’t just go, “Oh, I’ll just wait, one day my child will ride a bike.” No, you have to get a bike for them and put the training wheels on and help them and encourage them and run alongside them and bit by bit, you take away wheels and let go, and oh look, they’ve got it.
With sleep onset, learning that is the same. They don’t just suddenly go, “Yeah, I’m going to learn that today.” It’s gradual, but it needs to be intentional. So your awareness as the parent or caregiver is vital in understanding this.
Have a think about those sleep onset associations and which ones might be at play in getting your little one to sleep. Is there something that is entirely doing it for them? And if so, could you move a little bit from doing it for them to doing it with them, helping them and just not, but not doing the whole thing, so they’re doing a little bit of the work? And then could you ease up a little bit on your input bit by bit, gradually? So that they’re not left alone to figure it out all by themselves, but they’ve got your assistance. They’ve got your reassurance, but they’ve just got to work a little bit harder at it because you’re not going to do the whole job for them.
Is there something that you’re thinking of right now that you’re like, “Yes, ours is this. We feed to sleep. We need to stop feeding to sleep.” Okay, feed, absolutely feed your baby. When they’re full, make sure they’re awake, give them a little stroke and or with a little whisper, a little song, and then make sure they’re aware that they’re going down to sleep. And then use soothing, comforting touch and reassurance to help them to finish the job. But they will feel that sensation in their body as they drift off and they will get used to that. They will get well practiced at that until they can do it on their own.
So you can practice, little one’s can practice sleep onset from the early months. They really can. But I would definitely have them practice between four and six months. Because hopefully then by six months, they’ve mastered their sleep onset, and if they’ve mastered it, then they’re going to be able to settle to sleep when they fall asleep, which means they sustain the amount of sleep they need.
For naps, no more 30 minutes then, aha, I’m awake again. They will sleep on and they’ll do their full cycles until they’re done. And at night, they will cycle through, wake up, go back off to sleep, wake up, back off to sleep. And you won’t even hear from them because they’re efficiently going through their cycles themselves without needing the help anymore because they’ve got it. So practice is key.
If you have any questions, please reach out to us on our social media channels or Check out my Sweet Dreams series. A Simple, Science Backed, Parent-Approved 6 Step Process to Help Your Little One Develop Solid Sleep Skills.

Baby Waking up at Night

https://youtu.be/m0PSzAcmK7I
This week’s blog is a deep dive into the topic of responding to those night wakings.
How can you best respond to them? Because the truth is, different wakings need a different response, and sometimes your response can be perfect and help your little one to get back to sleep quickly, and other times your response might actually make the problem worse.
The first thing to look at is the type of waking. Why has your little one woken up in the first place?
Because if we know what the type of waking is and what the waking is about, that can help us to determine the best way to respond. Or for example, is your little one awake because they’re hungry? Are they awake because they’re in pain? Are they awake because they’re uncomfortable, or are they awake because they need some reassurance? Or are they awake because they just kind of woke? That can happen too. And sometimes they need some help with getting back to sleep.
So how do you know? How do any of us know? They don’t come with a manual and especially when they’re too young to talk or tell us, or really express their feelings, they just cry.
Sometimes all the cries can feel the same, especially in the middle of the night, “Oh, it’s this, no, it’s this, no, it’s this.” In the moment it’s trying to work out if we know why they’re awake.
As the journey through parenthood goes on you start to get familiar with cries, like pain cries for example. Pain cries are usually quite high pitched and prevalent. And you usually do just know if they’re in pain and you can tell because it’s different. It’s not the kind of cry, the communication style cry that you see every day when they’re hungry or need a nappy changing, or are just fractious. You do tend to spot those piercing pain cries, and hunger cries. Personally, I think they’re really hard to identify. Some people say they know, they just know if it’s hunger or not, but I know lots of us don’t know, and we’re left going, “Are they hungry? Are they not? I don’t know.”
So one of the best ways to determine hunger is by knowing roughly how much they need and have, and if they were breastfed, or bottle-fed, formula-fed, are they onboarding enough? And at what frequency does that usually take shape? Because then you will start to know, it’s definitely not hunger. That can be one way that you know it’s not. And again, as you’re getting familiar with those different sounds, expressions, and actions, you will start to see things they do when they’re hungry and things they do when they’re just irritable. So understanding that is key. Also related to that, sometimes you do get discomfort, particularly digestive discomfort. They may be full, sure, they may have fed brilliantly, and you’ve ruled out hunger, but they’re really uncomfortable because it hurts there in their tummy.
It’s a different kind of pain to the piercing pain cry, but really agitated, awkward discomfort. Sometimes with that, you see other signs like drawing the knees up and you can tell that they have that pain or discomfort in their tummy. Or they’re not comfortable in their sleep space. It could be that they’re too hot, too cold, that it’s a terribly hard mattress, particularly in the travel cots, we get those uncomfortable mattresses. Could just be that they can’t get comfortable in that way as well. Or it might just quite simply be that they need a little bit of help getting back to sleep. So try to identify why, but if you can’t identify why, or if you’re like, “Well, I think I’ve whittled it down to it’s going to be this or this.” If you’ve got a rough idea but you’re not certain, then it’s great to know how to respond and to have that kind of backup plan as well of, “Ah, if it’s this, then I’ll do this.”
And of course, if it’s pain, you want to alleviate the pain. And if it’s hunger, you want to feed that hungry baby. Aside from that, how can you respond?
The key things to think about with responding are that you are delivering the same sort of message of reassurance every single time. So any response from you, your little one wakes and cries out and you to them, any form of response is going to be reassuring. It lets them know that they’re not alone, they’ve not been abandoned, you always return, and you’re there to tend to their needs, as best you can identify. So any response is better than no response, but how you respond is definitely key. So if you have a particularly alert little one, let’s say, or toddler-preschooler age, because they were all pretty alert around that age, and they’re really tuned into interactions from you, then sometimes with little ones like that, too much fuss, too much interaction, or too much effort really from you.
If there’s lots of, “Come on, shh, shh, back to sleep,” and you’re fully expressive in your face, you’re making eye contact, you’re all hands on, sometimes too much of that is actually over-stimulating, and can actually rile them up to the point they’re like, “Okay, hold on. Right, you here. Right, we’re interacting.” Or maybe it’s daytime. It can be too much for them and it will actually wake them up more or keep them awake, or leave them in that frustrated place wanting to be asleep but not really sure what’s going on, and it will prolong going back to sleep. And if that is the case, less is more, so responding with a more, well, I would always say to respond with a very nonchalant, unengaging, bland and boring, be bland and boring. You’re not standoffish, you’re not angry in any way, you’re not being cold. You’re also not being all fluffy and animated and molly coddled, and all-engaging because that’s for the daytime.
You’re in nighttime mode which means you are in, nothing to see here mode, it’s time for sleep, come back to sleep, matter of fact. And just keep it really simple, less is more. I would suggest that anyway, regardless of your baby or child’s temperament type, but be more aware of that and be ultra vigilant with that, if you have got a super alert because they will pick up on every little detail of your facial expressions, your animations, your voice, everything. Keep to a whisper in the nighttime. You only whisper, you’re bland and boring, right from the minute you say goodnight, lights out, until the time they’re allowed to wake up and start the day, you are in bland and boring whisper mode. And I would just say that for every single response, every single time.
So whether that’s a feed, a cuddle, a trip to the bathroom, still maintain that nighttime persona because it will help to get that message to your little one that it’s not time to start the day, it’s nighttime. And that helps to differentiate night from day. In the night, Mummy is like this, or Daddy, or a caregiver. This is nighttime, it’s sleep time. In the daytime, my parents or caregivers are like this and it’s different. So again, they’re just associating. Things like daylight and darkness tell you night and day, they send a message to the brain, daylight, awake time, darkness, sleep time. It’s a real simple message that the brain picks up on. And same with interaction and animation and engagement from you.
The response you might give and the approach you might take to helping your little one to resettle will be covered in next week’s Blog, where I will be exploring sleep onset, and how to actually really practice and work on that to help them settle to sleep, and the same goes for back to sleep.
You might find that next week’s Blog will help you to come back and apply what I talk about to the night wakings as well. And so in that response, it may be something that is a little less engaging and may be more distant, so you may give them a bit more space, and come and check on them regularly, and reassure them as they need it. Others will need a lot more hands-on help they’re going to need, while being bland and boring and unengaging, they’re going to need you to be very present. They may need that physical contact and help from you at first, they’re going to need more help to get back to sleep than some that might just actually need a bit more space.
And that will be determined by their individual little character traits, but more on that next week.
What I want to finish with is a message about consistency in your response to Night time Wakings. The number one thing that is going to get you an outcome, in anything, is consistency. And that sounds cliche, I think because it’s something people just say, but it’s pointless if it’s just something you say, you’ve got to actually do it. And you’ve got to know what it really means. And it means that you are responding to that night waking consistently, in the same way, every time. Whether it’s you, whether it’s your partner, whether it’s another family member or a caregiver, whoever’s going to that child, that child is getting the same response and going through those same processes every single time. Why? It’s the kindest thing to do for them.
It’s not going to give them mixed messages, confusion, or false expectations. It’s going to keep it really clear to them that, “Hey, we’re here for you. We love you. We are going to help you. And this is how, and this is what it looks like.” And if everyone who responds to that child responds in that way consistently, they feel safe, they feel secure. They feel like they can count on you, they can rely on you because whether they particularly like the response or not, at least they know they can count on it to be the same every time. At least they can count on you, they can rely on you, they can trust you. So consistency is absolutely key.
I hope this has helped you understand a little bit more about responding to those night wakings. Standby for my week, where we will go into sleep onset itself. It’s going to be a good one!
Book a discovery call and find out how we can help you with your little ones sleep.

Parasomias and how to stop Night Terrors

https://youtu.be/YN1O5Yue6Xc
There are so many different reasons for night wakings, but today we’re going to explore one particular thing that could be causing night wakings for your little one, and that is parasomnias. What on earth are they? In this week’s blog post I am going to explain exactly what they are, why they happen, how you can respond to them and how you can prevent them.
Let’s delve into parasomnias. It’s a funny old word, isn’t it? Actually, it comes from para, meaning alongside of, and the Latin noun of somnus, which means sleep. It’s something that happens alongside sleep, basically.
What is it? What are they? What are parasomnias?
You will have heard of them in their individual little forms, things like sleep talking, sleep walking. You may have heard of night terrors or sleep terrors, those are all part of the parasomnia family. What they really are, what it really is, what it really means is a movement or behavior in sleep. That’s the easiest way to explain it. Things like sleep walking actually are pretty hereditary. It runs in families. If you were a sleep walker, maybe your child will be. Don’t be surprised if you see that, it does run along in families.
That hopefully gives you an idea as to what parasomnias are and the group they belong to. Sleep walking, is walking in sleep. It’s getting up out of bed and physically walking around, and talking is talking or making noises in your sleep. But the one that I think needs a little more explanation is sleep terrors or night terrors, because a lot of parents think their child is having them. Maybe they are, maybe they’re not, so it’s good to understand what they actually even are. They are not bad dreams or nightmares or severe bad dreams or terror, that kind of thing. That’s a dream and it’s something that you wake up from and you can recall it. You can remember it if you try hard enough. The brain can recall it.
Whereas, a sleep terror or night terror, whilst it can come across as being similar in the moment, maybe you can see them thrashing around or speaking and appearing upset. It looks like someone’s in a really bad dream. However it’s actually not the same thing. It’s not the same place. They’re actually in a state of somewhere between awake and asleep.
They’re in a very deep sleep, but there’s an awake and an awareness element to it as well. I’m not going to go into the science right now. But what you’ll see in terms of the difference is a bad dream or a nightmare is, “Oh my gosh. It’s awful. It’s awful. I’m awake.” As opposed to a little one who looks like they are awake. They already look awake. With a night terror or a sleep terror, or actually the milder version that we tend to see in the younger ones is typically called a confusion arousal. It can still be a little bit upsetting or distressing in terms of their behavior, but it’s not quite as terrifying in terms of how they behave, but it is still very odd.
They can be as mild as sitting up and looking around and looking for something and being confused and then going back to sleep, hopefully. The thing with those, confusional arousals, sleep terrors, night terrors, that kind of thing, is they will look or can look as though they are awake. Parents often describe it as they look like they’re possessed. Soetimes in this state if you approach them, they might look like they’re looking right through you and you’re feeling like, “They don’t recognize me,” or that they aren’t responding to you. When you try to comfort them or anything like that you don’t get a response and that’s how these episodes can be.
How do you respond to them? That’s the thing. The key thing is not to try to jolt or shake or wake a person from a parasomnia. It would be really confusing for them. It could be upsetting, or you could actually just become a part of all of the confusion that they’re in. You just become a figure that’s in that weird world they’re in right now with their mind, if you think of it like that. It’s better not to try and wake them, but instead to monitor them. With children especially, with little ones, monitor that they’re not going to hurt themselves. They’re not getting into physical difficulty because if they are thrashing about or walking or moving around, they could injure themselves. So safety, primarily, is the thing you’re looking out for. If they’re of an age that they can get up and out of bed and they’re walking, guide them back nicely. Don’t try to interact. Just, “This way,” and guide them back. They’ll subconsciously have this, ‘you’re there, but you’re not really there’ level of awareness.
If it’s talking, honestly, I would let it go and let them talk. Let them chat away in their sleep. It’s really not a problem. If it’s a night terror, if they’re shouting out, “No, no, no,” frustrated or anything that is disturbing, again, monitor. Watch them. If you can watch either from a baby monitor video camera or from a crack in the door, just to make sure they’re okay, but hold back. If they are okay, just hold back. Don’t intervene. Let the episode pass. Like I said, you can’t exactly comfort them. It doesn’t really work.
I’ve tried this myself, by the way. My son was prone to having some of these when he was in the toddler/ preschooler age, so I know firsthand what it feels like as a parent to experience a child having one of these. It is really bizarre and it can be quite upsetting. Sometimes it can be funny, but sometimes they can be upsetting. Hold back and try not to stimulate or engage with the child. But if you can steer them and keep them safe, that’s great.
Again, with sleep walking, my youngest, actually, has done a bit of that. I know if she’s come downstairs of an evening, which is really, really rare for either of my children to ever do that, but if she does, I almost immediately know. I’ve even looked at her, looked at my husband and gone, “She’s not awake.” and then I’ll say to her, “Come on, back to bed,” just gently though, not to wake her up or startle her and I walk with her and tuck her in. In the morning when I ask her about it, she has no memory of it and it’s because it was a parasomnia. That’s kind of a nicer kind where it’s not really upsetting and she’s even laughed about that in the morning.
So that’s parasomnias, how to respond or not to respond to them, how to deal with them in the moment, and rest assured they will usually pass quite quickly, and it’s good to know that they typically happen in the first half of the night. Less often in the second half of the night, so usually you can deal with it before you’re having your lovely deep sleep. But what can you do to actually prevent it? How can you stop them? How can you stop them? Well, like I said, sometimes it can be hereditary anyway, and so it is part of their genetic makeup and a tendency that they may have. However, that tendency is far more likely to show itself if they’re overtired. I say this about everything and if you’ve read any of my other blogs or watched my YouTube videos or followed me for a while, you’ll understand that I’m always talking about overtiredness because it is absolutely the root of a large proportion of sleep challenges with little ones. But overtiredness is a reason you’re going to start to see these.
If your child has them a lot, I would question how much sleep are they getting overall? If they should be getting daytime sleep, are they and are they getting enough? If they’re past the age of daytime napping, how else could they be getting more rest? Are they going to bed too late or is bedtime all over the place? Could we bring that earlier and make it consistent?
I would say spot it. You’ve got to spot it, then you’ve got it. Where is it that they could be getting overtired? Where are we depleting and where can we top up and replenish that sleep? Because usually once we overcome overtiredness, we stop seeing these episodes.
So there we have it, that’s what parasomnias are, how you can handle them when they happen and things that you can do to try to prevent them.
Parasomnias, are bizarre, but they are very real. They happen, and if we can avoid them then you are removing something that creates disturbance in your child’s sleep. Because if they’re prone to having these parasomnias, it’s disturbing their sleep. Every time they’re having one, it is a disturbance and it’s interrupting their sleep and it will slightly diminish the quality of a night’s sleep.
I hope that has helped and given you a brilliant understanding of the basics of parasomnias, one of the many reasons for night wakings. Next week I’m going to be exploring night wakings in the sense of how to respond to them.
Take care!
Book a discovery call and find out how we can help you with your little ones sleep.

Sleep Regression Signs

https://youtu.be/YGCOjZuaR1A
Being overtired is so often the cause of sleep challenges for babies and young children. You’d think being tired would lead to sleep, but being too tired actually makes sleep worse. In this week’s blog we’ll be exploring why being overtired is causing your little one to wake at night and how to figure out if your child is in fact overtired.
I know it’s counterintuitive, but when we get overtired, our sleep is worse. Why? Have you ever got so tired and for whatever reason you had to power through. And at some point, you just felt like you’d gone past it. And even though you hadn’t been to sleep, you didn’t feel tired anymore. Like a second wind.
That’s exactly what it is, a second wind. The brain tells the body it needs to keep going, so it releases hormones which are like getting an adrenaline boost. In other words, being overtired can leave you feeling quite awake and unable to get to sleep.
From birth, babies gradually manage longer and longer awake between sleeps. We call these wakeful windows, but most of us parents don’t know what the ideal wakeful windows are for our children. Plus, it’s a constantly changing target. Many babies and young children end up being awake for too long between sleeps and a sleep deficit builds up.
This leads to children filled with hormones at bedtime that are making it harder for them to settle to sleep. Or if they do crash out, the night sleep is disturbed or unsettled. And almost for sure, you get the 05:00 AM wake-up calls. If you know what I’m talking about, and you’ve experienced life with an early riser, like I have.
So how do we solve this? How do we get your little one to take all the sleep they need, so they don’t get overtired on a continual basis? Step one is, knowing those sleep and wakeful windows. This knowledge is true power. It will help you to know when to attempt to put your baby down for a nap and how long to aim for with the sleep.
It’s great to have a backup plan too because they often won’t sleep when or as much as we’d like. So you may need to bring the next nap a little bit earlier or get them to bed a bit earlier to top them up. Step two is, topping up the sleep tank. If you know your little one is already overtired, try some early nights or an extra power nap. If you can replenish the empty sleep tank, you’ll find your little one is better positioned to take better naps and sleep more soundly at night, which will further recover the overtiredness. If you’re experiencing sleep deteriorating for your little one after starting nursery or daycare, it may be because he’s just not getting the sleep he needs while there. I get a lot of messages from parents saying their child is overtired since starting in a childcare setting.
It’s similar to when children start school. The change and the emotional energy to be “brave,” is all extra tiring. In this case, do talk to the childcare provider to see if they can accommodate the sleep needs for your little one. And also make sure they’re getting to bed nice and early after those busy days. If your pickup time is right on top of nap time, consider tweaking your schedule for the short term, so he can get the sleep he needs at nursery, or once at home. Topping up with longer naps at the weekend or on home days will also really help. If your baby is overtired due to naps being very short and not replenishing, you can try working on extending the nap with some soothing back to sleep, rather than just getting your baby up the moment she wakes. Or you could head out for a motion nap in the pram or the car, just to help finish off that broken sleep.
For some, especially parents of two-year-olds who don’t want a nap, but really do need to, it can be such a battle and we just don’t want to fight every day. And we give up on the napping way before the child is ready to drop it. At first, things might seem okay with crash-out sleep at night, but it will catch up with you and before long you’ll experience the early rising at 05:00 AM. So decide which is more painful for you, persisting to get your toddler to take a nap in the day or the early wakings and possible unraveling of night’s sleep.
Avoiding overtiredness is one of the biggest keys to having a well-rested, healthily restored, and happy little one. And the same goes for you too. Until next time, sleep soundly and live with vibrance.
Book a discovery call and find out how we can help you with your little ones sleep.

3 Year Old Sleep Regressions

https://youtu.be/cK6DVFzP3Zw
3 YEAR OLD SLEEP REGRESSION.
A QUESTION FROM A PARENT
Hi.
Our question is, Joe, who will be three shortly? Sometimes he is over tired during the day. Should we reintroduce his daytime nap, which we haven’t had since the beginning of the year or do we bring his bedtime forward? Because it’s very hard to keep him up past seven o’clock.
So yeah, age three can be really tricky because some are ready to stop napping, whereas others still need some sleep in the daytime until they’re closer to four, even four and a half. So if this little one hasn’t been napping for a long time in the day, there probably is some built up over tiredness. But we are now approaching three and there’s a good chance that that nap would be on the way out anyway. So reintroducing it at this stage is probably not the best move. By all means allow catch up sleeps. If he nods off in the day, let him sleep. I wouldn’t disturb him. If you are out and about, he nods off on the go, he needs it. So I would let him have that sleep, but I wouldn’t enforce a nap now if he’s not used to doing one. I absolutely would say, yes, go ahead with the early to bed.
Early nights are going to be key right now because the length of the day is probably a bit too much for him. So if we are not going to get sleep in the middle of the day, then we need to chip a bit off the end of the day and make bedtime earlier. A lot of parents would be fearful of doing an early bedtime because they’re going to worry that going to bed earlier is going to mean waking up earlier the next morning, but it doesn’t work that way. In fact, actually if this little one’s continuing to go to bed too late and is overtired, the night sleep will be worse. So getting to bed earlier is good. Definitely, asleep by 7:00 PM, latest, and if he’s ready to go to sleep even earlier, that will be fine too.
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8 month sleep regression

https://youtu.be/E5Y5qymtlsM
The eight-month sleep regression. If you know me or have followed me for some time, you’ll know that I really don’t like the word regression. Why? Because it’s not really a regression, just because sleep becomes difficult or hindered, doesn’t mean they’re actually regressing.
Your child’s never regressing, they’re moving forward, so they’re actually progressing. Because of their progress and because of the progressions, I’m going to talk about in a minute, it can cause disruption to sleep. Especially if you’re not ahead of the game, and aware of what they need, and what they need you to help them with, then sleep can be hindered during this progressive leap that they’re taking.
So, I really don’t like the word regression, it’s so negative and not really true. Let’s have a look at what’s going on at this age and why we see an impact sometimes on sleep at this age, which gives everyone this phrase about the eight month sleep regression.
First of all, I really want to urge you to not preempt, expect, and look for it. Because actually, you can get so hung up on it that you start to think, oh yeah, that’s what it is, that’s what’s going on. And then you label it, and it’s almost like an excuse. Don’t expect it, don’t preempt it, don’t assume it will hit you. Just take what’s happening, work through it, and don’t read more into it than there really is.
So, what is happening?
Okay. First of all, the daytime sleep is going to be shifting around this time. So, if little one, from sort of six months, has been having three good naps a day and you’ve got into a good nap routine and things are looking good. And then you get this eight-month thing going on, and you’re like, napping is becoming a nightmare. Or maybe you never did get it off to a great start, maybe it’s always been a nightmare.
It’s important to know that eight-month things are starting to shift a bit, their sleep needs in the day are starting to shift a bit. Like I said, if we are not on top of that, and if we are not meeting those needs and accommodating that sleep when it’s needed, you can end up with a repercussion which is disturbed nights, so called regression.
So, being aware of that daytime sleep, how much does your child need? When do they need it? And are you meeting that need for them? They will not automatically just tell you when they need it and nod off to sleep brilliantly as you know by now, so have a look at that.
Now, what’s happening at eight months is that at night, sorry daytime sleep is going to gradually move towards a dropdown to two naps over the next couple of months. So, at eight months you start to see a shift, whatever you do, don’t do an immediate drop.
Don’t go, oh, okay, we were doing three naps, we’ll now do two, that’s it. It’s not that cut and dry, it’s a transition, it takes time. It will usually be over that eight-to-10-month period that this starts to happen, and you might take two steps forward and three steps back, it might be a bit stop and start for a while.
So, take each day as it comes, some days your child might need three naps, some days two, some days two and an early bed or there’s all sorts going on there, and that’s another episode. But have a look at that, also bear in mind that they’re wakeful windows. So that’s the period of time that they can manage to be awake in one stretch, that’s also growing. You may already be overestimating it, many parents do overestimate how long their little one can be awake in one stretch before they need to sleep.
Why do we overestimate it?
Because the little ones give us the impression that they’re fine, and they don’t start yawning and eye rubbing and fussing until they’re already over tired or on the brink of being overtired. So don’t wait for those signs, don’t wait for that before you put your child down. Just because a child appears to be fine or a baby appears to be fine and not in need of a sleep yet, doesn’t mean it’s true. And as I say, you need one eye on the baby and one eye on the time, and then you’ll probably hit it just right, and find that magic window where settling is a lot easier for them. So, their wakeful window will begin to stretch, the amount of sleep they need in the day it’s not so much that it’s going to come down rapidly, but it’s going to shift in how it’s spaced out. So instead of three naps, they’ll start to move towards two. But those two will be longer quite a bit more solid, stable naps, rather than perhaps having the sort of a cat nap or shorter ones.
Things are on the shift and that is what’s going to affect the night’s sleep, if you’re not meeting those daytime sleep needs. If your child is tired from lack of day sleep, or maybe they’re getting enough, but it’s in one chunk or there’s a period where they’re a wait too long, anything like that will impact the night’s sleep, which is why people think they get a regression. The next thing I want to share with you is that habits are sticking, where before six months if you were doing something, you could slightly shift that habit, steer that into a new direction. Things now are starting to stick and become more of a thing.
For instance, a dummy that you may have been able to get rid of before, they’re going to become a lot clingier to it now. They’re going to become a lot more reliant on these things that are habits, because they’re becoming more aware, why is that? Developing little personalities and starting to hang onto things that they get used to that give them comfort.
If those things are good, conducive comforters, brilliant, great, carry on there’s no problem there. A little lovey, cuddly, teddy, silly things, something like that, that they have control of that’s absolutely fine. But if it’s something that you know is not really a good, sustainable, useful thing, and they’re clinging onto it, then you really want to start thinking about getting rid of that, moving onto something else that actually you can use for the long term. Habits are starting to stick, make sure they are good ones. Other things that are in their sort of habits thing that you want to stick, the good ones are things like having a really nice bedtime routine. Having those steps you do in the lead up to bedtime, those same steps in the same order, every single night. Habits like having a settling process at bedtime, so the things you do, you’ve got your routine and then it’s night night, and then you put your baby down. The way you say goodnight, and put your baby down, that’s a habit and that it’s a good one, you want to have a good one there.
So they aren’t being put down already asleep, and they are practicing putting themselves to sleep maybe with your assistance, and that’s fine, that’s okay. But have something that you are doing that’s getting them on the right path, and it’s a good habit. Your night response, so when your baby wakes in the night, make sure that you know what the response looks like. That you don’t go in with something different every time, one minute it’s a feed, the next minute is a cuddle. And you refuse to feed, and the next minute you go in and do a full-on circle show, and this happens. Make sure you know what your night response looks like. It might be that, oh, okay. Well, at this point I go in and I feed, but the other wake ups I go in and I give a cuddle, a pattern of reassuring, sh sh sh, or whatever it looks like for you.
But makes sure you know what that is, and that you, the other caregivers in your child’s life, whoever goes to the baby gets the same thing every time, and that’s so important.
Not only so for their learning and for their development them and for their ability to go back to sleep, and also it’s kinder. It’s kinder, so they know what to expect, and they’re not confused and going, well, last time you did this, and oh, I want that. If you are consistent they know where they stand, which is actually kinder on them. But also for their security, it gives them a real sense of security knowing where they stand, and knowing what to expect. Knowing that they’re going to get that steady hand from you, they’re going to get a consistent, steady response. They might not always like it, wait till your children are older. They might not always like what you tell them, but if they can rely on you to always be consistent with your response, and not float and waiver in the wind with your response. There’s they might not like it, but they’ll certainly feel safe and secure, which is really important for their secure attachment and that general security.
And so the third thing I want to share with you is that at this age, around this eight month period, another thing that can impact things is their awareness for where they are and where they’re not, or where you are and where you are not is also really coming together. So they start to know when you are there, when you’re not there, when you are in the room, when you leave the room. They’re becoming a more aware of this, and this is why, again, at this age, you can see a bit of clinginess like, well, wait, don’t go stay with me. And that’s all very natural, it’s all fine, and sometimes the slightest sign of a baby uttering any kind of just happiness or unhappiness with you leaving the room, people think, oh my gosh, separation anxiety. Anxiety is a strong word, I think. Perhaps, no, just getting used to something more curious, more aware, doesn’t immediately mean separation anxiety, that sounds so strong. So let’s not label all these things so harshly, come on. Your baby is going to become more aware of when you’re there, when you’re not there.
You want to give them that room to explore, to crawl over in a baby group and interact with another child. When they look over their shoulder they can see you’re still there, they know you’re still close by, you don’t just disappear. It’s really healthy exploration that you want to encourage, and that reassurance that it’s okay, I’m still here. And okay, I go, I come back. I go, I come back. You can even play little games like this with them on the floor, but knowing that they have that heightened awareness, they’re a lot more aware of what’s going on around them at this stage as well. So lots is going on, they’re developing, they’re progressing. Because of all these developments, if we are not moving with them, and if we are not keeping up with that, and we’re trying to keep them on the schedule they were on, or the napping they were doing, or the whatever before then they end up tired. They end up out of source, they end up not really knowing what’s going on and where they stand.
And then you get disturbed night’s sleep, and we start to then thinking that there’s some kind of regression, it’s really not a regression at all. I hope this helps you, at this eight month stage, it can be really challenging. Just know that actually, even though right now, it feels like it’s your life, it’s not. In a matter of weeks, it’s all going to change again. So try and just keep up with what your baby needs from you right now, and it will all be fine. If you know other moms or the dads, or the parents, caregivers who are at this stage with their little ones, please share this with them. You never know, there may be just one little nugget in here that just changes everything for them, and we want to have up as many parents navigate this whole thing as smoothly as possible. Okay. Subscribe to the YouTube channel, you’ll get updates on when we release new episodes. Do have a look for the link that will take you to a nice freebie that you can download, you can print, that will help you on this topic.
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4 Month Sleep Regression

https://youtu.be/5Pn_i4INQXs
The four-month sleep regression. Is it real?
Well, this is tricky because yes, there are some things that go on in four and five months old, and it can often be seen or feel like there's a regression. But I want to give you some thought points today. Things to think about that will help you maneuver your way through this phase with more ease, because having a good understanding of it will definitely help you with this.
The first one is, I really like to think of these things as a progression, not a regression. So maybe you can re-look at this as the four-month progression. What's really happening is your child is progressing. Your baby is developing physically and mentally at a rapid, rapid rate. And in that fourth and fifth month, there's a huge amount of developmental growth. So really it's all about progress. They're not going backwards.
And it might feel like sleep goes backwards, which is why people call this a sleep regression. But, actually there's nothing going wrong with their sleep. They just have different needs at this kind of age. Why? Because sleep's taking shape, things are changing.
The second thing I want you to think about on this exact topic right now is the old tricks. The old tricks stop working.
So for instance, if ... And this might not happen at four months, this might not happen until later, but for lots of babies, it does happen at this stage. If you have been rocking your baby to sleep, but suddenly it's not working so well, or you're trying but then they're waking up, or feeding to sleep, or pacing them to sleep, whatever it may be, a trick, a thing, a little technique that you were using that worked to get your baby to sleep, or to get them back to sleep in the night when they wake, perhaps is not as effective now.
And you think, "Oh, it's a sleep regression. But actually, it isn't. It's just that your baby is wise to it. And it was kind of just masking and doing the job for them until they were ready to learn. And now your baby's going, "Yeah, this isn't going to cut it anymore." And it's a sign that they're ready to learn a bit more.
They're ready, to develop some better sleep skills and start doing a little bit more of that sleep stuff. And not have you do it all for them.
So, the old tricks might stop working. That was my second point there.
The third thing is naps become a bit more organized around this stage. They start to fall into better rhythms. So up until now, naps have probably been quite haphazard, snapped and grab, short and often, and not really very predictable. And that's very normal for the first few months, but you're coming into a stage now where they may be taking better shape.
They're a bit more structured. Your baby is managing to be awake for a chunk of time and then needs to sleep, and then awake for a chunk of time and needs to sleep. And it's much more rhythmic and patterned and structured. You could be there already, or maybe you are not there, but the fact that your baby's sleep might be looking like it's regressing at nighttime is possibly because they are looking for that structure.
Your baby's ready for a bit more rhythmicity and structure to those naps and wants you to help accommodate that so that they are getting enough. And then they're able to sleep better at nighttime. So, it could be to do with that.
And then the fourth point that I want you to think about is the bedtime routine. It really is key. Bedtime routine is key at this stage because again, if you haven't had one ... If you have one in place, amazing. And keep that going.
But if you haven't got one in place, it's absolutely important. So it’s imperative that you do this now, having those same steps in the same order every evening,

Sleep Regressions

https://youtu.be/E5Y5qymtlsM
Babies and sleep regressions, the four-month sleep regression, the eight-month sleep regression, the 18-month sleep regression. How many are there? Are you wondering what to look out for with a sleep regression or how to get through one? What if I told you there was no such thing as a regression with sleep? I'll explain it all here read on and stand by to conquer sleep regressions once and for all.
So, you'll hear the term “sleep regressions” batted around the parenting world. What it basically means is that a little one's sleep has got worse than it was. Things seem to have slipped backwards and thus the term regression. However, the sleep not being as good as it was, is the effect of the problem not the cause. The cause is your little one has reached a developmental milestone. They leaped forward in some way. Maybe in brain development or physically, even emotionally or socially. In some way, they have grown and developed, and I'd actually say progressed. As your little one makes this kind of progress with their development inevitably, their sleep needs change too.
Of course, we don't need to nap like a newborn our whole lives, do we? And as your baby grows, his or her stamina increases. They're able to be awake for longer but still need to get the right amount of sleep at the right intervals. It's constantly changing as they grow.
The reason this progress causes a worsening effect with sleep sometimes, is because we rarely know what to do to accommodate our growing baby. No one tells us how much we need to increase their wakeful window by each month, or how long they ought to be sleeping for, and how many times per day and even if they did. There are so many nuances to consider with each individual baby including their little character traits which can deceive us. They don't always tell us what they need in terms of sleep and we need to be in the know if we're going to help them to get the sleep they need.
Don't worry. You're not supposed to know everything. You can't be an expert at everything. Otherwise, let's face it, we wouldn't have doctors and midwives or teachers or dentists. If we knew the answers and were the expert at everything for our children, then we wouldn't need any of these professionals.
Sleep is a highly specialized subject. It's complex. The solution for one is totally different to the solution for another. Much like dental care. So don't beat yourself up if you feel stuck or feel like nothing you try seems to work. You're not alone. In fact, you are in the majority. Most parents don't know how to help their children to sleep better.
So how do you navigate these, so called regressions? Firstly, spot the progression. This is why they're linked to such milestone ages like four-months, eight-months and 18-months. You'll probably find a regression for any age if you search. But all it means is your little one is progressing in some way, and they need you to help shift their sleep pattern in line with where they are now. All you need to do to get through a sleep progression is to check in on how much sleep your little one ought to be getting and at what sort of intervals.
And if you struggle to get them to fit that rhythm or they're already a bit overtired, then you need to start by working on some topping up to replenish the sleep tank until they're good on the ideal sleep pattern for their developmental stage.
Sometimes a few small adjustments are all it takes. Other times, it can be more challenging to spot exactly what needs to be adjusted. And that's why having a pair of outside expert eyes on things can make the world of difference.
We'd love to hear from you about the tricky patches you've gone through or find yourself stuck in right now. Can you see how it's a developmental leap forwards that's causing the sleep to slip backwa...

Will My Baby Cry When Sleep Training?

https://youtu.be/X_graL8vCkE
Hey there, friends and fellow parents. Welcome back to my blog. It's the number one place to be for all things baby and child sleep. I'm going to be talking about the topic of crying and sleep training. And make sure you stick around to the end because I'll be revealing the biggest myth on this topic of crying and sleep training.
Let's dive in and talk about this - CRYING. Babies cry, humans cry. We all cry at times. And that's okay. We're allowed to cry. But what does it mean and how does it relate to sleep training? We hear from lots of parents who really want to help their baby or young child to sleep better, but their number one fear is - I can't handle any crying. I get it. Oh my goodness, I'm the world's worst. If one of my children cried when they were babies, I remember in the car, if they were crying I would feel so stressed. My stress levels would go up here. I'd be like, I've got to make it stop. I've got to make it stop.
Actually that's how we're wired. Especially as mothers, mother nature wired us this way to respond to the needs of our young. It's quite natural for us to feel a little bit flustered and like we've got to fix it when our babies cry. However, if we know what it actually means, and if we know what the crying is actually about, it's far less stressful and you can be more calm. After all, crying is a form of communication. It's a form of communicating a need of some sort and to get a response. That's why babies cry. Otherwise, they just wouldn't do it. Like in the sad story of the orphanage analogy where the babies cry and nobody comes, so eventually they learn not to cry anymore because there's no one coming. That's a really sad concept and actually, that's the definition of cry it out. No one comes, eventually you learn not to cry anymore.
This is not what sleep training is because sleep training, or coaching, is actually a form of parenting. It's a parenting approach to helping a child sleep better. That's all it is. Now, when you teach your child anything, you don't just expect them to do it or ignore them until they figure it out. You don't ignore them until they figure out how to use the potty. You don't ignore them until they figure out how to read or ride a bike. You help them and you show them the way, because that's what parenting is. It's guidance, it's support, it's demonstrating, it's supporting them as they learn something. It's no different to sleep. So cry it out is ignorance. It's ignoring. It's non-responsive. Everything that we teach and any sleep coach or consultant that I would ever support will teach you a responsive approach.
Now, I don't care how it gets dressed up. Some people will dress it up as sleep training and others will say that sleep training is bad but you need to do this holistic thing. It's all the same. If you are consciously and actively choosing how to help your little one go to sleep. Call it what you like. But if it's responsive, as in, if you are not ignoring your little one, but you've found the right way to respond to them for them, the unique individual, because it's different for every baby and child. What works for one won't work for another. If you've found the way to respond to your little one in a way that's conducive to helping them to sleep better, to take longer stretches and to develop at the rate that's just right for them at their age and their developmental stage as well, then you are effectively coaching them or training them. You are helping them with their sleep.
You're responding. You're not ignoring them. And if they cry, that's fine. What do they mean? What do they need? How do we address that in the right way? So when people say, but will my baby cry? Will my baby cry, because I just can't handle any crying. Does your baby cry now? I hope so, because that's completely normal. It's natural.

When To Start Sleep Training

https://youtu.be/wKd0s-EyqEI
When should you start sleep training? What a great question. And it's one people ask a lot because they worry that it might be too soon, or it might be too late and when is the best time?
First of all, it's never too early and it's never too late. Starting on the early side, it can never be too early. You can prepare to learn and understand about little one's sleep and about newborn baby sleep before you even have the baby. You don't need to implement anything, but just by learning and understanding it, you can get really prepared for the routine and the rhythm and the atmosphere and the environment. And actually then when your baby arrives, you can get them off to a really great start with their sleep. So that's how early you can begin. Now, if they're in the newborn stage, baby has arrived and you want to start working on sleep, it's going to just be very little subtle practices at that stage. Routine, creating rhythmicity for them, helping them to distinguish night from day and just some subtle rhythms. That's all you're looking at, rhythms, cues and little practices.
You're not expecting a newborn baby to sleep through the night by any means, they're going to wake and they're going to wake regularly because they're going to need to for feeding purposes as a newborn. But those little practices and those cues you can set up, those triggers and environmental factors will all help to shape your new baby's sleep as they grow and develop. So you can get started with basic shaping techniques right from the beginning.
Once they move on beyond 18 weeks and they start to regulate more day and night, and they are into a bit more of a rhythm, a bit more routine, and you are starting to spot... We've got naps and wakeful times, and it's becoming a bit more rhythmic. That's a really good time to look at working on the sleep a bit more, or as some would say, to start sleep training.
And so the optimum time I would recommend sleep training would be somewhere between four and six months. Why? Because they're ready and they're able, but they're also still really, really malleable. So any sleep onset associations, that's things that help them get to sleep can be shifted, moved, evolved, changed without it being too much of a big deal. If it's been there a long time, it can be very ingrained and harder to shift. But at four to six months, we can start to look at which of these associations are positive and helpful ones, which are maybe not so helpful and not so conducive to good sleep. And we can then just fine tune those really, really well. So between four and six months is absolutely great. That's when I would say it is the optimal time.
What if they're older though? Well, first of all, once they go beyond six months, those onset associations, any habits and routines, they start to embed a bit more and little ones will start to become more aware. So they're aware if it's not there, they're aware if it is there. They're more inclined to get frustrated if the thing they're expecting doesn't happen. They just get more set in their ways, slowly as time goes on.
Then you get to stubborn toddlers who know exactly what they want, and they are willing to hold out as long as it takes, which can be a challenging stage too. That's not to say it's too difficult. That's not to say it's too late. It just requires a different strategy and we need to look at what is going on with the little one's sleep. Are they really overtired? Are they not getting enough sleep in the day? Is bedtime a regular time? Or does it move around all the time? And what are the patterns looking like? Are they ideal? Are they optimal for the best sleep for this little one at that age?
And do they have any unhelpful associations with falling asleep that aren't actually helping them to prolong their sleep or have stretches?