Dreamtime

Sleepin’ like a baby” – how many babies do? Mark Stephenson examines some of the options to get a good nights sleep out of babies and young children.

For parents with babies and young children, especially in the first year of life. Lack of sleep causes scratchiness, temper tantrums, bad behaviour, slower thinking, lack of energy and disrespect for our elders and betters.

And the children are just as bad!

Newborns have an irregular sleep pattern but most babies are able to learn to sleep through the night. It varies by what age they can do this. However, normal infants and toddlers wake, or are in very light sleep, every couple of hours.

Even older children and adults tend to have an initial deep sleep, followed by variable sleep during which they often wake, albeit briefly. What they don’t do, is go and bother the neighbours about it!

There is no right way to put your child to bed.

If you mutter, ‘See ya later, kid’, switch off the light and walk off, your child sleeps through every night, and is happy and healthy – then fine.

If you read to them for 2 hours, kiss every one of the 90 teddies goodnight and tap dance to the Marseillaise till they sleep, and you enjoy this and it works – then there is no problem.

There will always be times when sleep is interrupted by illness or bogeymen. There are also developmental stages at which babies and children feel more insecure. As parents we have to accept this. Babies under six month almost always cry for a reason and this need to be attended to. It’s nature’s way of getting your attention.

However, if your toddler’s bedtime is later than yours, and you can’t remember when you last spoke to your partner, and not sleeping has become a pattern of behaviour, then it is time to act.

Here is a way to get sleeping back on track:

Step 1:

Talk about it with your partner. If you parent alone, try your own parents, brothers or sisters with children, friends with children (don’t bother with friends without children, they won’t understand).

You’re not alone. Don’t waste time blaming anybody, least of all yourself. Make a plan.

Step 2:

Develop a bedtime routine. Children love routines. It gives them a sense of security and control.

Be consistent.

All the normal things you do – last feed or snack, bath-time, quiet play-time, reading them a story, whatever – all lead to the child falling asleep, on their own, in their cot or bed.

Do it in the same order and spend the time with them. The fun and attention occurs before sleep time, not after. You decide the time.

Many people use a special toy, or cuddly blanket as a ‘transitional object’. If the child wakes again, they still have the toy on hand which they associate with going to sleep.

If you are the transitional object, however, they will call for you at 1am, 3 am, whenever they damn well feel like it. They may want to sleep, but they’ve learnt that they need you to do so.

Likewise the child that goes to sleep with a bottle – they can’t get back to sleep without it (also it’s bad for the teeth and ears). If someone took your pillow away in the night, and you woke up, you would probably go looking for it too.

Whatever the child associates with sleep, including tantrums, is what they come to expect, or even need. Children are sponges, they learn from what you do. (They generally have little regard for what you say).

The earlier a routine is established, the stronger it will be. Some people don’t like routines. They argue that having established a routine, then you are stuck with it.

Sure, but in general, what you accept today is what you will live with. So be sure the routines (or lack of) you do accept, are acceptable to you.

Step 3:

The progressive approach (after Richard Ferber). Now comes the hard part. The more established the pattern of not sleeping, the harder it will be.

The idea is to allow the child to cry for a short time before you go in to reassure them. The time you wait is progressively increased.

When you go in, you speak to them, pat them, but don’t pick them up or rock them. The child learns that you are still there for them, but it is time for sleeping, not playing.

On the first night you wait 5 mins the first time, then 10 mins the second time, then 15 mins each time after that. If they wake in the night, you go through the same process.

On the second night, you let them cry for 10 mins before going in to them. Then you increase it by 5 mins each time, up to 20 mins.

The third night you wait 15 mins initially, then increase by 5 mins each time up to 25 mins.

This incremental waiting goes up to 25 mins on the fifth night for the first wait, extending it out to 35 mins for subsequent waits.

Most children improve in a few days and can learn to go to sleep on their own in 1 to 2 weeks.

Your child will learn that their pre-bedtime routine is rewarding but that crying for attention after that is not worth the effort. A new pattern is established, easier on everyone.

Another way is to go ‘cold turkey’, and let them cry till they sleep from exhaustion. Not many of us are brave enough for that. Clearly, few would try this method unless they were already having a real problem. As always, prevention is better than cure.

Next: Diary Of A Homebirth