When will my baby sleep through the night?

 

Here’s my top 5 pointers to get you there!

1st April 2023

 

This month i will be celebrating my 10 year wedding anniversary.  10 years!!!!  When i reflect back over that time, we’ve been through so much; including becoming first-time-parents to twins plus another baby 4 years later!  Its been a real roller coaster and not a life i could have predicted when i walked down that aisle and said “i do” 10 years ago...

 

So how will i be celebrating?  We’ll have a fairly low-key meal out at a restaurant whilst my friend baby sits.  To some this may seem a bit tame, but there are others of you to whom this sounds like a luxury! A far off pipe dream that perhaps you feel you’ll not experience for years to come...

 

There was a time, when the twins were babies, that i was one of those people.  It used to be a joint effort to get the twins to sleep and we would pace up and down the stairs for most of our evening resettling one or both again and again. And that would carry on into the early hours of the night.  Oh it brings me out in a cold sweat when i remember it!

 

So i understand if you’re not yet at that point of being able to have an evening to yourself.  I know that fear of what the night will bring.  The longing for an unbroken evening; where you could leave the house without fear of them waking and you needing to return.

 

How did i get from that point to where i am now?  

A LOT OF WORK. A LOT OF PATIENCE AND CONSISTENCY.

 

But actually there’s more at play when it comes to your baby sleeping through the night. 

 

Here are my top 5 pointers for you:

 

1. Understand what is appropriate and manage your expectations. 

- If your baby is under a year old, they may well still need at least 1 milk feed overnight. 

- If they are ill, teething or learning new skills, sleep will be temporarily disrupted and you probably wont get results during that period.

- If they are relying on you to help them to sleep, they may not have the skills to go to sleep independently and stay asleep.  You may need to address this.
 

2. Get the foundations right

If you haven’t given your baby the right conditions for sleep, its a much harder job for them to sleep well. This includes

- Environment

- Routine

- Schedule

- Consistent approach

- Feeding / nutrition

3. Be committed

When you decide to work on sleep you have to be in the right headspace to commit to it.  You may WANT the changes, but if you’re not READY to make those changes (and for the WORK you need to put in) it just isn’t going to happen.  Do the research, decide upon the changes you are going to make, and throw yourself into it 100%.

 

4. Get support

I don’t mean necessarily from a sleep coach like myself (although of course i am here for you if you need me). Get support from your friends, relatives, loved ones.  It’s really easy to doubt yourself and not know whether you are doing the right thing. Your confidence and self esteem can waiver and can throw you off track. Talk to people you can trust about what you are doing and get their support.  Share the burden or even just have somewhere to vent - it will make a huge difference.

 

5. Give it time

If you make changes to your infant’s sleep, it can take time to take effect.  It can be so tempting to try something, not see immediate results (or even see worse results!) and then stop and move on.  It can take 4 or 5 days of consistent effort to see true results materialise before deciding whether your approach is working or not.  Think of it like clearing out an old draw (i know i know, bear with me on this) - you take it all out and it makes a big mess. You throw away what you dont want and you put everything back neatly.  The draw is now tidy and better than before.  See what i’m getting at?  It gets messy before it gets better!  Sleep can get worse before it improves when you’re making changes!  Give it time to work.

 

I hope you’ve found these pointers useful.  In answer to the question “When will my baby sleep through the night?” you can see its a multi-layered answer with lots of considerations!  Sleep is never simple!  If you need help navigating your way to your goals, book in a discovery call with me and we can chat about how i can get you there!