Being a parent means spending most of the time trying to calm down a crying baby! Many parents feel exhausted by their child random sleeping, waking, eating schedule. It is perfectly normal because the first three, four months, the baby is trying to adapt to life outside the womb.
Sleeping Schedules for Baby
So, here are some bits of advice for new parents having trouble to schedule sleep time for their toddler.
Changing Baby Sleep Schedule
If your baby trend to sleep early, and wake up early (sleep at 7 or 8, and wakes up at 3 or 4) you can change its sleep schedule and get him to sleep later.
First, you should know that the average time of sleep for a 9 month years old baby is 14 hours, so you can’t make your baby sleep more.
What you can do instead is cutting a bit on his nap, and put him to bed later than usual. If it doesn’t work, adapt your sleep schedule to his, take a nap with him during the day, and try to go to bed earlier.
Start and Keep a Routine for the Baby
A baby schedule is unique, some babies need to sleep 17 hours a day, for others 14 hours is sufficient. However, a sleep routine for the baby can only be implemented after 4 or 6 months.
For newborns, it is best that naps and feedings are on demand. Nevertheless, developing some routines will set the groundwork for establishing a schedule later on.
If you want to implement a routine, you should delay, even just for a few minutes, sleeping and eating time. For example, you can feed your baby when she is giving you signals that she is hungry.
If you do this at each feeding, she is likely to eat a little more each time and will be able to wait longer between meals. The same rule is applying to sleep time.
Steps to Sleep Training Success
The sleep training is a sum up of what we have said before: it helps you eliminate your baby nighttime walking.
- Set the scene: The right environment is very important when it comes to sleep training. Keep the room cool and comfortable, and if your baby’s room gets a lot of light, install room-darkening shades, so that she will be able to have longer naps during the days, and less early wake-ups. You might also buy a night lamp to help her sleep at night.
- Put baby down awake: even if your baby is still awake, put him on the crib. Expect some tears, especially if she is used to falling asleep in your arms. For the first three nights, sit next to the crip and of she becomes hysterical you can pick her up but put her back as soon as she calms down.
- Move a chair: every night when you put her to her crib. Use the same calming techniques with her every night and move the chair progressively farther from the crib every third night until you’re outside her room and out of view. It’s important to keep moving. If you stay in one spot for more than a few days, your baby will get used to have you in the room with him every night.
There are no easy ways to make your baby sleep at night, we can’t ensure that these methods will work, it will also depend on your baby’s temper! We wish you good luck
